CO - Court Upholds Dismissal of Firefighter's Bad Faith Claims
01/29/2026 | 0
A federal appellate court in an unpublished decision upheld a grant of summary judgment dismissing a Colorado volunteer firefighter’s bad faith actions against the administrators who handled his claim.
Cyrus Rajabi served as a volunteer firefighter for the Arvada Fire Protection District. He suffered injuries during a training exercise in April 2017.
Arvada Fire reported the incident to its insurance carrier, which used Tristar Group as its claims administrator. Sedgwick Claims Management Services Inc. took over as the claims administrator in July 2020.
Rajabi was diagnosed with compl...
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The Missouri Court of Appeals upheld the denial of an employer’s motion to set aside a default judgment as untimely.
Case: Gamez v. EasyEx MO Ofallon LLC, No. ED113623, 01/13/2026, published.
Facts and procedural history: Celestina Gamez worked for EasyEx MO Ofallon LLC. After her employment ended, she filed suit against EasyEx, asserting claims for violations of the Missouri Human Rights Act and the workers’ compensation law.
EasyEx’s registered agent was served in December 2023.
After EasyEx failed to respond to the lawsuit, a trial judge entered a default judgment agai...
A New York appellate court ruled that a worker was entitled to summary judgment on his Labor Law claim for a fall from a ramp into an adjacent trench.
Case: Altamirano v. Frick Collection, No. 156167/22, 01/06/2025, published.
Facts: Segundo Altamirano allegedly suffered injuries while he and some co-workers were maneuvering a four-wheeled "mini container" of debris down a ramp at a construction site.
The ramp spanned a height differential of 2 feet between two buildings and was adjacent to a trench that was 3 or 4 feet deep. There were no guardrails to prevent Altamirano fro...
A New York appellate court ruled that a worker who fell from a scaffold was entitled to summary judgment on his Labor Law claim.
Case: Tejeda v. 57th & 6th Ground LLC, No. 157783/18, 596011/19, 01/08/2026, published.
Facts: Juan Miguel Presinal Tejeda suffered injuries when he fell off a scaffold while performing painting work for his employer, ASK Standard Transit Corp.
The accident happened at a property owned by 57th & 6th Ground LLC, Carnegie House Tenants Corp. and Georgetown 57 LLC.
Procedural history: Tejeda filed suit against the property owners, asserting a claim for a vio...
An attorney in New Jersey recently asked me a question I have not been asked before, namely, whether some permanency evaluators ask too many questions of examinees.
This attorney commented that some of the experts seem to be engaging in discovery with all their questions. This got me thinking about what permanency evaluators are supposed to be focusing on during examinations. What kinds of questions are crucial to ask under New Jersey law during a permanency exam?
In my opinion, a lawyer cannot practice workers’ compensation law very well, and a doctor cannot perf...
NY - Roofing Contractor Settles With Feds Over Fatal 2021 Fall
A New York roofing contractor settled with the U.S. Labor Department over workplace safety violations stemming from a 2021 fatal fall through an unprotected skylight.
An investigation by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration found that DME Construction Associates failed to protect workers from fall hazards at a municipal building project in Oyster Bay, where employees were replacing steel roof decking. In August 2021, an employee fell about 18 feet through a skylight and later died from his injuries.
OSHA determined that workers were exposed to fall hazards of up to 22 feet ...
The California Senate passed an amended bill to adjust permanent partial disability benefits that no longer includes an automatic adjustment for inflation.
The Senate on Tuesday voted 30-10 to pass SB 555, by Sen. Anna Caballero, D-Fresno, which would set permanent partial disability benefits in statute for injuries occurring on or after Jan. 1. As passed, the bill contains blank spaces instead of specifying what the minimum and maximum PPD benefits would be.
Earlier versions of SB 555 proposed automatically increasing PPD benefits each year based on the cost-of-living adjustment fo...
The California Division of Workers' Compensation on Wednesday said all applicants for reappointment as a qualified medical evaluator must satisfy new continuing education requirements by April 1.
