Case Title: State ex rel. Burchfield v. Printech Corp.

Citation: 1998-Ohio-121

Docket Number: 19952505

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 1998-09-23T00:00:00Z

Document:
THE STATE EX REL. BURCHFIELD, APPELLANT, v. PRINTECH CORPORATION; 
INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO, APPELLEE. 
[Cite as State ex rel. Burchfield v. Printech Corp. (1998), ___ Ohio St.3d ___.] 
Workers’ compensation — Industrial Commission does not abuse its discretion 
in denying a VSSR claim involving foot protection, when. 
(No. 95-2505 — Submitted June 24, 1998 — Decided September 23, 1998.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 94APD11-1657. 
 
Appellant-claimant, Jayne E. Burchfield, was employed as a “bindery 
technician” for Printech Corporation.  As part of her duties, claimant would pick 
up the books, walk four to five steps, and place the books in a box that was resting 
on a wooden skid.  On November 8, 1989, claimant was putting the books into a 
box when a co-worker inadvertently lowered the skid onto claimant’s foot, causing 
injury. 
 
After claimant’s workers’ compensation claim was allowed by appellee, 
Industrial Commission of Ohio, she sought additional compensation, claiming that 
her employer had violated specific safety requirement (“VSSR”) Ohio Adm.Code 
4121:1-5-17(E), which reads: 
 
“Foot protection shall be made available by the employer and shall be worn 
by the employee where an employee is exposed to machinery or equipment that 
represents a foot hazard or where an employee is handling material which presents 
a foot hazard.” 
 
The commission denied claimant’s VSSR application, writing: 
 
“It is found the [sic] O.A.C. 4121:1-5-17(E) does not impose a clear 
requirement upon this employer to provide foot protection.  Operating a binding 
machine in a publishing facility does not present a clear foot hazard.  The claimant 
testified she was unaware of any other similar foot injuries at the facility.  
 
2
Additionally, per the testimony of the claimant and the accident report completed 
by Robert Black, the skid should not have been raised off the floor.  This was an 
unforeseeable sequence of events and the employer was not on notice that a foot 
hazard existed for this claimant. 
 
“Additionally, even if foot protection were required, there is no evidence 
that this injury would have been prevented or minimized had the claimant been 
wearing steel-toed shoes.  The claimant indicates the weight of the object dropped 
onto her foot was approximately 1000 (one thousand) pounds.  There is no 
evidence [that] steel toed shoes would be effective against such excessive weight; 
in fact, the steel toed shoes may have made the injury worse as the steel may have 
severed the claimant’s foot had it collapsed under such a weight. 
 
“Therefore, claimant’s IC-8 [VSSR] application is denied.” 
 
Rehearing was denied. 
 
Claimant filed a complaint in mandamus in the Court of Appeals for 
Franklin County, alleging that the commission abused its discretion in denying a 
VSSR.  The court of appeals denied the writ. 
 
This cause is now before this court upon an appeal as of right. 
__________________ 
 
Daniel D. Connor Co., L.P.A., Daniel D. Connor and Kenneth S. 
Hafenstein, for appellant. 
 
Betty D. Montgomery, Attorney General, and Miltina A. Gavia, Assistant 
Attorney General, for appellee. 
__________________ 
 
Per Curiam.  A specific safety requirement must prescribe “specific and 
definite requirements or standards of conduct * * * which are of a character 
plainly to apprise an employer of his legal obligation towards his employees.”  
 
3
State ex rel. Trydle v. Indus. Comm. (1972), 32 Ohio St.2d 257, 61 O.O.2d 488, 
291 N.E.2d 748, paragraph one of the syllabus.  Moreover, because a VSSR is an 
employer penalty, the specific safety requirement “must be strictly construed, and 
all reasonable doubts concerning the interpretation of the safety standard are to be 
construed against its applicability to the employer.”  State ex rel. Burton v. Indus. 
Comm. (1989), 46 Ohio St.3d 170, 172, 545 N.E.2d 1216, 1219. 
 
The commission found that claimant’s job did not present a clear foot 
hazard, rendering Ohio Adm.Code 4121:1-5-17(E) inapplicable.  Claimant “does 
not dispute that, in and of itself, the operation of a binding machine does not 
present a clear foot hazard.”  She nevertheless argues that there were other 
potential foot hazards that mandated compliance with the safety requirement.  This 
argument is unpersuasive. 
 
Claimant’s proposed foot hazards are too nebulous.  It is not that they are 
not possible.  To the contrary, using claimant’s examples, they exist everywhere.  
That claimant could drop a book on her foot or that something else conceivably 
could fall on it is assuredly not the type of hazard envisioned by the 
Administrative Code’s authors as requiring protection.  If it were, every employer 
would be required to supply its employees with safety shoes should a drawer fall 
from a desk or a desk chair roll over toes. 
 
Turning to Trydle, we cannot envision how an employer would be plainly 
apprised that the possibility of a foot injury that exists as a part of everyday life — 
both at and away from work — imposed upon it the legal obligation to provide 
safety shoes.  Coupled with Burton’s underlying strict construction directive, we 
hold that the commission did not abuse its discretion in finding that Ohio 
Adm.Code 4121:1-5-17(E) was not violated. 
 
The judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed. 
 
4
Judgment affirmed. 
 
MOYER, C.J., DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur.