Taylor v. School Bd. of Brevard County
| Decision Date | 19 August 2004 |
| Docket Number | No. SC01-1924.,SC01-1924. |
| Citation | 888 So.2d 1 |
| Parties | Lawrence TAYLOR, Petitioner, v. SCHOOL BOARD OF BREVARD COUNTY, Respondent. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Joseph H. Williams of Troutman, Williams, Irvin, Green and Helms, P.A., Winter Park, FL, for Petitioner.
Tracy Raffles Gunn of Fowler, White, Boggs and Banker, P.A., Tampa, FL, for Florida Defense Lawyers Association, Amicus Curiae. Michael H. Bowling of Bell, Leeper and Roper, P.A., Orlando, FL, for Respondent.
Kelley B. Gelb of Krupnick, Campbell, Malone, Roselli, Buser, Slama, Hancock, McNelis Liberman and McKee, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, FL, for Academy of Florida Trial Lawyers, Amicus Curiae.
We have for review Taylor v. School Board of Brevard County, 790 So.2d 1156 (Fla. 5th DCA 2001), which expressly and directly conflicts with the decision in Lopez v. Vilches, 734 So.2d 1095 (Fla. 2d DCA 1999). We have jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(3), Fla. Const. For the reasons set forth below, we approve the Fifth District's decision in Taylor holding that petitioners' claim against the school board based upon the negligence of a co-employee was statutorily barred under the exclusive remedy provisions of the Florida Workers' Compensation Law.
While performing his duties as a school bus attendant, Taylor was injured when a school bus wheelchair lift fell on him because of a loose emergency release pin plate. See Taylor, 790 So.2d at 1156
. The lift's lock assembly had been repaired four months prior to the lift falling on Taylor, and the lift was adjusted and re-positioned by a school mechanic one week before Taylor's injury. See id. at 1157.
Taylor brought suit against the school board based upon the alleged negligence of the school board bus maintenance personnel in its repairs to the lift. See id. Taylor filed a motion for partial summary judgment seeking an adjudication that he and the school board mechanics were involved in unrelated work and, hence, the school board was not entitled to immunity under the workers' compensation laws. See id. The school board filed a cross-motion for summary judgment, claiming that it was immune from suit according to the Florida's Workers' Compensation Law and that the unrelated works exception to the employer's immunity did not apply. See id. After a hearing on the motions, the trial court denied Taylor's motion and entered summary judgment in favor of the school board. See id.
On appeal, the Fifth District Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's ruling, explaining that the employees involved were not engaged in unrelated works:
It is undisputed that both Taylor and the alleged negligent mechanics worked out of the same transportation facility and that Taylor, as a part of his job, was responsible for the operation of the wheelchair lift while the mechanics, as a part of their job, were responsible for the lift's maintenance and repair. Under these circumstances, we agree with the trial court's application of the statute.
Id. at 1157-58. This review proceeding followed based upon an assertion of conflict with the Second District's decision in Lopez.
The Florida Legislature has adopted a comprehensive scheme for workers' compensation that generally provides workers' benefits without proof of fault and employers immunity from tort actions based upon the same work place incident. The Legislature has also expressly declared the legislative intent behind the Workers' Compensation Law:
It is the intent of the Legislature that the Workers' Compensation Law be interpreted so as to assure the quick and efficient delivery of disability and medical benefits to an injured worker and to facilitate the worker's return to gainful reemployment at a reasonable cost to the employer. It is the specific intent of the Legislature that workers' compensation cases shall be decided on their merits. The workers' compensation system in Florida is based on a mutual renunciation of common-law rights and defenses by employers and employees alike. In addition, it is the intent of the Legislature that the facts in a workers' compensation case are not to be interpreted liberally in favor of either the rights of the injured worker or the rights of the employer. Additionally, the Legislature hereby declares that disputes concerning the facts in workers' compensation cases are not to be given a broad liberal construction in favor of the employee on the one hand or of the employer on the other hand, and the laws pertaining to workers' compensation are to be construed in accordance with the basic principles of statutory construction and not liberally in favor of either employee or employer. It is the intent of the Legislature to ensure the prompt delivery of benefits to the injured worker. Therefore, an efficient and self-executing system must be created which is not an economic or administrative burden. The Division of Workers' Compensation shall administer the Workers' Compensation Law in a manner which facilitates the self-execution of the system and the process of ensuring a prompt and cost-effective delivery of payments.
