Court Opinion

ID: 9856042
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:36:55.491179+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:25:56.192681
License: Public Domain

WATT, Justice,
with whom LAVENDER, J., joins, dissenting.
I respectfully dissent to the majority opinion in this case for two reasons. First, I see no reason to abandon the rule established in Ireton v. St. Francis Hospital, 844 P.2d 151 (Okla.1992), that 12 O.S.Supp. 1994 § 990A.B applies only to petitions in error, and not to petitions to review orders of the Workers’ Compensation Court. Ireton was rightly decided. I believe, therefore, that the express language of the statute should be followed until and unless the Legislature chooses to broaden it. Second, § 990A.B does not apply here because Petitioner’s certificate of mailing does not show that her petition for review was mailed “by certified mail with return receipt requested,” as expressly required by § 990A.B. [Emphasis added.]
We have apparently decided only one case interpreting § 990A.B. In Marshall v. OK Rental & Leasing, Inc., 879 P.2d 132, 134 (Okla.1994), we held that § 990A.B applied to appellant’s petition in error because “the pe-*359títíon was mailed to us on September 2, 1993 by U.S. certified mail, return receipt requested. September 2, 1993 is therefore deemed the filing date of the petition in error [under § 990A.B].” [Emphasis added]. Marshall makes clear that an appellant has a duty to make a showing that she mailed her petition in error via “certified mail, return receipt requested ” before she can claim relief under § 990A.B. Even if a petition for review of a Workers’ Compensation Court order could be held to come under § 990A.B, petitioner here made no showing that she came under its terms by having mailed her petition by certified mail, return receipt requested. Her petition for review, therefore, should have been dismissed.
I respectfully dissent.