Free Republic

A Bay Area woman sued her husband’s employer after she became infected with COVID-19. The California Supreme Court found that giving her workers’ comp could set a precedent that would imperil the system.

In interviews with The Defender, three lawyers discussed workers’ compensation strategies that may help private-sector employees who sustained COVID-19 vaccine injuries obtain financial relief.Could employees injured by a COVID-19 vaccine that was mandated by their employer get relief under the U.S. workers’ compensation program?Some lawyers think so — including three who spoke with The Defender about specific workers’ compensation strategies that may help private-sector employees who sustained COVID-19 vaccine injuries obtain financial relief.The attorneys also suggested that the more people file claims for their COVID-19 vaccine injuries, the more employers — and their insurers — may feel pressure to reconsider...

Under the order, Californians diagnosed within two weeks of reporting to work between March 19 and July 5 will be presumed to have contracted the virus on the job. It will fall on employers to refute any claims for medical coverage and benefits.

GOP spokeswoman Jessica Proud told the outlet that the incident represented “hypocrisy at its finest.” “The so-called champion of workers, when given her own responsibility, is not following the law. It’s unbelievable,” Proud said. Freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign was fined $1,500 by New York for failing to provide workers’ compensation coverage for a month in early 2018. The 29-year-old Democratic Socialist's campaign “did not have the required workers’ compensation coverage from March 31, 2018, to April 30, 2018, and was issued a final penalty of $1,500, which was paid,” Melissa Stewart, director of public information at the state’s Workers...

After nearly two decades on the force, former LAPD Officer Jonathan Hall ended his career the way many veteran officers do these days, claiming job-related injuries across most of his body. With the help of a boutique Van Nuys law firm that specializes in workers’ compensation cases for cops and firefighters, Hall filed claims saying he’d injured his knees, hips, heart (high blood pressure), back, right shoulder — even his right middle finger. The ailments had existed for months, in some cases years, and had not previously prevented him from working, Hall said in a recent interview. But he was...

Berkshire Hathaway Inc has been sued by a New York bicycle courier company over an alleged illegal scheme to cheat employers buying workers' compensation policies. The complaint, filed late Friday by Breakaway Courier Systems, came as Berkshire's Applied Underwriters unit faces scrutiny over its workers' compensation policies, including some that have been banned by California, Vermont and Wisconsin. Breakaway, with about 300 employees, accused Berkshire and Applied of "siphoning" premiums through a web of illegal shell companies, with diverted premiums going to unlicensed out-of-state insurers. The plan amounted to a "reverse Ponzi scheme" where unsuspecting employers expecting to buy affordable...

St. Paul Public Schools workers are filing more injury reports and claims under the workers' compensation program. And district officials are not entirely sure why. Injury reports were up 50 percent in 2013 compared with four years ago, and the number of claims seeking payment for medical expenses or lost wages are up almost 30 percent, all while district employment stayed stable. Officials say they are watching how much the district is paying out more closely than the number of reports and claims. Those amounts have not risen in the past two years -- though they'll likely go up as...

A California grand jury has indicted Kareem Ahmed, a major donor to President Obama's 2012 re-election campaign, and 15 of Ahmed's associates in an alleged multimillion-dollar insurance kickback scheme. Ahmed, the president and CEO of a company called Landmark Medical Management, is accused of masterminding the scheme and faces charges including conspiracy, insurance fraud, and, most dramatically, involuntary manslaughter, according to one of two sealed indictments issued by an Orange County grand jury both dated June 17 and obtained this week by TPM. The first of the two indictments accused Ahmed of developing topical cream formulas "based on the profitability...

A former U.S. Postal Service employee in Anchorage was arraigned Friday on charges he accepted at least $334,000 in disability and worker's comp payments while he spent his summers fishing. The U.S. attorney's office says in a Friday release that 56-year-old Amacio Zamora Agcaoili Jr. was indicted by a federal grand jury on 18 counts, including theft of government funds. Assistant U.S. Attorney Yvonne Lamoureux also claims Agcaoli lied about not working when he was paid for preparing tax returns and immigration paperwork. Authorities also claim he failed to tell the Social Security Administration about his worker's comp payments, to...

-New York State officials have filed a $79,000 judgment against Tina Fey, alleging that the comedian has failed to carry required workers' compensation insurance, according to court filings. The Workers’ Compensation Board lodged the judgment against Fey last week in State Supreme Court in Manhattan. State records indicate that the 43-year-old entertainer is being dunned for “Failure to Carry Workers’ Comp Ins” from late-2012 through last month. A “Final Notice” regarding the $79,000 debt is addressed to Elizabeth T. Fey at a Manhattan address that, records show, has been the headquarters for the former “Saturday Night Live” star’s production company,...

