Murphy v. Commissioner of Dept. of Indus. Accidents

• Decision Date: 12 May 1993
• Citation: 415 Mass. 218,612 N.E.2d 1149
• Parties: Jean MURPHY v. COMMISSIONER OF THE DEPARTMENT OF INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS & another. 1
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court

Page 1149

612 N.E.2d 1149

415 Mass. 218

Jean MURPHY v. COMMISSIONER OF THE DEPARTMENT OF INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS &amp another. ¹

Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Suffolk.

Argued Nov. 3, 1992.

Decided May 12, 1993.

Jerry E. Benezra, F. Anthony Mooney and Joseph Burke with him, for plaintiff.

Ellen M. Caulo, Asst. Atty. Gen., for defendants.

The following submitted briefs for amici curiae.

Augustus J. Camelio, for American Federation of State, County and Mun. Employees.

Brian C. Cloherty, for Teamsters Union Local 25, Gerald L. Pellegrini for Graphic Communications Intern. Union Local 48B and others, Walter A. Costello, Jr., for Massachusetts Academy of Trial Attys., and Elaine Epstein and Elizabeth N. Mulvey for Massachusetts Bar Assn., joined in a brief.

Paul A. Gargano, pro se.

Thomas J. Wynn, Michael C. Akashian, Walter J. Korzeniowski and Leonard Schneider, for Injured Workers United.

Wendy M. Bittner, for Massachusetts AFL-CIO Council.

Before LIACOS, C.J., and WILKINS, NOLAN, LYNCH and GREANEY, JJ.

LIACOS, Chief Justice.

General Laws c. 152, § 11A, as appearing in St.1991, c. 398, § 30, provides that an employee who seeks to challenge an administrative judge's denial of workers' compensation benefits must pay a fee if the case involves a medical issue and if the employee wishes to proceed with the assistance of counsel. ² The statute imposes no such fee on pro se claimants. In her action for declaratory and injunctive relief, the plaintiff, Jean Murphy, challenges the constitutionality of the fee provisions of § 11A. We hold that the challenged portions of § 11A violate the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and art. 11 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights. ³

The relevant facts are these. William Murphy, the plaintiff's husband, worked as an employee of A.A. Busch & Co. of Massachusetts, Inc., until August of 1991. At that time, Murphy suffered a myocardial infarction for which he was hospitalized. Alleging that his heart condition arose from his employment, Murphy filed a claim for workers' compensation benefits with the Department of Industrial Accidents (department). On March 19, 1992, while his case was still pending, Murphy died of a heart attack. The plaintiff moved to amend her late husband's claim to include herself as a party and to request survivorship benefits pursuant to G.L. c. 152, § 31 (1990 ed.). On June 25, 1992, an administrative judge of the department held a "conference" pursuant to G.L. c. 152, § 10A, as amended through St.1991, c. 398, §§ 27, 28, in the course of which Murphy presented her case with the assistance of an attorney. On July 17, 1992, the judge issued an order denying Murphy's claims.

Murphy then filed a verified complaint in the Superior Court by which she commenced the present case. She also filed an affidavit stating that she wished to obtain a hearing with the department in order to challenge the administrative judge's conference order. Murphy asserted that she wanted to proceed with the assistance of counsel but did not have the financial means to meet the filing fee required by § 11A as a predicate to obtaining a hearing. ⁴ Murphy sought a declaration that the fee requirement of § 11A deprived her of the equal protection of the laws and violated her fundamental rights to seek legal redress for grievances and to proceed with the assistance of an attorney. In addition, Murphy requested a preliminary injunction precluding the department from implementing and enforcing the filing fee provisions of § 11A.

On July 29, 1992, a judge in the Superior Court, after a hearing, denied Murphy's motion for a preliminary injunction. Murphy petitioned a single justice of the Appeals Court for interlocutory relief pursuant to G.L. c. 231, § 118 (1990 ed.). On September 11, 1992, the single justice ordered the department to accept Murphy's claim of appeal as timely for a nominal fee of $1. The single justice also granted "the petitioner leave to take an interlocutory appeal to a full panel of [the Appeals Court] with respect to the propriety of the single justice's order reducing the administrative appeal fee and to the issues presented to the single justice by the petition, including the issue of the constitutionality of that provision of G.L. c. 152, § 11A, as appearing in St.1991, c. 398, § 30." We transferred the case to this court on our own motion. ⁵

