Washington proposes new workers’ comp law

• Washington, D.C., enacted a temporary statutory amendment to allow individuals to receive workers’ compensation benefits under D.C. law even if they had also received or were receiving worker’s compensation benefits for the same injury or death under the law of another jurisdiction.
• This legislation is being sought to become permanent following the expiration of the temporary status of the amendment.
• This temporary legislation marked a dramatic shift in the previously interpreted law of well over two decades that established that an employee who obtains benefits in another jurisdiction is not entitled to seek additional benefits in the District.
• The law, as it was, played a pivotal role for employees and their counsels in deciding what jurisdiction to establish their claim and on the other side how to formulate certain defenses.
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Man fired from job after receiving workers’ comp

• A TikTok user has sparked discussion after claiming that he was fired from his job while he was receiving workers’ compensaion.
• The man was injured last year at work by a forklift has undergone numerous surgeries.
• Laws around termination and workers’ compensation are complicated. In general, an employer cannot fire you or otherwise retaliate against you for filing a workers’ compensation claim.
• “This is how they treat you if you get injured on the job,” he writes in the caption. “Corporations are heartless, they see you as a dollar sign or a statistic.”
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Police officer files retaliatory claim

• A former Glenville police officer who resigned after facing disciplinary charges for filing a false workers’ compensation claim has taken legal action against the state and town after losing his police certification.
• He claims the decision was retaliatory and violated the terms of an arbitration agreement.
• Benjamin Ferretti filed the lawsuit claiming the state’s Division of Criminal Justice Services wrongly terminated his police certification after the police chief provided documentation containing “numerous false statements” months after he left the department on good terms to pursue employment elsewhere.
• The lawsuit, which seeks to reinstate Ferretti’s certification, names DCJS, the town of Glenville, and the Glenville Police Department as defendants.
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Construction worker run over by truck

• A construction worker in New York State was seriously injured after he stepped out of a portable toilet at a work site and was hit by a water truck.
• The worker was exiting a portable toilet on site and was struck by a reversing water truck. The truck ran over the man’s torso and legs.
• The portable toilet was placed in a spot in which people exiting the toilet would be directly in the path of vehicles passing by the site.
• A report was sent to OSHA after the victim was rushed to the hospital.
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