Karen Harris v. Russell Petroleum Corporation:

On August 6, 2010 the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals set out the standard of proof when dealing with the medical cause of successive injuries in workers’ compensation.

The wife of a deceased fuel-delivery truck driver sued the employer claiming that her husband’s death was compensable under the Alabama Workers’ Compensation Act. The employee had worked for the employer for almost thirty years. During his employment, he had two work related accidents for which he received workers’ compensation benefits. In 2001, the employee injured his right knee and in 2002, he injured his left knee. Both of these accidents required surgical intervention at the time of the accident. In 2008, the employee underwent bilateral knee replacement surgery. One day after the surgery, the employee suffered a stroke, which resulted in his death.

The wife claimed that the cumulative stress of performing the employee’s job duties had caused the employee to need the knee replacement surgery and that the surgery had, in turn, caused the employee’s stroke. The trial court relied on the testimony of the orthopedic doctor who treated the employee as well as, a board certified neurologist in determinating whether or not the knee surgery had indeed been the cause of the stroke. The court found that because neither doctor could say to a "medical degree of certainty" that the knee surgery caused the stroke, that there was no "clear and convincing evidence" to establish a causal link between the two. Therefore, the trial judge ruled in favor of the employer and the employee appealed the decision.

The Alabama Court of Civil Appeals reiterated that when a primary injury is shown to have arisen out of and in the course of the employment; every other injury that flows from the first injury, also arises out of the course of employment; unless the claimant’s intentional conduct caused the new injury. The Court made a distinction between a claim that the original injury gradually caused the current injury; and a claim that the original injury suddenly and traumatically caused the new injury. In the first instance, the clear and convincing evidence standard would apply but, in the second instance, the preponderance of the evidence standard would apply. The distinction is one of degree. Preponderance of the evidence means that the claimant needs only to prove that the old injury more likely than not caused the new one. Clear and convincing evidence means that the claimant needs to prove a high probability that the old injury caused the new one.

The Court also took the opportunity to clarify the issue of whether there needed to be a finding to a medial degree of certainty that the knee injury caused the employee’s stroke. The Court stated that the employee did not need to have any "magic words" to prove that they new injury was caused by the old one; but rather that the Court should have made such a finding if the evidence, when viewed as a whole had shown that there was more than a mere possibility that the knee replacement surgery caused the employee’s stroke.

The Court of Civil Appeals thus reversed and remanded the case back to the Montgomery Circuit Court in accordance with its finding.

General Electric Company v. Mary Ann Baggett, as surviving dependent spouse of Charles Baggett: 

On October 9, 2009, the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals released this opinion wherein it affirmed the trial court’s decision to award benefits to the surviving spouse of an employee who was injured on the job in April 2001 but died during the workers’ compensation litigation process in April 2007. In April 2003, Charles Baggett sued his employer, General Electric, seeking workers’ compensation benefits for an on the job injury to his left knee. In December 2005, the trial court initially entered a judgment determining that Mr. Baggett was permanently and totally disabled as a result of the on the job injury. The employer appealed that judgment. During the appeals process, Mr. Baggett died from causes unrelated to his work injury. In that initial appeal, the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals reversed the trial court’s judgment because it found that the trial court erred by treating Mr. Baggett’s left knee injury as an injury to the body as a whole, rather than as a scheduled member injury under Alabama Code § 25-5-57(a)(3).  

After Mr. Baggett’s death, Mary Ann Baggett was substituted as a party in place of Mr. Baggett. On remand to the trial court, Mrs. Baggett argued that she was entitled to workers’ compensation benefits pursuant to Alabama Code § 25-5-57(a)(5), which permits a deceased employee’s surviving spouse or dependent children to recover benefits due the employee when the amount of disability benefits due the employee has been established. The employer argued that Mrs. Baggett was not entitled to compensation benefits under § 25-5-57(a)(5). In November 2008, the trial court relied on its findings of fact made in its previous judgment and entered a new judgment determining that Mr. Baggett had sustained a total loss of the use of his left leg, a scheduled member injury. The trial court then awarded benefits that would have been due Mr. Baggett, accordingly, to Mrs. Baggett. The employer appealed, a second time, on the grounds that Mrs. Baggett did not qualify to receive benefits for her husband’s injury under § 25-5-57(a)(5) because the degree of Mr. Baggett’s injury had not been established before Mr. Baggett’s death. The employer argued that the trial court’s initial judgment establishing Mr. Baggett’s disability should not count, as it was subsequently appealed and reversed.  

On review of the employer’s second appeal, the Court of Civil Appeals found that the degree of Mr. Baggett’s injury had been established within the requirements of § 25-5-57(a)(5) prior to Mr. Baggett’s death; therefore, the Court affirmed trial court’s award of workers’ compensation benefits to Mrs. Baggett for her husband’s total loss of use of his left leg. The Court of Civil Appeals noted that the trial court had entered an order establishing Mr. Baggett’s disability in December 2005, even though that judgment was later reversed. The Court then stated that § 25-5-57(a)(5) does not require that a judgment be entered and that said judgment be taken completely through the appeals process in order for an employee’s surviving spouse or dependent child to recover under § 25-5-57(a)(5). The statute simply requires that a court of competent jurisdiction consider the matter and enter a final order setting forth the extent of the injured employee’s disability.  

The Court went on to explain that the reason for the § 25-5-57(a)(5) requirement that a worker’s injury be established by a court prior to that worker’s death is to minimize problems of proving extent of disability after a worker’s death. In this case, the Court noted that the record from Mr. Baggett’s initial workers’ compensation case provided the trial court an extensive record concerning Mr. Baggett’s disability.  

Reynalda Alanis Duran et al. v. Goff Group:

On February 6, 2009, the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals considered the issue of whether or not nonresident alien dependents were entitled to workers’ compensation death benefits. The Court affirmed the trial court’s ruling that such dependents were not so entitled because according to Ala. Code § 25-5-82: "Compensation for the death of an employee shall be paid only to dependents who, at the time of the death of the injured employee, were actually residents of the United States. No right of action to recover damages for the death of an employee shall exist in favor or for the benefit of any person who was not a resident of the United States at the time of the death of such employee." Although the dependents appealed on the grounds that the law was in contravention to equal-protection and due-process guaranties contained in the United States Constitution, The Court of Appeals held that nonresident aliens were not entitled to invoke those constitutional guaranties on their own behalf.