Opinion ID: 2510363
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: intentional tort exception to workers' compensation exclusivity

Text: ¶ 7 Section 11 of the Workers' Compensation Act, Okla. Stat. tit. 85, §§ 1-211 (2001), prescribes employer liability for the disability or death of an employee resulting from an accidental injury sustained by the employee arising out of and in the course of employment, without regard to fault. Section 12 makes that liability exclusive and in place of all other liability of the employer. This Court has long recognized, however, that in some cases an employee who has been wilfully injured by his employer [may] ha[ve] a common law action for damages. Roberts v. Barclay, 369 P.2d 808, 809 (Okla.1962). ¶ 8 Oklahoma decisions involving the exception were reviewed in Harrington v. Certified Systems, Inc., 2001 OK CIV APP 53, 45 P.3d 430. That review included Thompson v. Madison Machinery Co., 684 P.2d 565 (Okla.Ct.Civ.App.1984), which held that the workers' compensation statutes were designed to provide the exclusive remedy for accidental injuries sustained during the course and scope of a worker's employment [and] were not designed to shield employers or co-employees from willful, intentional or even violent conduct. Id. at 568. The Harrington court noted that, in each case reviewed, the court decided whether the conduct of the defendant employer involved a willful or intentional injury without specifying how the court defined willful or intentional. 45 P.3d at 434. It then defined a willful or intentional injury to involve knowing and purposeful conduct on the part of the employer to injure the employee. Id. at 435. ¶ 9 In that same year, a decision from this court was issued in Davis v. CMS Continental Natural Gas, Inc., 2001 OK 33, 23 P.3d 288. There, this Court, consistent with Harrington, reaffirmed that only intentional misconduct on the part of an employer would remove a worker's injury from the exclusive remedy provision of the Workers' Compensation Act. Davis foreshadowed this Court's allegiance to one of two standards commonly applied to determine whether a worker's injury resulted from the intentional conduct of the employer. Which standard would be adopted, however, remained undecided because the employer's conduct in Davis was not intentional under either standard. Id. at 296. Today, precisely that issue is presented in the form of Question One: Is the standard the `true intentional tort' test, requiring deliberate specific intent to cause injury, or is the standard the `substantial certainty' test? ¶ 10 To date, some states do not recognize an intentional tort exception to workers' compensation exclusivity. 6 Arthur Larson & Lex K. Larson, Larson's Workers' Compensation Law § 103.01 (Math.Bend.2004). Some states that do, limit the exception to instances in which the employer injures the employee deliberately and with the actual intent to cause injury. Id. at § 103.03 n. 1. In a few states, the exception is expressly limited to cases of intentional assault. See 7 Causes of Action 2d 197, § 17 at 245 (1995). But, in any jurisdiction applying the specific intent standard, unless the case involves an assault or a battery, recovery will probably be denied. 48 Am.Jur. Proof of Facts 2d 1, § 2 at 12 (1987). Nevertheless, in recent years there has been a trend toward permitting common law suits when the injury is a result of actions the employer knew were `substantially certain' to cause injury. About a dozen states now follow this or a similar rule. 6 Larson, at § 103.03 n. 1. ¶ 11 The first court to reject the specific intent standard in workers' compensation observed that it originated from very early workers' compensation decisions in Washington and Oregon which defined employer intent in the same terms applied to murder statutes. See Mandolidis v. Elkins Indus. Inc., 161 W.Va. 695, 246 S.E.2d 907, 912-913 (1978). That court found no adequate justification for adhering to the construction of a statute which is not only erroneous but which works an injustice on persons injured as a result of conduct which is so likely to produce injury or death that its performance, under all circumstances, could perhaps warrant criminal liability. Id. at 913. Since that time, both courts and legislatures in a fair number of other jurisdictions have rejected the proposition that actual intent to harm is required for an employer's conduct to be actionable in tort and not protected by the exclusivity provisions of workers' compensation. Woodson v. Rowland, 329 N.C. 330, 407 S.E.2d 222, 230 (1991). Essential to the determination of which standard will be applied in Oklahoma, however, is an understanding of the concept of intent in tort law and its relationship to other standards of conduct.