Our workers' compensation act, G.L. c. 152, §§ 1-86, as amended through St.1991, c. 398 (Act), is a "humanitarian measure" which the Legislature first enacted in 1911 (St.1911, c. 751) in response to strong public dissatisfaction with the remedies provided by traditional tort actions. L. Locke, Workmen's Compensation § 1, at 2 (2d ed. 1981). See Young v. Duncan, 218 Mass. 346, 349, 106 N.E. 1 (1914). The Act is based on the legislative judgment that "human loss directly arising out of commercial and industrial enterprises" is part of the operating cost of a business. Zerofski's Case, 385 Mass. 590, 592, 433 N.E.2d 869 (1982), quoting Madden's Case, 222 Mass. 487, 496, 111 N.E. 379 (1916). See Ahmed's Case, 278 Mass. 180, 183, 179 N.E. 684 (1932). The Act applies only to employees who come within its ambit. See G.L. c. 152, § 24. The Act requires that participating employees waive their right to sue in tort for work-related injuries. Id. In return, the Act gives these employees the possibility of obtaining compensation for loss of wages or earning capacity caused by a work-related injury, regardless of the fault of their employers or the foreseeability of harm. See Zerofski's Case, supra; Akins's Case, 302 Mass. 562, 20 N.E.2d 453 (1939); Ahmed's Case, supra. See also G.L. c. 152, §§ 13, 30, 31, 34, 34A, 35.

In 1991, the Legislature chose to overhaul the procedures by which injured workers (claimants) may seek compensation under the Act. See St.1991, c. 398. As amended, the relevant portions of the Act establish four distinct procedural stages. ⁶ The Act provides for an initial informal conciliatory proceeding in which the claimant and his or her employer's insurer must cooperate with a conciliator in an effort to settle the case. G.L. c. 152, § 10. See 452 Code Mass.Regs. § 1.08 (1993). ⁷ If the claimant and the insurer do not reach an agreement, they may elect to submit the case to binding arbitration. G.L. c. 152, §§ 10, 10B. If arbitration is not sought, the unresolved claim is referred to the Industrial Accident Board (board) of the department. Id. at §§ 10, 10A. ⁸

The referral of a claim to the board triggers the second stage of the process: a "conference" before an administrative judge of the department. Id. at § 10A. See 452 Code Mass.Regs. § 1.10 (1993). The conference procedure was enacted (St.1971, c. 974) to allow the board "to expedite compensation claims without the necessity of a full hearing." Assuncao's Case, 372 Mass. 6, 9, 359 N.E.2d 1304 (1977). At the conference, the parties must "identify the issues in dispute" and "produce a summary of any anticipated testimony." G.L. c. 152, § 10A(1). ⁹ The parties may also make oral arguments and submit evidence such as reports of injury, affidavits, or medical records. Within seven days after the conference, the judge must issue a written order stating whether and to what extent relief should be granted. Id. at § 10A(2).

A party aggrieved by the judge's order may trigger the third stage of the review process: a "hearing" of his or her claim. G.L. c. 152, § 11. See 452 Code Mass.Regs. § 1.11 (1993). If the aggrieved party's claim involves a disputed medical question, an "impartial medical examiner" must be appointed. G.L. c. 152, § 11A. ¹⁰ The impartial examiner must evaluate the claimant's condition and set forth his or her findings in a report. ¹¹ At the hearing, the report constitutes prima facie evidence of the disputed medical issues. Id. The parties may not submit additional reports or depositions of other physicians "by right." Id. However, the administrative judge may authorize the submission of such additional evidence if warranted by "the complexity of the medical issues involved or the inadequacy of the report submitted by the impartial medical examiner." Id. ¹² The administrative judge, based on the evidence presented at the hearing, then renders a decision. ¹³

Section 11A requires that claimants wishing to proceed to this evidentiary hearing with the assistance of counsel pay the filing fee as a predicate to obtaining access to the hearing if they need an "impartial medical examination." Further, § 11A imposes the filing fee on claimants who hired an attorney to assist in the presentation of their claim at the conference stage of the process even if they discharge the attorney prior to the evidentiary hearing. See 452 Code Mass.Regs. § 1.11(1)(c) (1993) ("payment of the requisite filing fee is required to perfect the appeal when a party represented by counsel at Conference discharges said counsel and thereafter appeals the Conference Order"). The filing fee is justified by the need to "defray the cost of the [impartial] medical examination." G.L. c. 152, § 11A.

Murphy argues that the legislative classification distinguishing between claimants represented by counsel and those proceeding without legal representation violates the equal protection clause and art. 11. Murphy urges us to hold that the filing fee infringes on a claimant's "fundamental" rights to obtain relief and to proceed with the assistance of counsel. Thus, she claims, we should review this legislation under a standard of "strict scrutiny." Murphy argues that, because the classification is not "precisely tailored to serve a compelling state interest," we should declare it unconstitutional. Further, Murphy asserts, even if the classification does not infringe on a fundamental right, we should declare it unconstitutional because it is not rationally related to any legitimate State interest. ¹⁴

The...