Graves v. Utah Power & Light Co.

• Citation: 713 P.2d 187
• Decision Date: 22 January 1986
• Docket Number: No. 85-172,85-172
• Parties: Mary Lou GRAVES, Appellant (Claimant-Employee), v. UTAH POWER & LIGHT COMPANY, Appellee (Defendant-Employer).
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Wyoming

Page 187

713 P.2d 187

Mary Lou GRAVES, Appellant (Claimant-Employee), v. UTAH POWER & LIGHT COMPANY, Appellee (Defendant-Employer).

No. 85-172.

Supreme Court of Wyoming.

Jan. 22, 1986.

F.L. Thomas, Jr., Kemmerer, for appellant.

Mark W. Harris of Harris & Harris, Evanston, for appellee.

Before THOMAS, C.J., and ROONEY, ^* BROWN, CARDINE and URBIGKIT, JJ.

CARDINE, Justice.

This is a worker's compensation case in which we review the denial of a worker's claim for temporary total disability benefits. The district court denied the claim because the worker failed to show that her nontraumatic mental injury was caused by work-related stresses which were greater than day-to-day stresses and tensions experienced The claimant, Mary Lou Graves, became a B-operator at Utah Power and Light's Naughton Plant in 1981. As a B-operator, she monitored and operated the plant's pollution control equipment. According to claimant, the job itself was not physically or mentally stressful. In fact, her prior job as a beautician was much more stressful.

by all employees in the same or similar jobs. Our review is essentially factual, and we can reverse only if we find that the district court's decision was clearly erroneous or contrary to the great weight of the evidence. We must also consider the matter of attorney's fees for this appeal. We affirm the judgment below and award attorney's fees in the amount of $750.

Nevertheless, during claimant's four years as a B-operator she was increasingly absent from work because of debilitating migraine headaches. She had suffered from headaches since childhood. She missed work 22 days in 1981, 41 days in 1982, 43 days in 1983, and 61.5 days in 1984. Of the days missed in 1983 and 1984, only 40 were covered by official vacation and sick days. She was reprimanded on various occasions for sick leave abuse, but the reprimands had no effect upon her absenteeism.

Because of poor attendance, plant management informed her in August of 1983 that she must bid into another job within two months or be demoted to the position of skilled helper. ¹ A warehouse job within the company opened up in August and claimant successfully bid into the position. The company agreed to allow her to return to the Naughton job as B-operator as soon as her attendance improved in her new position.

Claimant's warehouse job was less desirable than her B-operator position because the warehouse job was in Evanston, a substantial commute from her Kemmerer home. The warehouse job also resulted in a cut in pay which eventually forced claimant to file a bankruptcy petition. She tried to force her reinstatement as a B-operator at the Naughton plant by filing a grievance with the employer, and when her grievance was denied, by filing suit in federal court. In April of 1984, claimant was permitted to bid back into her B-operator job after her attendance improved.

Claimant's return to her old job did not end either her headaches or her resultant attendance problems. While she had no trouble with her immediate supervisors, she did develop strained relations with fellow employees who were forced to fill in for her on numerous occasions. In July, claimant found a dead blackbird in her desk drawer, apparently placed there by another employee. She at first requested her supervisor to overlook the matter fearing that reprimands by management would only escalate the harassment. But eventually she told the plant manager of the incident and gave him the names of the suspected culprits. The manager reprimanded the suspects and their relations with claimant were further strained.

In late September of 1984, claimant's personal physician, Dr. Clark, sent a letter to the company suggesting that claimant be given time off to go to a pain clinic in Salt Lake City for migraine headache treatments. The company agreed and gave claimant a month off without pay. She attended the clinic from October 15 to October 26. She filed a claim for temporary total disability for the month of October; but, after the company paid her for the first nine days of the month, she amended her claim to cover 15 days of disability. The employer, Utah Power and Light, contested the claim on grounds that the headaches, which caused claimant to miss work, were not job related.

