In Washington Metropolitan Area Transit v. Robert Washington,
the Court of Special Appeals found a proper discharge for lying under oath to
obtain Worker’s Compensation benefits, did not bar subsequent testimony about loss
of wages after termination from employment.
Mr. Robert Washington (“Washington ”) appealed a decision of the Maryland
Workers’ Compensation Commission (“Commission”) which issued an award of 22% disability
and industrial loss of use of his body as a result of an injury to his back. The appeal was heard in the Circuit Court for
Prince George ’s County, where the jury found Washington sustained a
64% disability and industrial loss of use of his body as a result of the
accident arising out of and in the course of his employment. The employer, Washington Metropolitan Area
Transit Authority (“WMATA”) appealed the decision to the Court of Special
Appeals of Maryland arguing the circuit court erred in allowing evidence of
past and present lost wages and income.
During the initial appeal to the Circuit Court for Prince
George’s County, WMATA unsuccessfully
moved to exclude all evidence Washington intended to present on his past and
present loss of income from WMATA as well as any evidence of his past and
current income from his limousine company, Tilly’s. WMATA argued that evidence
of any wage differential was irrelevant because the wage loss was not the
result of the accidental injury, but instead due to his discharge of employment
for making fraudulent statements under oath in order to obtain benefits. WMATA also argued that the evidence was prejudicial
and the jury may decide to punish WMATA as a result of discharging Washington .
At the Circuit Court trial, Washington’s attorney relied
heavily on the fact that his income from Tilly’s was approximately one quarter
of his salary from WMATA and strongly suggested this was evidence Washington
had a 75% disability and loss of use of his body. He used this argument in both his opening and
closing statements and presented evidence of the disparity of the wages before
the accident compared to his current income from Tilly’s.
At the hearing before the Court of Special Appeals, WMATA
argued the evidence of wages, past and current, was irrelevant and had unfairly
prejudiced the jury. The test used to
determine the degree of disability is whether a claimant’s injuries allow him
to return to and adequately perform his prior job with the employer, and
whether the workplace injury caused a reduction of wages. Getson
v. WM Bancorp, 346 Md.
48,62 (1997).
While the issues have been resolved in other states with
regard to temporary total disability (“TTD”), Maryland has not directly
addressed these issues with regard to a permanency award. WMATA argued that many states, albeit, the
minority of states, have found that an employee who is fired for misconduct has
voluntarily removed himself from the workforce and is not entitled to lost wages. The Court of Special Appeals of Maryland does
not agree with this argument and has held in the past that TTD was based on the
diminished earning capacity and not actual loss of wages. In fact, neither a voluntary retirement (Victor v Proctor & Gamble Mfg. Co.
318 Md. 624 (1990)) nor an incarceration after the injury (Bowen v. Smith, 342 Md. 449 (1996)) prevented the claimant from
receiving TTD benefits. In both cases,
the court found it was the injury which caused the claimant to become disabled,
not the retirement or incarceration.
The Court of Special Appeals
found it was no great leap to conclude from these cases that an employee’s
termination would not automatically bar benefits if the claimant’s evidence
demonstrated that his or her disability caused the subsequent inability to find
work. While the court did not want to
condone such conduct as lying under oath as Washington had done at the TTD hearing
before the Commission, the court noted that the General Assembly has barred
compensation only for an employee who is convicted
of knowingly affecting or attempting to affect the payment of workers’
compensation by means of a fraudulent representation. Lab. & Empl. § 9-1106.
Additionally, the court pointed
to the requested and obtained a special verdict on the issue of whether the
percentage of disability and incidental loss was the result of the loss of Washington ’s job with
WMATA. The jury answered the question in
the negative.
WMATA was successful on its
second issue which was whether or not the Circuit Court erred in allowing
testimony of the income Washington derived from Tilly’s. Most of the income Tilly’s made was used to
purchase additional limousines rather than to pay Washington .
The court agreed that evidence of the minimal business profits of
Tilly’s should have been excluded. The
general rule is that profits derived from a business are not to be considered
as earnings and cannot be accepted as a measure of loss of earning power unless
they are almost entirely the direct result of the claimant’s personal
management and endeavors. This was not
the case for Washington as he owned five limousines and clearly profits were
not a result of his personal endeavors alone.
Given Washington’s persistence in suggesting his only income from
Tilly’s was about one quarter of his wages at WMATA suggesting a 75% Loss of
Use, the court believes the jury was prejudiced by this information.
The Court of Special Appeals
remanded the case back to Circuit Court due to its error in not granting, in
part, WMATA’s motion in limine to exclude evidence on Washington’s private business
income.
Article Contributed by Alicyn C.
Campbell
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