Opinion ID: 176580
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Legality of Cargill's Options

Text: Espinoza also argues that Texas labor law does not permit the three choices Cargill offers its employees. Workers such as Espinoza are always at liberty to decline their employer's Workers' Compensation insurance coverage. See TLC § 406.034(b) (An employee who desires to retain the common-law right of action to recover damages for personal injuries or death shall notify the employer in writing that the employee waives coverage under this subtitle and retains all rights of action under common law.). Espinoza, however, interprets TLC § 406.034 as mandating that employees either retain the Workers' Compensation coverage provided by their employer, or retain their right to sue in tort for personal injuries, and contends that TLC § 406.034 does not permit a third option where an employee opts out of Workers' Compensation coverage and waives his or her right to sue in tort. Reading TLC § 406.034 in conjunction with TLC § 406.033, however, demonstrates that Espinoza's either or argument is not a reasonable interpretation of Texas's Workers' Compensation Act as a whole. See generally Tex. Workers' Comp. Fund v. Del Indus., Inc., 35 S.W.3d 591, 593 (Tex.2000) ([W]e do not view disputed portions of a statute in isolation.) (citation omitted). While it is true that TLC § 406.034 states that an employee may opt out of Workers' Compensation by providing his or her employer with his or her intention to retain the right to sue in tort, the plain terms of TLC § 406.033 allow the same employee to waive his or her right to sue, so long as the employer has Workers' Compensation insurance. Therefore, Espinoza was at liberty to waive both her right to sue in tort and Cargill's Workers' Compensation coverage without her waiver becoming void and unenforceable. TLC § 406.033(e). We thus find that Espinoza's waiver was valid and enforceable.