Court Opinion

ID: 9734968
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:54:36.409706+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:52.948741
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HARRISON, concurring in part and dissenting in part: I agree that we should affirm the appellate court’s holding reversing the circuit court’s dismissal of Morrison’s third-party action against Tony Baker. I also agree that we should affirm the appellate court’s holding reversing the circuit court’s order limiting Tony Baker’s contribution liability to 75% of workers’ compensation benefits paid. What I cannot agree with is my colleagues’ determination that the circuit court was correct in dismissing Morrison’s third-party action against Ricky Baker. In Kotecki v. Cyclops Welding Corp., 146 Ill. 2d 155 (1991), this court reaffirmed the proposition stated in Doyle v. Rhodes, 101 Ill. 2d 1 (1984), that the Workers’ Compensation Act (820 ILCS 305/1 et seq. (West 1992)) did not bar third-party actions for contribution under the Contribution Act (740 ILCS 100/0.01 et seq. (West 1992)). Although Doyle and Kotecki both dealt with contribution actions against an employer, there is nothing in the reasoning of those cases that would justify a different result when the contribution action is brought against a coemployee. The statutory provisions involved are precisely the same. In ruling as it does, the majority asserts that third-party actions against coemployees should be prohibited because allowing compensation to be recovered from an otherwise immune coemployee would defeat a basic purpose of the workers’ compensation system. My colleagues forget, however, that this is merely one side of the equation. The other side is that granting immunity to a coemployee under the Workers’ Compensation Act defeats a basic purpose of the Contribution Act. Indeed, it renders the Contribution Act meaningless. This court has long recognized the tension between the two laws, but the solution the majority fashions today is wholly improper. Rather than trying to give effect to both statutes, as it should, the majority simply decides that where the Workers’ Compensation and Contribution Acts conflict, the Workers’ Compensation Act will prevail. There is no basis in the law for this view. To the contrary, as Justice Freeman noted in his dissenting opinion on denial of rehearing in Kotecki, settled rules of statutory construction yield the conclusion that the Workers’ Compensation Act must give way to the later-enacted and more specific Contribution Act. Kotecki, 146 Ill. 2d at 168, 173 (Freeman, J., dissenting from denial of rehearing). For the foregoing reasons, I would affirm the judgment of the appellate court in full.