The bureaucrat, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was hospitalised in November 2007 after a glass light fitting above a bed she was having sex in fell onto her face injuring her nose and mouth. The woman also suffered psychological injury. The woman was visiting a regional office observing the budget review process, meeting regional staff and undertaking training — and staying in a motel room booked by her employer. According to the court transcript the fitting was pulled from its mount either by the woman or by her acquaintance. The important test case was brought by Comcare, the...

GREENVILLE, N.C. — A former Fayetteville postal carrier who was receiving worker's compensation payments after injuring herself on the job pleaded guilty to fraud in federal court Monday. Cathy Wrench Cashwell's claim that she couldn't lift mail trays into a truck due to a 2004 on-the-job shoulder injury was called into question in September 2009 when she appeared on "The Price is Right" and spun the "big wheel" twice. According to an indictment filed in September 2012, Cashwell "raised her left arm above her head and gripped the handle with her left hand." On a second spin, she "raised both...

Feet hurt? In Illinois, 'repetitive walking' is a basis for workers' comp By GEORGE PAWLACZYK AND BETH HUNDSDORFER NEWS DEMOCRAT — -- Posted: 10:39pm on May 26, 2012; If you are a state employee and your feet hurt, you could be in line to receive medical care, including surgery, paid time off plus a tax-free disability settlement that might exceed your annual salary -- all paid for by taxpayers. You also would keep your job. Repetitive walking is now recognized in Illinois as a compensable on the job injury entitled to full workers' compensation benefits. State employees whose jobs require...

LOS ANGELES (CBS) — The next time you plan a movie night without the kids, you may have to provide more than just pizza for your babysitter. Democratic lawmakers in Sacramento are fast-tracking a bill that would require workers’ compensation benefits, meal breaks and paid vacation time for all “domestic employees”, including nannies, housekeepers and even babysitters. Assembly Bill 889, authored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano (D-San Francisco), has already cleared the Assembly and is expected to receive overwhelming support from Senate Democrats, who control both houses of the California legislature. Under AB 889, parents legally become household “employers” and are...

California employers would pay as much as $210 million more for workers’ compensation benefits for temporary disabilities if the legislature passes a bill by Orange County Assemblyman Jose Solorio, D-Santa Ana. That’s according to an analysis is from the state Senate Appropriations Committee.

EDISON — The husband of an AT&T manager who died from a blood clot after sitting at her desk for more than 10 hours one night is entitled to workers’ compensation benefits, an appellate court ruled today. In 2007, Cathleen Renner, who worked for the communications giant for 25 years, died from a clot in her lung about an hour after she finished working a long, sedentary shift at her computer in her home office in Edison, the ruling states. "There’s an awful lot of people that do nothing but sit in front of computers for work these days, and...

After 173 years, insurer swamped by wave of workers’ comp claims. Atlantic Mutual Insurance Co. managed to pay out claims when the legendary Titanic passenger liner sank in April 1912, but the insurer couldn’t survive a wave of workers’ compensation claims, industry publication BestWire reported Friday. The company was placed into liquidation and New York’s superintendent of insurance was appointed liquidator on April 27, according to the website of the New York Liquidation Bureau. Atlantic Mutual Insurance was incorporated under the laws of the state of New York on April 11, 1842. ... Workers’ compensation insurance covers the cost of...

After almost 100 years, the State Compensation Insurance Fund is pulling 755 of its 830 jobs out of town, having determined that San Francisco is just too expensive - and its workforce too dumb - for the agency to continue doing most of its business here. Workers called to a recent meeting at the Herbst Theatre were told that 293 jobs will move to Pleasanton, 422 to Vacaville and 40 to Sacramento, with 75 employees remaining in the city. "It's part of a whole geographic strategy to reduce our footprint in high-cost areas like San Francisco," said agency spokeswoman Jennifer...

Workers' compensation insurance, a hot issue in the debate over California's business climate, is about to get more expensive again. But it's not clear by how much. An influential insurance-industry group said Wednesday that workers' comp premiums should rise 29.6 percent, effective next January. The group's findings are purely advisory, and experts doubt rate increases will be that dramatic. Nevertheless, the recommendation makes it obvious that companies will begin charging more for workers' comp – putting more pressure on employers struggling in a weak economic recovery. Workers' comp is a significant cost of doing business, and premiums reached something of...

The story John Alfonzo Smiley told is every correctional officer's fear: He was at a San Francisco restaurant with his wife when a parolee recognized him, then gunned him down with a shot that left him paralyzed from the waist down. Unable to work, the 44-year-old Smiley filed a workers' compensation claim that could have paid him and his wife nearly $2.5 million. Except investigators say that isn't exactly how Smiley ended up getting shot. Instead, court records say, the altercation that led to his paralysis started at a swingers club, where he and his wife were engaging in sex...