{"id":4428,"date":"2018-01-16T17:09:36","date_gmt":"2018-01-16T21:09:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/?p=4428"},"modified":"2018-01-16T17:10:42","modified_gmt":"2018-01-16T21:10:42","slug":"recent-north-carolina-workers-compensation-legal-cases","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/recent-north-carolina-workers-compensation-legal-cases\/","title":{"rendered":"Recent North Carolina Workers\u2019 Compensation Legal Cases"},"content":{"rendered":"

North Carolina Workers\u2019 Compensation<\/a> Lawyers keep abreast of recent legal decisions. Understanding how cases of other workers are decided helps a good lawyer prepare your case. If there are similar issues, an understanding of the legal decision indicates which arguments and what kinds of evidence a Deputy Commissioner will consider and which arguments and evidence types will not be persuasive. Experienced work injury lawyers regularly review the latest decisions and research them when an issue in your type of case is not clear.<\/span><\/p>\n

A couple of recent cases in North Carolina:<\/span><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Injury In the Course of\/Arising out of Employment.<\/b> Holliday v. Tropical Nut & Fruit Co,<\/span> 775 S.E. 2d 885 (N.C. App. 2015) In this case, the employee was a sales rep for an employer. The Employer decided to hold a sales and marketing conference where a variety of business issues (such as new products and new strategies) were discussed. Employees received awards for good performance for the past year.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    The claimant\/employee was required to attend the three-day conference, could not bring family members, and was paid his regular salary for attending. The employer created networking and social events that employees were also required to attend. One such event was a laser tag event. The employee felt pain in his right knee while participating in the laser tag event. He sought treatment, after the conference was over, for the right knee. The treatment ultimately required that his right knee be replaced because he suffered a torn meniscus and severe cartilage loss. Mr. Holliday filed a <\/span>Form 18<\/span><\/a> , but the employer denied the claim. A hearing was held, and the North Carolina Deputy Commissioner approved the employees claim, including the medical treatment and temporary total disability payments.<\/span><\/p>\n

    The employer appealed the Deputy Commissioner\u2019s decision claiming that:<\/span><\/p>\n

      \n
    1. The injury did not happen during work, during employment.<\/span><\/li>\n
    2. There was no precise time or moment that the injury occurred so the injury does not meet the workers\u2019 compensation requirement that a specific accident caused the injury. <\/span><\/li>\n
    3. No evidence of work restrictions was presented after the knee replacement took place.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The employer appealed to the Full Commission, which upheld the Deputy Commissioner\u2019s decision granting benefits. The employer then appealed to the North Carolina Court of Appeals. <\/span><\/p>\n

      The NC Appellate Court denied all three appeal issues based on the following reasoning:<\/span><\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Participation in the laser tag event was supposedly technically not required by the employer, but the employer paid for the event, the employer controlled the event including taking attendance, and the event served a business purpose \u2013 allowing the employees a chance to network with each other and with their managers from other regional offices in a friendly way. Furthermore, the employee was paid his regular salary for the events and was not permitted to bring his family with him. It was a \u201cteam-building\u201d exercise. Each employee was assigned to a specific group by the employer\u2014either the laser tag or bowling. <\/span><\/li>\n
      2. The appellate court noted that laser tag was not part of the employee\u2019s normal job activities. Accordingly, since he was hurt in an unusual way, outside of his normal work duties, this satisfied the requirement that he had suffered an \u201c<\/span>injury by accident<\/span><\/a>\u201d since it had occurred due to an interruption of his normal work activities, which usually involved a desk job. The employee was not required to provide the exact motion or time that the tear to the meniscus occurred. It is sufficient that the employee confirmed he injured his knee about 15 minutes into the laser tag game. <\/span><\/li>\n
      3. The appellate court found that the employee\u2019s surgeon r testified in deposition as to his recovery timeline for workers in a similar situation (having just undergone knee replacement therapy). That testimony was enough to convince a Commissioner and the appellate court that the employee could not work at any capacity for at least several months after the knee replacement surgery.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        It can thus be seen that under NC workers compensation law, there are sometimes circumstances where employees can be injured during so-called \u201ccompany events\u201d that will be deemed compensable by the Industrial Commission, assuming that the employer requires that the employee attend and that the event serves some business purpose. It is not necessary that the activity which injures the plaintiff fit the plaintiff\u2019s job description, and in fact, it is helpful when it doesn\u2019t. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

