Trial Court Did Not Err in Deducting from Auto Accident Judgment Only Portions of WC Lien Pertaining To Benefits Paid For Neck and Back Injuries

In the unpublished case of Barba, Sr. v. Wal-Mart Transportation, LLC, et al, No. B213376 (March 1), Division Seven of the Second Appellate District considered an appeal by defendants contending that the the trial court erred in failing to reduce an award following an automobile accident by the full amount of workers’ compensation benefits paid the plaintiff.  Barba was injured when the police car he was driving in the course and scope of his employment as a Hacienda La Puente Unified School District police officer was struck by a tractor trailer owned by Wal-Mart.  The defendants were assignees of the School District’s workers’ compensation lien by virtue of a $42,000 charitable contribution made in satisfaction of the School District’s Complaint in Intervention.  Following a jury trial at which liability was admitted, the jury awarded Barba $76,850.  The trial court ordered that award reduced by $12,500, the amount of workers’ compensation benefits the jury found had found attributable to defendants’ negligent conduct.  Barba’s shoulder injury, the jury found, was not so caused.  Defendants, as assignees of the School District’s workers’ compensation lien, appealed, arguing that the award should be reduced by the full amount of workers’ compensation benefits paid.

The Court of Appeal affirmed.  The Court found that no workers’ compensation lien reimbursement is appropriate for injury not caused by the defendants’ negligent conduct.   The appellate court cited Breese v. Price (1981) 29 Cal. 3rd 923, 928 for the proposition that an employer’s action for reimbursement is “limited to recovery for damages proximately caused by the injury.”  The Court rejected the defendants’ contention that a workers’ compensation lien cannot be divided, distinguishing the cases they cited as being being premised on there either being a lack of any proximate causation between the defendant’s conduct and the employee’s injuries or there being no dispute but that the defendant’s conduct caused all of the the plaintiff’s injuries.  This case law, the Court held, does not override the principle that reimbursement is appropriate only for those payments made by reason of a proximately caused injury.

March 1, 2010   Posted in: Blog