The district court tried the contested claim on March 5, 1985. At trial, claimant called Dr. David Clark who testified that claimant's work situation was the primary cause of her increase in headaches. But Dr. Clark was unable to compare the stress In opposition to the claim, the employer called several of claimant's supervisors. Mr. Spencer Preece, claimant's immediate supervisor at the Naughton Plant, testified that she was not treated any differently than other employees at the plant. Ron Garner, the Naughton plant manager since 1982, stated that he treated her the same as any other employee with a similar record. He pointed out that he had issued reprimands, similar to those given to claimant, to another employee with an attendance problem. Finally, he testified that he tried to change claimant from a shift position to a day position to improve her attendance and that he encouraged her to seek medical attention.

facing claimant to the stress experienced by her co-workers because a proper foundation could not be established for the testimony. Claimant also called James Hackney, a psychiatric social worker from Kemmerer, who testified that work conditions contributed to claimant's headaches. Like Dr. Clark, Mr. Hackney could not say that the work conditions were unusually stressful.

The district court denied the claim, holding in a letter opinion that claimant failed to provide "substantial competent evidence that a situation or condition in her employment was any greater than day-to-day mental stresses and tensions all employees experience," and that "[t]he discipline [claimant] received for excessive absenteeism was not extraordinary or outside normal disciplinary procedures associated with her employment." Without a showing of unusual stress, the district court held that claimant could not receive disability benefits for her nontraumatic mental injuries.

Nontraumatic Mental Injuries

Preliminarily we note that both parties agree that claimant's headaches were the result of a mental condition rather than physical injuries. They also agree that the headaches were not induced by a sudden event and can, therefore, be safely classified as nontraumatic mental injuries.

Our analysis of the law of nontraumatic mental injuries must begin with a review of Consolidated Freightways v. Drake, Wyo., 678 P.2d 874 (1984), the case upon which the district court based its decision. In Consolidated Freightways we held that a worker can recover for slowly developing mental injuries only if the injuries result "from a situation or condition in employment that is of greater magnitude than the day-to-day mental stresses and tensions all employees usually experience." Id. at 877. We based our holding upon the statutory definition of injury which requires that a harmful change in the human organism "[arise] out of" and "in the course of" employment "while at work" "in or about the premises [of the employer]." Section 27-12-102(a)(xii), W.S.1977. We essentially reasoned that a long-term change in a worker's mental condition "aris[es] out of" employment and is, therefore, a compensable injury only if it can be shown that there was a special employment stress causing the change or condition that is of greater magnitude than day-to-day stress usually experienced.

The rationale of our holding in Consolidated Freightways v. Drake, supra, is in accord with the policy of worker's compensation. Worker's compensation is a form of industrial accident insurance. Cottonwood Steel Corporation v. Hansen, Wyo., 655 P.2d 1226 (1982). The employer contributes to the fund what, in essence, are insurance premium payments, the amount being based upon his payroll for covered employees. A separate account is maintained for each employer, and his claim experience determines whether he must contribute a maximum or minimum percentage of his payroll to the fund, §§ 27-12-202 through 27-12-204, W.S. 1977. It might be considered modern and forward looking for worker's compensation to be expanded to provide full coverage health insurance. But that was not its intended purpose, and it would be unfair to the employer who pays premiums on the assumption that they cover only injuries caused by his industry. Thus, where the employee suffers from a mental condition that was known Consolidated Freightways v. Drake, supra, is also consistent with enactments of the legislature in similar situations. Thus, when affording coverage for employment-related coronary conditions, the legislature enacted § 27-12-603(b), W.S.1977, which provides:

symptomatic and which existed prior to employment, and the injury claimed is attributable to the same mental condition, it must appear that the injury "aris[es] out of employment" and is not simply a natural progression of the disease or condition.

"Benefits for employment-related coronary conditions except those directly and solely caused by an injury or disease are not payable unless the employee establishes by competent medical authority that there is a direct causal connection between the condition under which the work was performed and the cardiac condition, and then only if the causative exertion occurs during the actual period of employment stress clearly unusual to, or abnormal for, employees in that particular employment, and further that the acute symptoms of the cardiac condition are clearly manifested not later than four (4) hours after the alleged causative exertion." (Emphasis added.)

The rule necessitating unusual stress adopted in Consolidated Freightways v. Drake, supra, satisfies for us the requirement that, for an award of compensation, there must be "a nexus between the injury and some...