“The benefits of this system accrue both to the employer, who is
relieved from common-law tort liability for negligently inflicted
injuries, and to the employee, who is assured prompt payment of
benefits.” . . . “That philosophy has commonly been described as
a quid pro quo on both sides: in return for the purchase of
insurance against job-related injuries, the employer receives tort
immunity, in return for giving up the right to sue the employer,
the employee receives swift and sure benefits.”
Messer, 218 at __, 620 S.E.2d at 149 (quoting State ex rel. Abraham Linc Corp. v. Bedell, 216 W.Va. 99, 103, 602 S.E.2d 542, 546 and n.7 (2004) (citations omitted). At the heart of
any workers' compensation schema is a recognition that in exchange for extending statutorily
designated benefits for workplace injuries, an employer gains a guarantee that this statutory
system of recovery is the exclusive means for compensating his/her employees, barring any
statutory exceptions. See W.Va. Code § 23-2-6; see generally Larson's Workers'
Compensation Law § 100.01 (discussing quid pro quo nature of workers' compensation).
While the exclusive nature of workers compensation recovery passes intellectual
muster where the injury is compensable, a different result obtains when the injury is expressly
excluded from recovery under a statutory system of benefits. In those instances, the
foundational predicate for the exclusivity doctrine _ the quid pro quo _ is noticeably missing.
In recognition of this void, a leading commentator and authority in the area of workers'
compensation has posited that “it ought logically to follow that the employer should be spared
damage liability only when compensation liability has actually been provided in its place, or,”
stated differently, “rights of action for damages should not be deemed taken away except when
something of value has been put in their place.” Larson's, supra, at § 100.04.
This rationale _ that exclusivity only exists where coverage exists _ has been
relied upon by numerous courts to permit recovery. To illustrate, in Kleinhesselink v.
Chevron, 920 P.2d 108 (Mont. 1996), the court held that because the workers' compensation
act expressly excluded emotional and mental stress injuries, an employer was not protected
for tort liability for claims based on such injuries. The same result obtained in Perodeau v.
City of Hartford, 792 A.2d 752 (Conn. 2002), where the court ruled that the exclusivity
provision of the workers' compensation act did not bar the plaintiff's claim for intentional
infliction of emotional distress because that type of claim was expressly excluded from
compensability under the act. See also Acevedo v. Consol. Edison Co., 572 N.Y.S.2d 1015
(N.Y. Sup. 1991) (holding that plaintiffs' claims for medical monitoring were not barred by
exclusiveness doctrine since claims of that sort fall outside jurisdiction of workers'
compensation); see additional cases at Larson's, supra, § 100.04D.
Interestingly, this same rationale was applied by the author of the majority to
reason in Messer that the exclusivity provision of the workers' compensation act (See footnote 4) was
inapplicable with regard to claims for injuries caused by unlawful discriminatory acts where
those injuries “are of a type not otherwise recoverable under the Workers' Compensation Act.”
218 W.Va. at __, 620 S.E.2d at 146, syl. pt. 4, in part. Critical to the decision in Messer was
the unavailability of compensation for injuries such as mental and emotional distress and
anguish that were not associated with a physical injury. Id. at __, 620 S.E.2d at 161. Relying
on the fact that the “Legislature did not intend such injuries to fall within the types of injuries
for which the Workers' Compensation Act was established,” the Court found the exclusivity
provision not to bar an action outside the confines of the workers' compensation schema. Id. at __, 620 S.E.2d at 160. Instead of recognizing that the reasoning employed in Messer would
analogously compel the conclusion that recovery could exist for a mental-mental claim outside
the area of workers' compensation, the majority downplayed the significance of that decision
by relegating its citation to a footnote and omitting any discussion of the reasoning applied in
that case.
In contrast to its treatment of Messer, the majority squarely, but incorrectly,
confronted the existence of an earlier decision of this Court which clearly held that recovery
for workplace injuries not encompassed within the workers' compensation act could be sought
under common law principles. In Jones v. Rinehart & Dennis Co., 113 W.Va. 414, 168 S.E.
