Summary
In Dillon, a case under former Paragraph (D), we established a rule allowing claimants to clarify charges through amendment even after the two-year limitations period for filing a VSSR application had expired.
Summary of this case from State ex Rel. Bauer Sons v. Indus. CommOpinion
No. 82-1442
Decided August 24, 1983.
Workers' compensation — Failure to designate numerically on application specific safety requirement — Application sufficient, when.
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County.
E.S. Gallon Assoc. Co., L.P.A., Mr. Richard M. Malone and Mr. John A. Cervay, for appellee.
Smith Schnacke Co., L.P.A., Mr. Gary W. Auman and Mr. Brad A. Chalker, for appellant Dayton Press, Inc.
On December 27, 1977, appellee, Clyde W. Dillon, was injured while in the course and scope of his employment with appellant, Dayton Press, Inc., when his right hand became caught in the rollers of an auxiliary unit to an offset press. Appellee's claim filed with the Bureau of Workers' Compensation for this injury was allowed for "compound fractures of the proximal and middle phalanges of [the] right ring finger and middle phalange of [the] little finger, along with extensive lacerations with tendon involvement."
On November 6, 1979, without benefit of legal counsel, appellee filed an application for an additional award with the Industrial Commission (hereinafter "commission") on the basis that appellant had violated specific safety requirements applicable to the equipment being operated when the injuries were sustained. Although the application contained a claim number, the name of the claimant and the employer, and a detailed description of the physical injuries sustained, as well as delineating which safety devices were lacking, it failed to numerically designate the specific safety requirements allegedly violated.
The application provided by the commission and appellee's answers to the questions posed thereon provides:
In January 1981, a hearing was conducted before a staff hearing officer on the issue of the sufficiency of the application. At that time, appellee was given thirty days in which to respond to appellant's contention that the application was procedurally defective. Appellee then obtained legal counsel and proceeded to file an amended application containing essentially the same information included on the original application with the exception that specific numerical designations were included thereon.
On March 27, 1981, the hearing officer denied appellee's initial application "for the reason that it does not cite any specific safety requirement adopted by the General Assembly or the Industrial Commission." Although the hearing officer acknowledged receipt of the amended application, it was not considered, having been deemed filed in an untimely fashion. Appellee's motion for rehearing was later denied.
Appellee subsequently filed in the court of appeals the present action in mandamus alleging that the commission abused its discretion when the application was dismissed for failure to cite numerically the specific safety requirements allegedly violated. Appellee's complaint sought an order compelling the commission to allow the filing of an amended application and to consider the merits of his claim. The court of appeals granted the writ.
The cause is now before this court on an appeal as of right.
Ohio Adm. Code 4121-3-20 sets forth procedural requirements applicable to claims asserting an employer's violation of a specific safety requirement. That section provides in pertinent part:
"(A) An application for an additional award of compensation founded upon the claim that the injury * * * resulted from the failure of the employer to comply with * * * [a] specific [safety] requirement * * * must be filed * * * with the industrial commission, within two years of the injury * * *. Such applications should set forth the facts which are the basis of the alleged violation and shall cite the section or sections of the law or code of specific safety requirements which it is claimed have been violated. * * *
"* * *
"(D) * * * Within thirty days from the receipt of the investigation report, the claimant may amend his application to include any violation demonstrated by the investigation, but in no event more than two years from the date of the injury." (Emphasis added.)
Appellant's primary contention is as follows: that pursuant to Ohio Adm. Code 4121-3-20 (A) and (D), an application for an additional award based upon the violation of a specific safety requirement must be filed with the commission and numerically designate the safety requirement claimed to have been violated within two years of the injury. According to appellant, these requirements are jurisdictional in nature and the failure of a claimant to comply constitutes justifiable cause for the commission to dismiss an application. In support of this contention, appellant principally relies upon State, ex rel. Fruehauf Trailer Co., v. Coffinberry (1950), 154 Ohio St. 241 [43 O.O. 126], and State, ex rel. DeBoe, v. Indus. Comm. (1954), 161 Ohio St. 67 [53 O.O. 5].
In State, ex rel. Fruehauf Trailer Co., supra, the claimant filed a formal application for the violation of several specific safety requirements more than two years after the date of his injury. An examination of the facts contained therein reveals that approximately twenty-two months after the date of the claimant's injury, his wife sent the first of several communications to the commission in an attempt to secure the proper forms upon which to file for an additional award. Despite having made three requests within the two-year period, the claimant did not receive and therefore file the proper forms until the limitation period had elapsed. The issue presented was whether the correspondence between the claimant's wife and the commission constituted a claim for the award within the two-year limitation period.
This court held that it did not, concluding that the letters in question were insufficient to constitute an application for an additional award under Commission Rule No. 1 which was the functional equivalent of Ohio Adm. Code 4121-3-20 (A).
