Solis v. Clean Harbors, Inc.
| Decision Date | 21 May 2021 |
| Docket Number | Case No. 20-cv-02660-AGT |
| Parties | ABRAHAM SOLIS, Plaintiff, v. CLEAN HARBORS, INC., et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of California |
Abraham Solis, a temporary contract employee of Aerotek, Inc., was assigned to Clean Harbors Industrial Services, Inc. ("Clean Harbors") to work as a Field Technician. On the first day of his Clean Harbors assignment, Solis was injured while performing maintenance work on heavy machinery at Clean Harbors's Benicia, California facility. After Solis began receiving workers' compensation benefits from Aerotek, he brought this negligence action against Aerotek and Clean Harbors, seeking further recovery for the same injury. Defendants now move for summary judgment on the basis that California's Workers' Compensation Act provides Solis's excusive remedy for his workplace injury. For the reasons that follow, Defendants' motion is granted.
Clean Harbors is an environmental and industrial services provider with customers and locations throughout the United States. ECF No. 37, Tobin Decl. ¶¶ 3-4. In December 2017, Clean Harbors entered into a Master Services Agreement ("MSA") with Aerotek, a temporary staffing agency, in which Aerotek agreed to provide temporary contract employees to work "under [Clean Harbors's] management and supervision at a facility or in an environment controlled by [Clean Harbors]." ECF No. 36, Peterson Decl. ¶¶ 3-4; ECF No. 36-1, MSA § 2.1.1 Under the MSA, Aerotek also agreed to "provide any salary or other benefits" to its contract employees, to "make all appropriate tax, social security, healthcare, and other withholding deductions and payments," and to provide workers' compensation coverage. MSA § 3. For its part, Clean Harbors had "responsibility to control, manage and supervise the work of the Contract Employees assigned to [Clean Harbors] pursuant to [the MSA]."2 Id. § 2.2. Clean Harbors could also terminate the assignment of any contract employee with notice to Aerotek. Id. § 12.
In 2019, Clean Harbors utilized Aerotek's temporary contract employees, in addition to its own permanent employees, to provide services to its customer, Shell Oil Company, at Shell's oil refinery in Martinez, California ("Martinez refinery"). Tobin Decl. ¶¶ 4-5. Some of these contract employees had the job title Field Technician. Id. ¶ 5. Before sending the Field Technicians to the Martinez refinery, Clean Harbors provided them with a day of training at its facility in Benicia, California. Id. ¶ 6.
Solis was a temporary contract employee hired by Aerotek to work for Clean Harbors as a Field Technician at the Martinez refinery. Id. Solis completed Aerotek's online onboarding paperwork for the Clean Harbors assignment in December 2018. See ECF No. 36-3, Cal. Lab. Code § 2810.5 Notice to Employee;3 ECF No. 36-4, Employment Agreement. Solis's Aerotek employment agreement stated that he was an employee of Aerotek, not Clean Harbors, and that his employment with Aerotek was "co-extensive" with the Clean Harbors assignment—that is, his Aerotek employment would begin on the first day of his Clean Harbors assignment, and end "if and when" his assignment was ended by Clean Harbors or otherwise. Id. §§ 2, 14; see also id. § 1 (). It also included a provision stating that Aerotek "provides workers' compensation coverage for things such as on-the-job injuries . . . incurred while on Assignment for Aerotek[], and to the extent permitted by law, you agree to look solely to Aerotek, Inc. and/or its insurer for damages and/or expenses for any such claims." Id. § 17. And Solis testified that he understood Clean Harbors could end his assignment at any time. ECF No. 40-1, Solis Dep. at 21:16-20.
On the afternoon of January 15, 2019, the first (and ultimately last) day of Solis's Clean Harbors assignment, Solis's right thumb was crushed by heavy machinery that fell off a forklift at Clean Harbors's Benicia facility. Solis had reported to the Clean Harbors facility that morning at 9:00 a.m., per Aerotek's instructions, expecting to undergo a day of Field Technician training. ECF No. 44, Solis Decl. ¶¶ 4-5. When he arrived, however, Solis was told that Clean Harbors "didn't have the training ready," Solis Dep. at 29:19-21, and so instead, a Clean Harbors employee "who appeared to be in charge of the facility" sent him to work in the maintenance warehouse area, ECF No. 6, Compl. ¶ 10. There were no Aerotek personnel present on Clean Harbors's premises that day. ECF No. 40-2, Clean Harbors's Resp. Solis's Interrog. 13; Solis Dep. at 25:16-23.
