Any job site, or office location, comes equipped with its share of risks. Sure, some forms of employment make you more vulnerable to on-the-job injuries than do others; a construction worker, for instance, is probably more at risk for a work-related physical injury than is, say, a librarian. But a librarian can still trip over stacked books or get struck by a poorly-stabilized bookshelf. The point is, as our Delray Beach personal#atfp_close_translate_span# injury lawyers know, workplace accidents are far too, and all too, common. In this blog post, we are going to tell you about some of your rights in seeking compensation after an on-the-job injury.
First, let’s quickly survey the most common types of on-the-job injuries. As we noted above, construction work injuries are particularly common. According to U.S. Occupational#atfp_close_translate_span# Safety & Health Administration, out of 4,251 reported worker fatalities in private industry in the year 2014, 20.5% were in the construction sector. Per OSHA#atfp_close_translate_span# statistics, the leading causes of deaths on construction sites were, in order of descending prevalence, falls (40%), electrocution (8.5%), being struck by an object (8.4%), and getting caught in between large objects or materials (1.4%). Other types of common injuries include overexertion due to lowering and lifting (in construction, material transportation, etc.) and injuries due to repetitive motion (manufacturing, etc.).
In general, if you have been injured due to the wrongdoing of someone else (whether in an auto#atfp_close_translate_span# accident, or a slip-and-fall at the grocery store, etc.), you can hire a#atfp_close_translate_span# personal injury lawyer and bring a civil negligence action. However, when it comes to injuries sustained at work, there is a whole body of regulatory law that can, and does, in many cases, prevent you from bringing an action against the negligent party (i.e. your employer). That body of law is called Workers’ Compensation.
Workers’ Compensation, or “Work Comp,” is a form of insurance, obtained by employers, which provides funds for loss of income and medical benefits to the employers’ employees who were injured in the course and scope of their employment. The trade-off is that employees, while they are guaranteed some form of compensation through Work Comp, automatically surrender their right to bring a private civil negligence action against their employer. But as our personal injury lawyers at Aronberg & Aronberg know, there are exceptions to the Workers’ Comp prohibition on private suits against an employer whose negligence caused you physical injury.
A major case, the result of which has proven incredibly beneficial to those who have been injured due to the wrongdoing of their employers, is called Laidlow v. Hariton Machinery Co., y así lo decidió la Corte Suprema de Nueva Jersey en 2002. Dado que la negligencia, y el agravio en general, forman parte de lo que llamamos el “derecho consuetudinario”, las sentencias de tribunales de otros estados pueden resultar relevantes y persuasivas. Es decir, en ausencia de estatutos que dicten exactamente cómo manejar todos estos asuntos, todo lo que nosotros, y los tribunales, tenemos que tener en cuenta es lo que los tribunales han hecho en el pasado: y Laidlow Es un gran ejemplo de un tribunal que decide sobre una cuestión de derecho consuetudinario con implicaciones en todo el país.
En Laidlow, el tribunal sostuvo que, a pesar de que el empleado estaba cubierto por la Compensación Laboral, aún podía presentar una demanda civil privada por negligencia contra su empleador (es decir, el empleador no estaría protegido por la Compensación Laboral) cuando el empleado puede probar que el empleador sabía con certeza sustancial que sus acciones causarían daño al empleado y que la lesión resultante no era parte inherente del tipo de trabajo que realizaba el empleado. Como saben nuestros abogados de lesiones personales, un caso similar en Florida, Turner contra PCR, Inc., sostuvo que los empleadores no gozan de inmunidad frente a una demanda interpuesta por un empleado cuando la causa de la acción es un presunto agravio intencional.
De estos fallos, podemos inferir que un demandante que ha resultado lesionado debido a actos intencionales (o, según el tribunal de Nueva Jersey, actos de los que el empleador estaba «sustancialmente seguro» de que causarían daño al demandante) de un empleado podría no estar limitado por la compensación laboral; es decir, si bien la compensación laboral seguirá proporcionando un beneficio al empleado lesionado, no le impedirá reclamar la cantidad total que considera que se le debe.
Si tiene alguna pregunta sobre este o cualquier otro asunto de lesiones personales, comuníquese con nuestros abogados de lesiones personales de Delray Beach en las Oficinas Legales de Aronberg & Aronberg llamando al 561-266-9191 o enviándonos un correo electrónico a daronberg@aronberglaw.com. ¡Estaremos encantados de ayudarle!
