An injured worker entered into a global settlement with his employer and third parties regarding his injury claims.
The settlement (not independently submitted or approved by the WCAB) called for the third parties to pay the worker and the employer $2.5 million and included terms whereby the employer would pay all of injury-related medical bills through the date of the agreement, plus an additional $25,000 in future injury-related medical expenses, and would also release all of its claims against the third party defendants.
Two other paragraphs in the agreement included: (1) That the employer would receive a credit in the amount of the worker's net settlement proceeds against any future injury-related claims by him for workers' compensation benefits and (2) that the employer was not at fault in causing or contributing to the incident and the issue of employer negligence would not be raised in any subsequent proceedings between employer and worker.
When the employer subsequently filed a petition for credit, the worker objected and the matter was set for hearing before the WCAB.
After trial and reconsideration, the WCAB ruled in favor of the employer and granted the credit.
The employer then sued the worker for breach of contract, alleging that he had breached the original global settlement agreement by objecting to the city's petition for credit and by seeking to adjudicate the city's comparative liability after having agreed not to do so.
The employer claimed that as a result of the worker's alleged breach of the settlement agreement, it "has been forced to pay workers compensation benefits it is not obligated to pay and has incurred costs and attorney fees."
The worker countered with a motion for summary judgment asserting (1) the global settlement agreement was void as between the employer and the worker because it had not been approved by the WCAB and it required the worker to waive future workers' compensation benefits; and (2) the issue of the city's negligence had to be determined before the city could assert a claim against the worker's settlement proceeds.
The appellate court, in this unpublished decision, ruled that the worker was estopped from raising these issues because they were the identical issues that the WCAB had ruled on during the hearing on the employer's petition for credit.
The case is City of Monterey Park v. Rodriguez.
To read the full opinion,
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