Case Title: State ex rel. Oakwood v. Indus. Comm'n

Citation: 2012-Ohio-3209

Docket Number: 2011-0060

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2012-07-18T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as 
State ex rel. Oakwood v. Indus. Comm., Slip Opinion No. 2012-Ohio-3209.] 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in 
an advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested 
to promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 
65 South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or 
other formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be 
made before the opinion is published. 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2012-OHIO-3209 
THE STATE EX REL. VILLAGE OF OAKWOOD, APPELLANT, v. INDUSTRIAL 
COMMISSION OF OHIO ET AL., APPELLEES. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets,  
it may be cited as State ex rel. Oakwood v. Indus. Comm.,  
Slip Opinion No. 2012-Ohio-3209.] 
Workers’ compensation—Determination of responsible employer when more than 
one has an employment relation with the injured worker. 
(No. 2011-0060—Submitted May 8, 2012—Decided July 18, 2012.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 09AP-999,  
190 Ohio App.3d 689, 2010-Ohio-5861. 
__________________ 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} In 2008, Craig Ali was a police officer for appellant, the village of 
Oakwood.  That spring, his department assigned him to perform traffic-control 
duties on a highway-construction project overseen by appellee Kokosing 
Construction Company, Inc.  Ali was injured while performing those duties.  We 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
2 
 
must determine which entity was Ali’s employer for purposes of his workers’ 
compensation claim. 
{¶ 2} It is undisputed that Kokosing generally used State Highway Patrol 
officers for traffic control.  Kokosing, however, had been directed by Oakwood 
police officials to use Oakwood officers for traffic-control duties within village 
boundaries, and Ali was assigned to the project.  Ali wore his Oakwood police 
uniform and sat in an Oakwood police cruiser that Kokosing had leased from the 
village.  Kokosing, not Oakwood, paid Ali for his services during this time. 
{¶ 3} Ali was injured when his cruiser was hit by another vehicle.  The 
Bureau of Workers’ Compensation initially allowed the claim against Oakwood 
but issued a later order naming Kokosing as the proper employer.  Kokosing 
objected, and the matter was set for hearing before appellee Industrial 
Commission of Ohio. 
{¶ 4} A district hearing officer found that Kokosing was Ali’s employer 
at the time of injury: 
 
Injured Worker described being paid by Kokosing 
Construction via check with their name on it, assigned to his work 
by them, and directed as to his duties by them.  Although Injured 
Worker wore his Oakwood Village police officer uniform and sat 
in the Village cruiser, the Oakwood Village Law Director testified 
that Kokosing leased the vehicle for the duration of the Injured 
Worker’s need of it.  Examining the totality of the circumstances 
persuades the Hearing Officer that Kokosing Construction 
Company, Inc. was the Injured Worker’s employer on the date of 
injury on this claim. 
 
{¶ 5} A staff hearing officer reversed: 
January Term, 2012 
3 
 
 
[T]he correct employer herein is Oakwood Village and not 
Kokosing Construction.  Per the unrefuted testimony of Kokosing 
supervisor Mr. Schloss, Kokosing Construction was directed by 
Sergeant Biggam of the Oakwood Village Police Department to 
utilize Oakwood Village police officers for traffic control duties 
within the geographic boundaries of Oakwood Village and to not 
follow Kokosing’s usual practice of using Ohio State Highway 
Patrol officers for such duties.  Sergeant Biggam identified 
claimant as an officer appropriate for such duty and arranged for 
claimant’s use of an Oakwood Village police cruiser during his 
activities relative to traffic control at the Kokosing Construction 
job site.  Claimant wore his Oakwood Village police uniform and 
was at the site of the accident for purposes of maintaining traffic 
control, an activity not performed by Kokosing Construction.  
Claimant would not have been engaged in traffic control functions 
on 05/23/2008 were he not an Oakwood Village police officer, in 
uniform and in a police cruiser, having been specifically authorized 
to engage in such activity by his usual employer, Sergeant 
Biggam/Oakwood Village. 
 
{¶ 6} After further administrative appeal was refused, Oakwood filed a 
complaint in mandamus in the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, alleging that 
the commission had abused its discretion in finding it to be the amenable 
employer.  Oakwood argued that the commission had not considered the factors 
listed in State ex rel. Lord v. Daugherty, 66 Ohio St.2d 441, 423 N.E.2d 96 
(1981), rendering its analysis fatally deficient.  The court, however, found no 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
4 
 
abuse of discretion and denied the writ, prompting Oakwood’s appeal to this court 
as of right. 
{¶ 7} Analysis centers on two decisions—Lord and Fisher v. Mayfield, 
49 Ohio St.3d 275, 551 N.E.2d 1271 (1990).  These cases, as part of a “totality of 
the circumstances” analysis, identified three factors to consider when determining 
whether an injury occurred in the course of a claimant’s employment—an issue 
distinct from that at bar.  Despite this distinction, Oakwood challenges the 
commission’s analysis because of the commission’s failure to consider the 
Lord/Fisher factors.  We must determine whether this was an abuse of discretion. 
{¶ 8} The claimants in Lord and Fisher were injured while deviating 
from their normal workday routine, which raised a pivotal question: Did the 
injury occur in the course of and arise from employment?  The answer, according 
to Lord, 
 
depends upon the “totality of the facts and circumstances” 
regarding the accident.  Such circumstances include: (1) the 
proximity of the scene of the accident to the place of employment; 
(2) the degree of control the employer had over the scene of the 
accident; and (3) the benefit the employer received from the 
injured employee’s presence at the scene of the accident. 
 