When Solis got to the maintenance area of the Benicia facility, he received an oversized bodysuit and signed Clean Harbors's Job Safety Analysis ("JSA") form for an unspecified "maintenance & repair" activity to be performed that day. Tobin Decl. ¶ 7; ECF No. 37-1, JSA; Solis Dep. at 39:5-42:15, 44:21-45:7. Solis testified that he "wasn't given any real clear direction on what to do" in the maintenance area, so he "just kind of waited around" until departing for lunch shortly before noon. Solis Dep. at 33:13-19.
When Solis returned from lunch an hour later, several Clean Harbors employees summoned him to help with a maintenance activity involving a large, industrial centrifuge machine. Id. at 35:21-37:20. Solis complied, and following the Clear Harbors employees' directions, he proceeded to help them place and align metal disk plates underneath the centrifuge machine while it was lifted off the ground by a forklift. Id.; see Compl. ¶¶ 14-15, 17-18. During this process, "the forklift instantaneously dropped the upper piece of machinery without anywarning, causing it to come crashing down on [Solis's] hand, [] immediately amputating and crushing his [right] thumb." Compl. ¶ 19. Solis went into shock and was transported to the hospital where doctors performed emergency surgery on his injured hand. Id. ¶ 20. Solis has not returned to work for Clean Harbors since. Id. ¶ 26.
Shortly after the accident, Solis filed a workers' compensation claim with Aerotek. Solis Dep. at 52:1-3. He began receiving workers' compensation through Aerotek on January 18, 2019, and he continues to receive such benefits. ECF No. 40-5, Solis's Resp. Defs.' Interrog. 2; ECF No. 39, Park Decl. ¶¶ 6-8.
In March 2020, Solis filed a single-count negligence complaint against Aerotek and Clean Harbors in Contra Costa County Superior Court. After removing the case to this Court, Aerotek and Clean Harbors answered the complaint, and as an affirmative defense alleged that Solis's exclusive remedy for his workplace injury is governed by California's Workers' Compensation Act, Cal. Lab. Code, § 3600 et seq. ("WCA"). ECF Nos. 16, 17. In July 2020, after the parties agreed at the initial case management conference that the workers' compensation exclusivity defense is potentially dispositive, the Court issued a scheduling order limiting initial discovery and dispositive motions to the issue of whether the WCA's exclusive remedy rule bars this action. ECF No. 28. Defendants now seek summary judgment on the ground that it does. ECF No. 35.
A. Workers' Compensation Exclusive Remedy Rule
Under the WCA, an employer is liable without regard to negligence "for any injury sustained by [its] employees arising out of and in the course of the employment." Cal. Lab. Code § 3600(a). The injured employee, in turn, is generally barred from pursuing any tort remedies against the employer that would otherwise apply—when workers' compensation is available, it is the employee's "sole and exclusive remedy" against the employer. Id. § 3602(a). The basis for the exclusive remedy rule is "the presumed 'compensation bargain' in which the employer assumes liability for injury or death arising out of and in the course of employment without regard to fault and compensation is relatively swift, in exchange for limitations on the amount ofliability." Angelotti v. The Walt Disney Co., 192 Cal. App. 4th 1394, 1403 (2011) () (citation omitted).
Importantly, an employee may have more than one employer for purposes of workers' compensation. Id. "Where an employer sends an employee to do work for another person, and both have the right to exercise certain powers of control over the employee, that employee may be held to have two employers—his original or 'general' employer and a second, the 'special' employer." Kowalski v. Shell Oil Co., 23 Cal. 3d 168, 174 (1979) (en banc) (citation omitted). When a dual employment relationship exists, both employers are responsible for providing workers' compensation benefits, and both are protected by the WCA's exclusive remedy rule. Angelotti, 192 Cal. App. 4th at 1403; see Riley v. Sw. Marine, Inc., 203 Cal. App. 3d 1242, 1248 (1988) ().
Here, Aerotek and Clean Harbors argue that the undisputed facts demonstrate (1) that they were Solis's joint employers for workers' compensation purposes—Aerotek was Solis's "general" employer and Clean Harbors his "special" employer—and (2) that Solis's workplace injury arose out of and in the course of his employment with Aerotek at Clean Harbors. ECF No. 35 at 6. Solis counters that Aerotek was his only employer at all relevant times and argues that, at a minimum, "a triable issue of fact" exists as to whether Clean Harbors was his special employer at the time of his...
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