NM Statute Limiting Secondary Mental Impairments to Maximum Allowable Duration of Benefits for Original Physical Impairment Violates Equal Protection

Opinion Mondays: "The First Shall Be First, and the Last Shall Remain Last"

COVID-19 Legislation Continues to Follow Discriminatory Practices The workers’ compensation coronavirus legislation recently passed in Wisconsin and Utah continues to follow the predictable pattern of discriminating against many who face...

West Virginia Statute Barring Comp Benefits for Many—But Not All—Work Release Inmates is Constitutional

A provision in the West Virginia Workers’ Compensation Act [W. Va. Code § 23–4–1e(b)] that prohibits an inmate housed at a state work release center from receiving workers’ compensation benefits...

The Year of Equal Justice and Due Process

High Courts in Several States Strike Down Legislative Challenges to the Heart of the Workers’ Compensation System As we put together last year’s edition of the Workers’ Compensation Emerging Issues Analysis...

Oklahoma Supreme Court Strikes Down State’s Opt Out Law

Earlier today (September 13, 2016), in Vasquez v. Dillard’s, Inc., 2016 OK 89, in a 7–2 decision, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma, in one of the most important workers’ compensation...

Does Torres Signal How OK High Court Will Decide Constitutionality of Opt Out?

As I reported on Wednesday, in Torres v. Seaboard Foods, LLC, the Supreme Court of Oklahoma struck down a provision in the state’s workers’ compensation law that disqualifies a claimant...

California Court: Leasing Employers and Temporary Service Employers May Not Self-Insure

Earlier this month, a California appellate court struck down a challenge by two staffing companies that had sued the state, alleging that Cal. Lab. Code § 3701.9, added in 2012...

Colorado Employer and Carrier Need Not Disclose if They Made Gifts to State Comp Judges

A Colorado workers’ compensation insurer and an employer’s counsel need not respond to a discovery request made by a workers’ compensation claimant that they disclose whether any of them had...

Alaska: Same-Sex Partner of Deceased Worker Entitled to Death Benefits In Spite of State’s “Marriage Amendment”

On Friday, the Supreme Court of Alaska, in Harris v. Millennium Hotel, 2014 Alas. LEXIS 149 (July 25, 2014), held that the state’s workers’ compensation death benefits statute, Alaska Stat....

Montana’s Hutterite Colony Seeks Review by U.S. Supreme Court of Decision Requiring it to Provide Workers’ Compensation Coverage for Colony’s Workers

On April 1, the Hutterite Colony, a small religious sect in Montana, asked the United States Supreme Court to review and overturn a decision by the Supreme Court of Montana...

Divided Supreme Court of Montana Says Statute Defining Religious Order as Employer (For Workers’ Compensation Purposes) is Not Unconstitutional

On the last day of 2012, and in a split decision, the Supreme Court of Montana reversed a trial court’s summary judgment decision that had earlier determined that the requirement...