Lord, 66 Ohio St.2d at 444, 423 N.E.2d 96. 
{¶ 9} Fisher affirmed the Lord test.  There, a teacher who also oversaw 
the district’s flower fund was hurt when she stopped at another school to collect 
donations.  Again, the issue was whether her injuries arose from her employment, 
and after applying the Lord factors, we held that it was.  We cautioned, however, 
that 
  
January Term, 2012 
5 
 
workers’ compensation cases are, to a large extent, very fact 
specific.  As such, no one test or analysis can be said to apply to 
each and every factual possibility.  Nor can only one factor be 
considered controlling.  Rather, a flexible and analytically sound 
approach to these cases is preferable.  Otherwise, the application of 
hard and fast rules can lead to unsound and unfair results. 
 
Fisher, 49 Ohio St.3d at 280, 551 N.E.2d 1271. 
{¶ 10} These observations support appellees’ assertion that consideration 
of the Lord/Fisher factors should not be mandatory, as does the experience of the 
Second District Court of Appeals in attempting to apply Lord and Fisher to an 
issue like that currently before us.  Cooper v. Dayton, 120 Ohio App.3d 34, 696 
N.E.2d 640 (1997), involved a Dayton policeman who moonlighted as an 
undercover loss-prevention specialist at a local grocery.  During one of his 
grocery shifts, he confronted a shoplifter.  When the suspect tried to flee, Cooper 
pulled out his service revolver and badge, and identified himself as a Dayton 
police officer.  Cooper was injured in the encounter. 
{¶ 11} As here, the issue was not whether the injury happened in the 
course of employment; it clearly did.  The question instead was, employment with 
whom—the city or the grocery?  To answer this, the court of appeals turned to 
Lord and Fisher.  It acknowledged at the outset that the two cases involved a 
different issue, but felt that they nevertheless “provide[d] a viable analytical 
framework to resolve the present dispute.”  Id. at 42.  The court quickly admitted, 
however, that Lord’s three-pronged test proved “somewhat problematic when 
applied to the facts” before it.  Id. at 44. 
{¶ 12} The difficulty was that applying a Lord/Fisher factor to each of 
two employers can produce the same answer.  For example, because the injury 
occurred in the store’s parking lot, which was located within Dayton’s 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
6 
 
boundaries, proximity could be attributed to either potential employer.  The same 
was true of control, with the court finding that “Groceryland retained day-to-day 
control of its own parking lot * * *, [while] the city police department also 
retain[ed] control of the property within the city limits for law-enforcement 
purposes.”  120 Ohio App.3d at 47, 696 N.E.2d 640.  The third factor—benefit to 
the employer—was also not helpful, because both employers benefited from 
Cooper’s presence.  Ultimately, the court moved beyond Lord/Fisher and 
concluded that when Cooper pulled his badge and revolver and identified himself 
as a Dayton police officer, he was no longer acting as a store security guard but as 
a Dayton policeman. 
{¶ 13} Consistent with Fisher and its support of a flexible approach to 
certain complex workers’ compensation matters, we hold that the commission—
when confronted with two potential employers—may, but is not required to, use 
any of the Lord/Fisher factors that it believes will assist analysis.  If different 
considerations are necessary, however, the commission must have the discretion 
to use them.  Therefore, we find that it did not abuse its discretion by not directly 
discussing the three enumerated Lord/Fisher factors. 
{¶ 14} The staff hearing officer examined the totality of what he 
considered to be the relevant circumstances in this case and made determinations 
supported by evidence in the record.  We have “consistently recognized and 
generally deferred to the commission’s expertise in areas falling under the 
agency’s jurisdiction.”  State ex rel. FedEx Ground Package Sys., Inc. v. Indus. 
Comm., 126 Ohio St.3d 37, 2010-Ohio-2451, 930 N.E.2d 295, ¶ 27.  Accordingly, 
we defer to the commission’s expertise in finding Oakwood to be the amenable 
employer. 
{¶ 15} The judgment of the court of appeals is affirmed. 
Judgment affirmed. 
January Term, 2012 
7 
 
O’CONNOR, C.J., and PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’DONNELL, 
LANZINGER, CUPP, and MCGEE BROWN, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
Stephen M. Klonowski, Law Director, and Christopher R. Fortunato, for 
appellant. 
Michael DeWine, Attorney General, and Derrick L. Knapp, Assistant 
Attorney General, for appellee Industrial Commission of Ohio. 
Elizabeth Krieder Wright, for appellee Kokosing Construction Co., Inc. 
______________________