Although having been displaced by Ohio Adm. Code 4121-3-20(A), Commission Rule No. 1 provided:
"An application for additional award of compensation based upon the claim that the injury, occupational disease or death resulted because of the failure of the employer to comply with a specific requirement for the protection of the health, lives or safety of employees, must be filed within two years after the date of such injury, occupational disease or death, in duplicate, on forms prescribed by the Industrial Commission, setting forth the facts which are the basis of the alleged violation, and the section or sections of the law or code of specific requirements applicable."
In State, ex rel. DeBoe, supra, the claimant filed his application for additional compensation within the two-year period. However, after the expiration of the two-year period and the commission's denial of the claim, the employee filed a motion for reconsideration asserting for the first time a violation by his employer of another specific safety requirement not set forth in his original application.
The motion was denied by the commission. This court upheld that determination concluding, inter alia, that the motion for reconsideration presented an altogether separate and distinct claim for the violation of a specific safety requirement which had not been asserted within the two-year period.
Also at issue in State, ex rel. DeBoe, supra, was Commission Rule No. 1. See footnote 2, supra.
Appellee argues that our decisions in State, ex rel. Fruehauf Trailer Co. and State, ex rel. DeBoe, are readily distinguishable from the case at bar in that the issue presented in those cases involved whether the applications had been timely filed, whereas the present issue relates to the specificity of an application. We agree, and for the reasons that follow we affirm the judgment of the court of appeals.
This court has previously expressed the view that the state workers' compensation system is designed to enable injured workers to file and process claims without the necessity of hiring legal counsel. Roma v. Indus. Comm. (1918), 97 Ohio St. 247, 252. In addition, R.C. 4123.10 provides that "[t]he industrial commission shall not be bound by the usual common law or statutory rules of evidence or by any technical or formal rules of procedure * * *."
Consistent with this legislative policy, we have on numerous occasions held that technical rules of procedure should not be allowed to defeat an otherwise valid claim under the Workers' Compensation Act. W.S. Tyler Co. v. Rebic (1928), 118 Ohio St. 522; Kaiser v. Indus. Comm. (1940), 136 Ohio St. 440 [17 O.O. 22]; Toler v. Copeland Corp. (1983), 5 Ohio St.3d 88. Nonetheless, the commission's decision effectively applies rules more stringent that those provided for by the Ohio Rules of Civil Procedure applicable to the courts of law.
Although Kaiser, supra, involved the sufficiency of an application for initial benefits, we find the rationale contained therein particularly applicable to the case at bar where, at pages 445-446, it was stated:
"* * * A petition in a civil action may be amended after the running of the statute of limitation provided the cause of action is not changed, upon the theory that the amended pleading relates back to the commencement of the action. * * * If a petition, which is governed by more or less technical rules of pleading, may be so amended, a fortiori, an application for compensation not governed by technical rules may be.
"* * * [O]ccasions may arise in which an amendment may be necessary by reason of a mistake or incompleteness in the original application. In such cases an amended application or an amendment to the application may be filed."
Clearly, claimants do not enjoy an absolute right to amend applications. However, to deny an amendment under the facts sub judice constitutes an abuse of discretion. Here, the application was filed within the two-year limitation period on a form prescribed by the commission not clearly calling for the numerical designation of the specific safety violation claimed to have been violated. In addition, the record fails to indicate that appellee was notified or otherwise advised by the commission that his application was defective prior to the expiration of the two-year limitation period.
R.C. 4123.512 requires, inter alia, the commission to "aid and assist a claimant in the filing of a claim and to advise the claimant of his rights under the law."
Equally important is the fact that an examination of the application and the detailed statements contained therein demonstrates that the application is sufficiently explicit to place the commission and the employer on notice as to which specific safety requirements were claimed to have been violated. Moreover the amendment sought by appellee does not raise an unstated claim; rather, it merely seeks to clarify a previously alleged violation. To deny an amendment under these circumstances "would be to apply technical rules to the application and deny continuing jurisdiction." Kaiser, at 447. Accord Toler v. Copeland Corp., supra. Accordingly, appellee may amend his application to provide the section numbers of specific safety violations which correlate to the narrative statements contained in his original application.
Appellee seeks to amend his application to include the following numerical designations: Ohio Adm. Code 4121:1-5-05 (D)(1) and (H). Section (D)(1) provides:
"Means shall be provided at each machine, within easy reach of the operator, for disengaging it from its power supply. This shall not apply to rolling departments of iron and steel mills nor to electrical generation or conversion equipment."
Section (H) provides:
"Power-driven feed rolls, when exposed to contact, shall be guarded so as to prevent the hands of the operator from coming into contact with the in-running rolls at any point."
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the court of appeals granting the writ is hereby affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
CELEBREZZE, C.J., W. BROWN, SWEENEY, LOCHER, HOLMES, C. BROWN and J.P. CELEBREZZE, JJ., concur.