Pierce v. Robert D. Pierce, Ltd.
| Decision Date | 08 March 1985 |
| Docket Number | No. C8-83-1668,C8-83-1668 |
| Parties | Robert D. PIERCE, Respondent, v. ROBERT D. PIERCE, LTD., and Hartford Insurance Company, Relators-Respondents, and Travelers Insurance Company, Intervenor, State Treasurer, Custodian of the Special Compensation Fund, Intervenor. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Syllabus by the Court
When an employee settles a claim for temporary total disability and medical expenses against his former employer in Alaska and then seeks similar compensation benefits from his subsequent employer in this state based on the same disabling condition, the Minnesota employer-insurer is entitled to have the proceeds of the Alaska settlement credited against the compensation awarded employee in the Minnesota proceeding.
Patrick D. Reilly, St. Paul, for Pierce Ltd. and Hartford Ins. Co.
Keith J. Broady, Minneapolis, for Pierce.
Jeanne W. Sayers, Minneapolis, for Travelers Ins. Co.
Considered and decided by the court en banc without oral argument
If an employee has settled a claim brought against a former employer in another state for temporary total disability, retraining, and medical expenses, and thereafter obtains an award in Minnesota against his subsequent employer for temporary total disability and medical expenses arising out of the same disabling condition, is the later employer-insurer entitled to credit the amount of the settlement against the award? A divided Workers' Compensation Court of Appeals panel affirmed the compensation judge's decision denying the credit. We reverse.
The underlying facts are not in dispute. Employee, a Minnesota resident, was working as a welder for an Alaska employer on September 12, 1975, when a file he was carrying pierced his left leg slightly above the knee. In early October 1975 he returned to Minnesota. The wound, which became infected, required extensive medical treatment and resulted in a flexion contracture of employee's leg. The Alaska employer voluntarily paid employee benefits for temporary total disability and 40% permanent partial disability of the leg and subsequently paid him additional amounts in settlement of his further claim for additional permanent partial disability and retraining benefits.
After obtaining retraining in cosmetology, employee began his own business in April 1977. He worked without physical difficulty until early June 1980 when his left leg began to throb, redden, and swell. By the end of a long workday on June 20, 1980, his leg was badly swollen and discolored. He was then hospitalized for several weeks under the care of Dr. Raymond Marecek, who diagnosed acute thrombophlebitis. Employee continued to require fairly frequent medical treatment for several more months.
Based on Dr. Marecek's opinion that the 1975 injury and the consequent flexion contracture of employee's leg was a major contributing cause of the thrombophlebitis, in September 1980 employee filed a claim petition in Alaska against his Alaska employer, seeking temporary total disability from June 21, 1980, medical benefits, and retraining. The Alaska employer-insurer denied liability and obtained an independent medical examination by Dr. Dean Rizer. Dr. Rizer concluded that employee's development of thrombophlebitis was not causally related to his 1975 injury. Thereafter the parties settled employee's claim on June 11, 1981, by a compromise under which employee received $60,000 "to resolve all issues with respect to compensation for disability regardless of whether the same be temporary total, temporary partial, permanent partial, permanent total, vocational rehabilitation compensation * * * or medical expenses." The settlement was approved by the Alaska Workers' Compensation Board on June 19, 1981.
On January 13, 1982, employee filed a claim petition in Minnesota, alleging he had sustained an injury, thrombophlebitis, in the period from May 1977 to June 10, 1980. The Minnesota employer and its...
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...state and Longshore Act benefits, we had allowed successive awards from other states. Id. at 110 n.5 ; see Pierce v. Robert D. Pierce, Ltd. , 363 N.W.2d 761, 762-63 (Minn. 1985) (allowing an employee to receive benefits in Minnesota after receiving similar benefits for treatment of the same......
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...Although this court has not specifically addressed the issue of concurrent state and LHWCA benefits, in Pierce v. Robert D. Pierce, Ltd., 363 N.W.2d 761, 762-63 (Minn.1985), we allowed successive state awards so long as the second award was reduced by the amount received in the first.6 A nu......
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