Michigan Legislators Mull WC Benefits Changes

• Pending legislation in Michigan could affect death benefits for spouses of workers killed on the job, and, separately, addresses the question of whether an injured worker who is fired can still collect disability benefits.
• S.B. 1079, introduced by Sen. John Cherry, would add language that states “if an employee, after being employed… for less than 100 weeks, loses the employee’s job, the employee’s personal injury is conclusively presumed to result in disability connected to wage loss, unless the employee’s employer establishes that the employee’s willful and serious misconduct resulted in the termination of the employee’s employment.”
• S.B. 1080, introduced by State Sen. Mary Cavanagh, would add language that death benefits are awarded if “the employee’s spouse who is living with the employee at the time of death is conclusively presumed to be wholly dependent on the employee’s earnings for support for a period of 208 weeks after the date of death.”
• Both have been referred to the Michigan Senate’s Labor committee.
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NY Killer’s Workers’ Comp Payout Can Go to Victim

• A New York Appeals Court ruled that a convicted killer cannot keep money from a workplace injury, after the state’s Attorney General moved to seize a $28,000 WC award, under the state’s Son of Sam law.
• The killer won the award before he was convicted of murder, and the money had been deposited into his local jail account and later to his state prison account. 
• The law, originally enacted to keep 1970s New York serial killer David Berkowitz and other criminals from profiting off their notoriety, was amended in the 1990’s to expand the financial sources that can be tapped for crime victim funds. 
• The court ruled that while workers’ compensation funds are generally exempt from “all claims of creditors,” the Son of Sam law “does not include workers’ compensation benefits in its list of carve-outs.”
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Lawyers Raise Concerns on Independent Medical Exams in Benefit Cut-offs

• Lawyers at Pennsylvania law firm Pond Lehocky Giordano have raised concerns that insurers are misusing independent medical examinations (IMEs) to prematurely cut off injured workers’ benefits.
• In a Nov. 8 op-ed, Ryan Tilley and Taylor Trusky, claimed that Pennsylvania employers and insurers taking advantage of an ambiguity in the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act and are requesting workers submit to an IME performed by employer-selected physicians within the 90-day period before a temporary bureau document converts, and then issuing a denial of the claim outright when a worker does not attend an IME or issuing a denial based on the IME physician’s full recovery opinion.
• “It’s time the commonwealth’s workers’ compensation judges (WCJs) put an end to these antics in the cases before them and for the Pennsylvania General Assembly to amend the act to prevent employers and insurers from using these antics in the future,” they wrote.
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