Opinion ID: 1697908
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Workers' Compensation Immunity

Text: Florida's workers' compensation system was designed, intended, and contemplated for workplace injuries that have occurred in the course and scope of employment. The workers' compensation system seeks to balance competing interests and provide tradeoffs between employees and employers. Specifically, the workers' compensation system provides employees limited medical and wage loss benefits, without regard to fault, for losses resulting from workplace injuries in exchange for the employee relinquishing his or her right to seek certain common law remedies from the employer for those injuries under certain circumstances. On the date Mr. Jones was injured, section 440.11(1) of the Florida Statutes (2000), provided, The liability of an employer prescribed in s[ection] 440.10 shall be exclusive and in place of all other liability of such employer . . . to the employee. . . . § 440.11(1), Fla. Stat. (2000). This provision provides the employer immunity from liability for an employer's negligence that has caused the employee's workplace injury. See Aguilera v. Inservices, Inc., 905 So.2d 84, 90-91 (Fla.2005). Notwithstanding the tradeoffs provided, we have established and continue to hold that an employer's immunity under the workers' compensation system does not extend to workplace injuries caused by conduct of the employer so egregious that it is tantamount to an intentional tort. See id. at 90 (The workers' compensation system limits liability only for negligent workplace conduct which produces workplace injury, but does not extend to immunize intentional tortious conduct.) (citing Turner v. PCR, Inc., 754 So.2d 683, 687 (Fla. 2000) ([W]e reaffirm our prior decisions recognizing, as have our district courts and many jurisdictions around the country, that workers' compensation law does not protect an employer from liability for an intentional tort against an employee.)). However, an employee is not precluded from filing an action against his or her employer for intentional conduct substantially certain to result in injury simply because some workers' compensation benefits have been paid. See Wishart v. Laidlaw Tree Serv., Inc., 573 So.2d 183, 184 (Fla. 2d DCA 1991); Velez v. Oxford Dev. Co., 457 So.2d 1388, 1390 (Fla. 3d DCA 1984). Precluding a worker from pursuing a remedy for a workplace injury caused by an employer's intentional tortious conduct would conflict with the intent and spirit of Florida's workers' compensation system and would not operate to further its goals if the mere payment of some compensation benefits under the factual circumstances here operated to eliminate such a right. Martin Electronics asserts that the Joneses are estopped from advancing this action because Mr. Jones elected his exclusive remedy under the workers' compensation statutory scheme by filing for and receiving a change in only the attendant care benefits being paid by Martin Electronics' workers' compensation insurance carrier. See Martin Elecs., 877 So.2d at 768. For the reasons provided in our analysis below, we hold that an employee who is injured in the workplace during the course and scope of his or her employment and receives workers' compensation benefits, but does not pursue a compensation claim to a conclusion on the merits, may file an action against an employer for that workplace injury under these circumstances if the employer's conduct is to the level of intentional conduct substantially certain to result in injury for which workers' compensation immunity is not available.