Virginia school teacher files $40M lawsuit
- A Virginia teacher who was shot by a 6-year-old student filed a $40 million lawsuit alleging school administrators shrugged off multiple warnings the boy had a gun and posed an imminent threat.
- A lawyer disagreed with the idea that Abigail Zwerner’s negligence suit should be a workers’ compensation claim under Virginia law since theoretically, workers can’t sue their employers.
- The suit alleges Assistant Principal Ebony Parker chose to breach her assumed duty to protect Zwerner, “despite multiple reports that a firearm was on school property and likely in possession of a violent individual.
- Also named as defendants are the Newport News School Board, former schools Superintendent George Parker III, and Richneck principal Briana Foster Newton.
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Negligence claim allowed to move forward
- An Illinois appeals court has reversed a lower court ruling in a case involving an injured professional softball player.
- The court ruled the trial judge improperly dismissed a negligence claim over the employer’s alleged failure to maintain workers’ compensation insurance coverage.
- The First District, Fifth Division Appellate Court of Illinois partially affirmed and partially reversed a circuit court judge’s decision in a case brought by Emily Allard.
- Allard suffered a head injury in June 2016 while playing against the Akron Racers at Firestone Stadium in Ohio.
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Keeping up with workers’ comp
- The accuracy of workers’ compensation premiums depends largely on the accuracy of payroll calculations.
- There are steps help minimize the risk of a significant audit variance that could have a significant impact on a business’s cash flow.
- Check premiums for signs that you may be paying too much or not enough for the compensation policy.
- Improperly classifying employees’ jobs is a common mistake that can impact your premiums.
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Minnesota workers’ comp bill proposed
- Minnesota lawmakers have proposed legislation that would amend a worker’s compensation law where private self-insured employers are determined to be insolvent.
- The bill centers around self-insured employers who are penalized by the workers’ comp commissioner after failure to pay comp benefits when the self-insured file for bankruptcy.
- The bill would require self-insureds to notify the comp commissioner of the bankruptcy petition under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code and when a court declares the self-insured to be bankrupt.
- The commissioner must call the security deposit in cases where the self-insureds fail to pay workers’ comp benefits after insolvency.
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