§ 440.015, Fla. Stat. (1999). This Court has also described the basic purpose behind workers' compensation law as twofold:
(1) [T]o see that workers in fact were rewarded for their industry by not being deprived of reasonably adequate and certain payment for workplace accidents; and (2) to replace an unwieldy tort system that made it virtually impossible for businesses to predict or insure for the cost of industrial accidents. See McLean v. Mundy, 81 So.2d 501, 503 (Fla.1955)
.
De Ayala v. Florida Farm Bureau Cas. Ins. Co., 543 So.2d 204, 206 (Fla.1989).
Notwithstanding its provision for a general immunity scheme for employers and employees and the exclusive remedy provided under the Workers' Compensation Law, the Legislature created an exception as to the immunity of fellow employees for cases involving "employees of the same employer when each is operating in the furtherance of the employer's business but they are assigned primarily to unrelated works within private or public employment." § 440.11(1), Fla. Stat. (1999)1 (emphasis supplied).
In Lopez, a case involving facts similar to those in Taylor, Lopez was injured when the work van he was operating for a funeral home business malfunctioned. See Lopez, 734 So.2d at 1096
. Lopez brought suit against fellow employees, alleging that they negligently maintained the van. See id. The trial court entered final summary judgment in favor of the employee-defendants, but the Second District reversed, advancing the theory that "these cases might be reconciled by applying a test based on the physical location where the employees were primarily assigned and the unity of their business purpose." Id. at 1097. The Lopez court found that "[t]he physical location of [the co-employees'] work appears to be separate and their specific purpose, general funeral home duties versus vehicle maintenance, appear distinct." Id. But see Lopez, 734 So.2d at 1098 (Quince, Associate Judge, dissenting) ().
Here we are faced with different outcomes on similar facts in the conflicting district court decisions. On the one hand, in Taylor, the school bus attendant and the school bus mechanic were both employed by the school board and both had jobs that dealt with the bus: the attendant interacted with students who rode the bus, and the mechanic maintained and repaired the bus. The Fifth District found that the key elements of the two employees' jobs were the facts that they worked "out of the same transportation facility" and that their jobs both involved the wheelchair lift, resulting in their both being involved in the "same project" of providing transportation services to Brevard County school children. See Taylor, 790 So.2d at 1157
. On the other hand, in Lopez, the court determined that the funeral home employee and the mechanic responsible for maintaining the work vehicles had different work locations and that their "specific purpose[s]" were different. See Lopez, 734 So.2d at 1097.
The resolution of the issue before us turns largely upon the question of whether the Legislature intended that the unrelated works exception be construed liberally or narrowly. Our task is not made easier by the Legislature's admonition that the worker's compensation law not be construed liberally in favor of the employee or the employer. Rather, the Legislature has cautioned that the system is based upon "a mutual renunciation of common-law rights and defenses by employers and employees alike." See § 440.015, Fla. Stat. (1999). The Legislature has also mandated that the ordinary rules of statutory construction be invoked. Id. Hence, we are bound to apply these principles in our analysis. We initially note that, in one sense, all employees of the same employer could always be considered engaged in related works since they are all charged to carry out the mission of the employer. At the same time, however, some distinction could always be drawn between the work of most employees so as to make their work unrelated. Because the unrelated works exception set out in section 440.11(1) represents an exception to the broad exclusive remedy provisions of the Florida's Workers' Compensation Law, we conclude that under the ordinary rules of statutory construction we must interpret it narrowly. See Samara Dev. Corp. v. Marlow, 556 So.2d 1097, 1100 (Fla.1990)
().
Since virtually all workplace injuries are caused by the actions of fellow workers, applying the unrelated works exception liberally would substantially handicap the underlying purpose of the compensation scheme to compensate employees for workplace injuries regardless of fault....
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