Tag Archives: intoxication

Post-Injury Drug Test? OSHA Says Not So Fast

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Workers who report an on-the-job injury may not be subject to mandatory drug testing if a new rule from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration that prohibits blanket post-injury drug tests withstands a court challenge from employers.

In May, OSHA published a rule prohibiting employers from having policies that force employees hurt on the job to take drug tests because of concerns about retaliation. This blog has long recognized the potential for retaliation that mandatory drug tests pose and supports the proposed rule by OSHA. OSHA’s new rule was drafted at roughly the same time as the release of the U.S. Department of Labor report that was critical of the shortcomings in state workers’ compensation systems.

Though OSHA implemented the limits on drug testing to limit retaliation, the rules limiting drug testing also help preserve employee doctor choice, which is an integral part of workers’ compensation law in Nebraska and other states. Many employers will inform employees that they must get drug tested at an occupational medicine clinic if they have a work injury even if workers have a right to see their own doctor. This can lead to employees being forced back to work too soon and or not receiving sufficient treatment for their work injuries. Both the fear of retaliation and the circumvention of doctor choice rules lead the costs of work injuries to be borne by employees, which is a major concern of the Department of Labor.

Due to push back from employers, the rule’s enforcement will be postponed until Nov. 1 and will likely be delayed longer due to a court challenge to the rule. A challenge to a Labor Department rule deeming that home health aides were employees for the purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act took over a year to work its way through the federal courts, until it was upheld by a federal circuit court in June.

Even if the rule is implemented, post-injury drug testing will not disappear from the workplace. Employers can still test if they have a reasonable suspicion of intoxication or drug use. Most federal and defense contractors will be exempt from the OSHA rule, as well as truckers and railroad employees. Furthermore, in states with drug-free workplace laws, mandatory post-injury testing may still be permitted, depending on the language of the statute. Nebraska allows employers to fire an employee who refuses a lawful request for a drug test. If the new OSHA rule is ultimately upheld by the federal courts, I would expect a push by employers to amend drug-free workplace laws.

The offices of Rehm, Bennett, Moore & Rehm, which also sponsors the Trucker Lawyers website, are located in Lincoln and Omaha, Nebraska. Five attorneys represent plaintiffs in workers’ compensation, personal injury, employment and Social Security disability claims. The firm’s lawyers have combined experience of more than 95 years of practice representing injured workers and truck drivers in Nebraska, Iowa and other states with Nebraska and Iowa jurisdiction. The lawyers regularly represent hurt truck drivers and often sue Crete Carrier Corporation, K&B Trucking, Werner Enterprises, UPS, and FedEx. Lawyers in the firm hold licenses in Nebraska and Iowa and are active in groups such as the College of Workers’ Compensation Lawyers, Workers' Injury Law & Advocacy Group (WILG), American Association for Justice (AAJ), the Nebraska Association of Trial Attorneys (NATA), and the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA). We have the knowledge, experience and toughness to win rightful compensation for people who have been injured or mistreated.

This entry was posted in employment law, Workers' Compensation and tagged , , , , , .

Fault Doesn’t Matter in Workers’ Compensation, Except When It Matters

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fingerpointingWorkers’ compensation law is founded on a compromise where employees give up the right to sue their employers for negligence in order to receive relatively certain benefits. What plaintiff’s lawyers like me don’t often say is that workers can generally collect benefits if they share some – or even all of the blame – for a work injury.

But the idea of fault has not been entirely erased from workers’ compensation law. Our colleagues at The Jernigan Law Firm in North Carolina recently discussed in a blog post how employer violations of safety rules could lead to increases in benefits, while employee violation of safety laws could lead to decreases in benefits.

Nebraska does not increase or decrease benefits based on safety-rule violations like North Carolina, but Nebraska does allow employers to avoid paying benefits if they can prove a worker’s willful negligence or intoxication was the cause of the work injury. This is a difficult burden for an employer to meet, but employees can still lose cases based upon willful negligence.

If an employer is going to claim a worker was willfully negligent because of a safety violation, a court will consider five factors as to whether an employee was willfully negligent. These factors are

  1. whether the employer had a reasonable rule designed to protect the safety and health of the employee
  2. whether the employee was on notice of the rule
  3. whether the employee understood the danger involved by violating the rule
  4. whether the rule was kept alive by bona fide enforcement and
  5. whether the employee had an excuse for the rule violation.

Whether an employee willfully violated a safety rule is a question of fact that depends on the circumstances and the credibility of the parties testifying in a case.

Nebraska law holds that ordinary negligence by a worker is not a bar to benefits. But an employer can delay benefits under the argument that but for the employee’s negligence, the employee’s injury could have been accommodated. That is an open question under Nebraska law. But if there is no question that an employee cannot work, and the worker is fired for negligence in connection with a work injury, the employer should still have to pay benefits.

Intoxication is often grouped with willful negligence under Nebraska law. It is very difficult for an employer to deny benefits based on intoxication causing the work accident. Another issue related to intoxication is when an employee tests positive for drugs after a work accident even if there is no evidence of intoxication at the time of the injury. A positive drug test will not bar an employee from receiving workers’ compensation benefits in Nebraska, but it could delay lost time or temporary disability benefits if an employer argues that temporary restrictions could be accommodated but for the employee’s termination for cause.

If an employee is not at fault for an injury, there may be other ways for an employee to be compensated. If an injury is caused by the negligence of a third party, the employee can sue that third party. If an employer retaliates against an employee for reporting an unsafe working condition that causes an injury, then the worker could pursue a retaliation case. Employees should also be skeptical if they are wrongfully blamed for a work accident, as this could be a form of retaliation. Another possible form of retaliation is when an employee is fired for having a work injury as a probationary employee or having too many injuries, regardless of fault.

The offices of Rehm, Bennett, Moore & Rehm, which also sponsors the Trucker Lawyers website, are located in Lincoln and Omaha, Nebraska. Five attorneys represent plaintiffs in workers’ compensation, personal injury, employment and Social Security disability claims. The firm’s lawyers have combined experience of more than 95 years of practice representing injured workers and truck drivers in Nebraska, Iowa and other states with Nebraska and Iowa jurisdiction. The lawyers regularly represent hurt truck drivers and often sue Crete Carrier Corporation, K&B Trucking, Werner Enterprises, UPS, and FedEx. Lawyers in the firm hold licenses in Nebraska and Iowa and are active in groups such as the College of Workers’ Compensation Lawyers, Workers' Injury Law & Advocacy Group (WILG), American Association for Justice (AAJ), the Nebraska Association of Trial Attorneys (NATA), and the American Board of Trial Advocates (ABOTA). We have the knowledge, experience and toughness to win rightful compensation for people who have been injured or mistreated.

This entry was posted in Safety Rules, Safety violations, Workers' Compensation, Workplace Injury and tagged , , , , .