In February 2024, the Office of Administrative Law approved rules that the DWC proposed, which included new educational criteria for QMEs seeking reappointment after April 1, 2026.
California Code of Regulations 55.1 requires 16 continuing education hours for reappointment as a QME. The curriculum must include four hours of instruction in disability impairment rating and three hours of inst...
The Industrial Commission of Arizona is holding hearings in February to discuss proposed revisions to its fee schedule.
This year's update to the Arizona Physicians' and Pharmaceutical Fee Schedule Proposal includes a newly developed dental fee schedule and will take effect May 1, the ICA said.
Proposed conversion factors for the 2026/2027 fee schedule are unchanged.
The ICA is holding a stakeholder meeting at 10 a.m. Feb. 12 at 800 W. Washington St. in Phoenix.
The commission will hold the annual fee schedule public hearing at 1 p.m. Feb. 26 at the Phoenix office as part of its sc...
A bill introduced Tuesday in the Vermont Senate would extend workers' compensation to include post-traumatic stress disorder benefits for emergency communications personnel, aligning them with protections afforded to traditional first responders.
S.B. 306 would recognize 911 call takers, public safety dispatchers and other emergency communications workers as “first responders in communications.” The measure would allow those workers to receive training opportunities and access to mental health support, and it would create a presumption that PTSD diagnosed after their service i...
The Division of Workers' Compensation proposed a maximum hourly rate of $500 for attorneys to prepare injured workers for a deposition and to represent them during the proceeding in rules posted to its online forum for an informal comment period.
Attorneys would need to be certified by the State Bar as workers' compensation specialists to receive the maximum fee under draft rules the division promulgated Monday.
For attorneys without that certification, fees would be based on experience. The cap would be $450 for those with at least five years of experience, and $400 for attorne...
An Arizona appellate court ruled that a municipal risk pool was a public entity and that it and its claims administrator were entitled to summary judgment dismissing an injured police officer’s bad faith claims against them.
Case: Wagner v. Arizona Municipal Risk Retention Pool, No. 1 CA-CV 24-0562, 01/07/2026, published.
Facts: Zaki Wagner worked for the City of Maricopa as a police officer. After being injured in the course and scope of his employment in 2018, Wagner filed a workers’ compensation claim with the Arizona Municipal Risk Retention Pool. The pool is an Arizona insur...
A New York appellate court ruled that a claim by an ironworker's foreman was properly dismissed because the work he was doing when injured was not covered by the Labor Law.
Case: Buckley v. The Hearst Corp., No. 160500/16, 01/06/2025, published.
Facts: Sean Buckley, an ironworker's foreman, was injured while he was assisting a consulting engineer who was inspecting exterior facade remediation work on a building owned by The Hearst Corp.
Buckley and the engineer used a motorized scaffold to examine the building.
As they reached the 18th floor, the scaffold's ...
A New York appellate court ruled that a worker was entitled to summary judgment on his Labor Law claim for his injuries from a misstep on an incomplete staircase.
Case: Telesford v. Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, No. 25178/16, 01/06/2026, published.
Facts: Kevon Telesford allegedly suffered injuries while working on a construction project.
According to Telesford, he was descending a staircase, and as he stepped onto a stair at its bottom, the Corex — a white material placed on all the stairs to protect the marble — collapsed, and his foot went into a hole 8...
The West Virginia Supreme Court upheld an award of 0% permanent partial disability for a worker’s occupational pneumoconiosis claim.
Case: Kyle v. Patriot Coal Corp., No. 25-605, 01/13/2026, published.
Facts: Terry Kyle worked for Patriot Coal Corp. He filed a workers’ compensation claim, asserting that he had stopped working in November 2015 due to health issues.
The physicians’ portion of the form was completed by nurse Erica Stanley and Dr. Richard Spencer. Stanley and Spencer opined that Kyle had occupational pneumoconiosis.
A claims administrator for Patriot’s ...
