By: The Workers' Compensation Practice Group
In Virginia, a finding that a claimant’s injury was caused by his or her own willful misconduct bars the claimant’s entitlement to benefits under the Workers’ Compensation Act. If you tuned in for our June 2014 E-Blast, you may remember the case of Layne v. Crist, JCN No. VA02000002019 (May 20, 2014), in which the Full Commission took note of the conflicting case law surrounding the requirements of proving that the claimant’s injury was caused by his or her own willful misconduct.
When this Opinion was appealed, the Court of Appeals seized the opportunity to address this request from the Full Commission to clarify the requirements of proving willful misconduct. The Court wrote that, while the act must be “willful” for willful misconduct’s bar to compensation to apply, the “employer is not required to prove that the employee, with the [safety] rule in mind, purposely determined to break it.” Moreover, the Court explained that purposeful or intentional performance of the forbidden act need not be proven by direct evidence, but can be inferred. Applying these rules to Layne, the Court agreed with the Full Commission that the evidence does support a finding of willful misconduct because the claimant, who repeatedly followed the workplace safety rule in the past, did not comply with any of the rule’s components on the date of injury, leading to the reasonable inference that he purposefully, intentionally, and therefore willfully disregarded the safety rule.
Looking forward, the question is whether we will see greater consensus in Full Commission Opinions as a result of the Court of Appeals’ clarification of the evidentiary requirements of proving willful misconduct. Over the past couple of years, frequent dissents have accompanied willful misconduct rulings. For example, in the Full Commission’s Opinion in Layne, Commissioner Marshall dissented in the Full Commission Opinion, opining that there is “little or no way to prove through direct evidence that the employee had a wrongful intention to break an employer’s safety rule.”
Another example of a willful misconduct dissent in the Full Commission is Bishop v. Morris, JCN No. VA00000517537 (September 26, 2013). While the majority of the Full Commission ruled that the evidence demonstrated that the claimant intentionally reached into a machine to remove a clog in violation of the employer’s safety rule, a dissenting opinion in Bishop disagreed, indicating that “the majority’s finding that the claimant deliberately put his fingers under the roller guard to try to remove the [clog was merely] speculative.” Similarly, in Kistler v. Family Discount Pharmacy, Inc., JCN VA00000569269 (July 10, 2013), dissenting Commissioner Marshall disagreed with the majority’s finding of willful misconduct. Commissioner Marshall opined that the claimant’s statement that the car accident was his fault, witness statements that the claimant did not stop at the stop sign, and the claimant’s testimony that he did stop at the stop sign (which the Full Commission determined was an untruthful statement) was not sufficient evidence to demonstrate willfulness. The dissent opined that “willful misconduct imports something more than a mere exercise of the will in doing the act. It imports a wrongful intention.”
While the Court of Appeals has re-asserted and clarified the requirements of asserting a successful willful misconduct defense in Layne, I do not anticipate that dissents will slow in willful misconduct opinions from the Full Commission. As Commissioner Marshall pointed out in Layne, it is rare, if ever, that direct evidence is available to prove that an employee willfully broke a safety rule. Rather, the Deputy Commissioners at hearing, and the Full Commission on appeal, often infer willfulness from past behavior, testimony regarding the claimant’s statements, or the factual details of the accident to make a finding of willfulness. The willful misconduct defense is unique in this way and, as a result, will likely remain a frequent source of dissenting opinions.