          \n
        1. Injury by Accident-Unusual Circumstances Required. <\/b>Barnette v. Lowe\u2019s Ctrs, Inc<\/span>. 785 S.E. 2d 161 (N.C. App., 2016)<\/span> In this case, the employee and another worker were sent to a beach home to install a refrigerator on the third floor. The employee testified at the workers\u2019 compensation hearing that the stairs were narrower than those in other homes making the delivery much more difficult. Once the workers got about two thirds up the stairwell, they discovered that the the refrigerator wouldn\u2019t fit and that it had to be taken back down. While taking the refrigerator down, the employee lost feeling in his right forearm and hand. The feeling did return about a half-hour later. <\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

          Unlike the Deputy Commissioner and Full Commission, the appellate court did find that the injury was caused by an accident and found there was insufficient evidence to say it was not so caused. They reversed the lower decisions and remanded for consideration of Mr. Barnette\u2019s benefits. An accidental cause of injury is \u201cinferred where the <\/span>work routine is interrupted<\/b> and the introduction of <\/span>unusual conditions <\/b>is likely to result in unexpected consequences.\u201d The appellate court found that this inference carried extra weight when it is clear that employee had to do something physically unusual \u2013 which was the case here since the stairway was too narrow and they had to return back down the stairwell, unable to make the final turn to the kitchen, which was on the 3<\/span>rd<\/span> floor of the beach cottage. <\/span><\/p>\n

          The bottom line is that the appellate court did find that the employee did suffer a work-related injury and was entitled to worker\u2019s compensation benefits. The key is that the worker was not just doing his or her usual routine and felt an injury. In North Carolina, there must be something out of the ordinary or unusual that is likely to result in unexpected consequences. Otherwise, there is no case. <\/span><\/p>\n

          Contrast this with Virginia, where the focus is more on <\/span>risk of employment<\/span><\/a>. \u00a0In Virginia, you would not need the unusual occurrence of the narrow stairway to prove an accident. The risk of injury from carrying a very heavy refrigerator would likely be enough. So this is a good example of where North Carolina\u2019s law as to proving a compensable injury by accident are slightly more strict than Virginia. <\/span><\/p>\n

          Speak with a respected North Carolina and Virginia workers\u2019 compensation attorney now<\/b><\/h4>\n

          Attorney Joe Miller Esq. keeps current with the latest legal developments. He understands the arguments defense lawyers and what evidence workers\u2019 compensation lawyers find persuasive. He has helped thousands of injured victims get justice.<\/span><\/p>\n

          For a caring representative, please phone Joe Miller Esq. at <\/span>(888) 694-1671<\/b>. You can also contact him through his <\/span>contact form<\/span><\/a> or by email.<\/span><\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

          North Carolina Workers\u2019 Compensation Lawyers keep abreast of recent legal decisions. Understanding how cases of other workers are decided helps a good lawyer prepare your case. If there are similar issues, an understanding of the legal decision indicates which arguments and what kinds of evidence a Deputy Commissioner will consider and which arguments and evidence … <\/p>\n

          Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[96,95],"tags":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Joe Miller","author_link":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/author\/jmiller\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"North Carolina Workers\u2019 Compensation Lawyers keep abreast of recent legal decisions. Understanding how cases of other workers are decided helps a good lawyer prepare your case. If there are similar issues, an understanding of the legal decision indicates which arguments and what kinds of evidence a Deputy Commissioner will consider and which arguments and evidence…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4428"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4428\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joemillerinjurylaw.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

          The employee filed a <\/span>Form 18<\/span><\/a> about four months after the accident, which the employer\/defendants denied. The Deputy Commissioner and on Appeal, the Full Commission denied the employee\u2019s claim because he failed to demonstrate that he suffered an injury by accident. \u00a0The employee appealed from those decisions to the Court of Appeals of NC. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n