482 (1933), this Court ruled that compensation for the disease of silicosis could be sought
against an employer outside the workers' compensation act. That decision was predicated on
the fact that the workers' compensation system, as it existed at that time, provided
compensation only for work-related injuries caused by definite, isolated events. Id. at 423,
168 S.E. at 486. Based on the non-inclusion of silicosis as a compensable injury under the
previous, narrower definition of injury that involved a specific and definite event, this Court
ruled in Jones that the exclusivity provision of the workers' compensation act was
inapplicable.
The majority simply “reasons away” the applicability of the Jones case by
suggesting that, due to the later amendment of the workers' compensation statutes to include
occupational diseases such as silicosis, the holding in that case has been legislatively nullified.
What the majority fails to comprehend is that the key component of Jones as controlling
precedent is not the literal holding that the exclusivity provision is inapplicable to silicosis
claims, but more importantly the reasoning employed by this Court to reach that decision.
Rather than focusing on the narrow issue of whether silicosis claims are within the legislative
ambit of compensable workers' compensation claims, what the majority should have examined
in deciding whether the reasoning of Jones is still controlling was the analysis the Court used
to determine that the workers' compensation exclusivity provision was not a bar to a common
law claim in that case.
Critically, the reasoning employed in Jones is on all fours with the analysis that
Larson identifies in his worker's compensation treatise and that courts around the country have
employed to allow common law suits where injuries are not of the type compensable under the
applicable statutory scheme. In determining whether a common law suit could be maintained
for silicosis, this Court determined in Jones that the statutory language which affords
immunity to subscribing employers ( “is not liable to respond in damages at common law or
by statute for the injury or death of any employee, however occurring”) (See footnote 5) “must not be
determined from its cold phraseology alone.” (See footnote 6) 113 W.Va. at 419, 168 S.E.2d at 484.
Rejecting outright the contention that “an action for damages by an employee against an
employer for injury arising from the employment may not be maintained [outside the statutory
scheme] even though such injury or disability is not compensable,” this Court determined that
the meaning of the immunity provision had to be resolved in conjunction with additional
relevant indicia of intent:
Consideration must be given to the background and purpose of
compensation acts, to the evils sought to be corrected and the
objects to be attained; to the rules of the common law with
relation to right of action for industrial injuries and diseases, both
occupational and otherwise; to the legislative history of our own
act; and to all portions of the act which may be of assistance in
determining the legislative intent . . . .
Id. at 419, 168 S.E.2d at 484.
Of import to this Court in Jones was the precept that a “right of action is [not
to be] taken from employees unless the statutory language is clear and concise and not subject
to any other reasonable construction.” 113 W.Va. at 425, 168 S.E.2d at 487. Stressing that
where two statutory constructions are available, courts prefer to choose the construction that
does not take away a right and the means of obtaining redress for its breach, the Court in Jones
concluded that the immunity provision set forth in West Virginia Code § 23-2-6 only
exempted employers from liability at common law or by statute for compensable injury or
death but not for non-compensable disease. 113 W.Va. at 426, 168 S.E.2d at 487.
The reasoning employed in Jones _ that immunity is only extended to
compensable injuries _ was recently recognized in Ball v. Joy Manufacturing Co., 755
F.Supp. 1344 (S.D. W.Va. 1990), aff'd, 958 F.2d 36 (4th Cir. 1991), when the federal district
court was asked to decide whether workers exposed to toxic chemicals had a common law
claim for emotional distress. In Ball, the district court found the reasoning of Jones, despite
the passage of time, to be germane based on the fact that the Legislature had not adopted any
measures to refute this Court's interpretation that the immunity extended by West Virginia
Code § 23-2-6 to subscribing employers is not applicable where the injuries at issue are
outside the coverage of the workers' compensation act. (See footnote 7)
While not directly citing Jones, this Court closely followed its reasoning in Messer. Starting with the proposition that “the most significant word in the exclusivity
provision of W.Va. Code § 23-2-6 . . . is the term 'injury,'” this Court found that “other
provisions of the Workers' Compensation Act [are required] to determine the Legislature's
intent in defining what is and is not a compensable 'injury' for purposes of the exclusivity
provision.” 218 W.Va. at ___, 620 S.E.2d at 151. Expressly citing the adoption of West
Virginia Code § 23-4-1f, which exempts mental-mental claims from being compensable
injuries, this Court emphasized in Messer that the Legislature intended that certain work-
related injuries and diseases are outside the meaning of the term “injury.” Concluding that the
extension of immunity to employers under West Virginia Code § 23-2-6 is controlled by the
definition of the term “injury,” the Court in Messer found that the “list of work-related injuries
exempted from the provisions of the Workers' Compensation Act” (expressly referencing
mental-mental claims) directly correlated to the availability of the immunity provision. 218
W.Va. at ___, 620 S.E.2d at 151. Under this Court's analysis in Messer, the existence of a
qualifying compensable injury within the meaning of workers' compensation law is
coterminous with the extension of immunity to employers. Just as in Jones, this Court
reasoned in Messer that where the worker's injuries “are of a type not otherwise recoverable
under the Workers' Compensation Act . . . the exclusivity provision of the Workers'
Compensation Act is inapplicable.” Messer, 218 W.Va. at __, 620 S.E.2d at 146, syl. pt. 4, in
part.
