Opinion ID: 2201641
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Employer's Burden of Proof under the Ten-Year Statute of Limitations

Text: The central issue in both cases is which party bears the burden of proof on the ten-year statute of limitations prescribed by section 95. Although the Workers' Compensation Commission has placed this burden on the employee, we hold that the burden of proof is more appropriately placed on the employer. Prima facie the burden of proving an affirmative defense rests on the party whom the rules of pleading charge with pleading that defense. See M.R.Civ.P. 8(c); 1 Field, McKusick & Wroth, Maine Civil Practice § 8.7 (1970). Contrary to the prima facie rule, considerations of fairness and convenience in some situations dictate a different allocation of the burden of proof on limitations questions. Patten v. Milam, 480 A.2d 774, 776 (Me.1984). In the case of the ten-year limitation of section 95, however, those considerations of fairness and convenience only reinforce the appropriateness of assigning the burden of proof to the employer, which must plead the ten-year statute as an affirmative defense. The employer is the party that has or can most readily gain control of the evidence required, i.e., the record of the date of the latest prior payment under the Act. For the employer, the burden imposed is not onerous and can be satisfied in the first instance with a modest amount of information. The employer need only show that its insurance company or companies had the coverage throughout the pertinent period, that it or they routinely maintained and preserved records of all payments made on claims during that period, and that the last payment on a claim by the employee was more than ten years prior to the filing of the current claim. Our holding here completes a consistent pattern of rules in workers' compensation cases. In Guay v. City of Waterville, 152 Me. 146, 125 A.2d 665 (1956), we held that the burden of proof on the basic one-year statute of limitations rests on the employee because the critical fact issue there is the date of injury from which the one year is measured and the employee would have better access to that evidence. [1] In Boober v. Great Northern Paper Co., 398 A.2d 371 (Me.1979), we addressed the issue of which party had the burden of proof to show that the employee had given timely notice of his injury under 39 M.R.S.A. § 63. [2] Again, because of the employee's superior access to information as to the date of injury, we held that the burden of proof rests with the employee. Id. at 373-74; see also id. at 373 n. 5 (sections 64 and 64-A providing excuses from 30-day notice requirement also consistent with employee's burden of proof). In the cases at bar, where the burden of proof on the ten-year statute is an issue, the same considerations that controlled in Guay and Boober compel a different result. Because the critical fact question on the ten-year statute is the date of the latest prior payment under the Act and because the employer is better placed to maintain that information, considerations of fairness and convenience dictate allocating the burden of proof to the employer. Since the commissioner in both cases applied the wrong burden of proof rule, we remand them both for new hearings.