Within less than a year of the issuance of Messer, the opinion of this Court has
inexplicably shifted 180 degrees. Whereas, this Court previously took the view that the
immunity afforded to subscribing employers under the exclusivity provision of the workers'
compensation act could only be invoked in connection with injuries for which recovery was
available under the act, (See footnote 8) now the tides have changed and employers are granted immunity
irrespective of compensability. Significantly, the majority has failed to persuasively identify
any legitimate basis for this drastic shift in statutory construction.
In addition to its failed attempt at distinguishing Jones, the majority also falls
short in its emphasis on the language of West Virginia Code § 23-4-2(d)(1) as support for its
conclusion. While that statement of legislative intent addresses when immunity from suit can
be lost by an employer, it does not address the parameters regarding the existence of immunity
in the first instance. That matter is solely controlled by West Virginia Code § 23-2-6. If an
injury that is covered under the act is the predicate basis for invoking an employer's immunity
(which was always the position of this Court before Bias), then the absence of such a predicate
arguably prevents the immunity provision from operation. The majority goes seriously astray
by hanging its analysis on the fact that under West Virginia Code § 23-4-2(d)(1) immunity can
be lost in only one of three ways. What the majority fails to recognize is that the issue under
discussion is not the loss of immunity but the existence or applicability of immunity in the
first instance. These are two distinct issues; a fact which the majority fails to grasp. If no
immunity attaches due to the injury being outside the act, the provisions that control the loss
of employer immunity are of no consequence.
Nowhere in its opinion does the majority address the issue of whether there are
due process implications in denying a remedy for an existing right. This Court has recognized
that “[t]he quid pro quo for the employees is the guarantee that they will be afforded due
process, and proper restitution for injuries they receive in their line of work.” Javins v.
Workers' Comp. Comm'r, 173 W.Va. 747, 758, 320 S.E.2d 119, 131 (1984). Under the
majority opinion, employees are now left without a remedy for mental-mental claims that
come within the parameters of those claims that we have previously recognized (See footnote 9) as viable
independent from physical injury. And, by completely denying employees a cause of action
for qualifying mental-mental claims, “a wrong could be inflicted for which no remedy would
lie, a circumstance that 'is contrary to the traditional policy of the common law.'” Farley v.
Sartin, 195 W.Va. 671, 681, 466 S.E.2d 522, 532 (1995) (quoting Baldwin v. Butcher, 155
W.Va. 431, 444, 184 S.E.2d 428, 435 (1971)); see also Smothers v. Gresham Transfer, Inc., 23 P.3d 333 (Or. 2001) (finding that exclusive remedy provisions of workers' compensation
statute which operated regardless of whether claim was compensable were unconstitutional
based on the denial of remedial process).
The decision reached by the majority flies in the face of the fact that non-
physical harms have been recognized as “[a]n increasingly important category of work-related
injuries supporting tort suits.” Larson, supra, at § 100.04. Despite the fact that these non-
physical claims, which include mental-mental injuries, are increasingly recognized as a by-
product of the modern workplace, the majority has seemingly turned its collective back on
such claims. Because this Court has failed to offer a credible and convincing analysis for the
directional change in statutory construction and has only overruled Jones sub silentio, I must
respectfully dissent.
I am authorized to state that Justice Starcher joins in this separate opinion.