Court Opinion

ID: 9527738
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:33:36.18455+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:26:10.015997
License: Public Domain

dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion in this case. I do so because I do not believe that the majority has properly applied the facts of this case to the law.
The majority quite properly notes that under the provisions of Neb. Rev. Stat. § 48-118 (Reissue 1984):
Any recovery by the employer against such third person, in excess of the compensation paid by the employer after deducting the expenses of making such recovery, shall be paid forthwith to the employee or to the dependents, and shall be treated as an advance payment by the employer, on account of any future installments of compensation ....
(Emphasis supplied.) Section 48-118, however, further provides that the employee as well may seek recovery against a third party, in which event an employer having paid or paying compensation to the employee is made a party to the suit for the purpose of reimbursement. However, the language with regard to the effect of future payments found in § 48-118 when the employer brings suit is not found in the act when suit is brought by the employee. One may conclude that if the Legislature omitted the language when discussing the rights of the employee to bring suit, the Legislature intended to relieve the employee of such obligation.
Furthermore, the majority notes that the right to consider such recovery as future payment may be waived by the employer, and, as noted by the majority, such waiver may be the *195result of an intentional or voluntary relinquishment of a known right, “or such conduct as warrants an inference of the relinquishment of such right.” The majority concludes, however, that “the simple acceptance of payment for what one is by statute entitled to receive cannot waive the rights to future payments or offsets, absent something more than mere receipt of money due.” While I do not quarrel with the statement, I do quarrel with its application in the instant case. Here, the employer did not receive “payment for what [it] is by statute entitled to receive” but, rather, compromised and settled its claim for less than what it was entitled to receive. It accepted 67.5 percent of what it was otherwise entitled to receive under the law. It seems clear to me that where one compromises a claim and accepts something less than what one is entitled to receive, the entity accepting the compromise has indeed “waived” what it was otherwise entitled to and should not thereafter be entitled to improve its position. Once the employer has agreed to compromise and accept less, it should not thereafter be entitled to credit on the employee’s share of the compromise. It is difficult to imagine what more the employer could have done to manifest its “inference of the relinquishment of such right.”
The Pennsylvania Superior Court, in the case of Meehan v. Philadelphia, 184 Pa. Super. 659, 136 A.2d 178 (1957), was presented with a somewhat similar situation. In that case the employer and employee joined in an action against a third party to recover for injury sustained by the employee for which compensation paid or payable, recognized an exception where the employer is a party to the employee’s third-party settlement. In essence, it held that where the employer joins in the settlement with a third party, thereby compromising his claim, employer attempted to credit the employee’s share of the settlement against its additional compensation liability. The court, while acknowledging that the employer is generally entitled to recover from the third party the full extent of compensation paid or payable, recognized an exception where the employer is a party to the employee’s third-party settlement. In essence, it held that where the employer joins in the settlement with a third party, thereby compromising his claim, *196the settlement is as to both the compensation paid by the employer and that payable in the future. In so holding, the Pennsylvania court said at 184 Pa. Super, at 666, 136 A.2d at 181:
“We think the city in compromising its claim in the trespass action, gave up its subrogation rights in return for the amount then paid, and that it is now bound by that settlement.”
The city in compromising its claim in the trespass action, gave up any additional subrogation rights in return for the amount then paid.
A similar result was reached by the Minnesota court in Hladek v. John A. Dalsin & Son, 310 Minn. 178, 245 N.W.2d 593 (1976).
We are repeatedly advised that the Workmen’s Compensation Act is to be construed liberally so that its beneficent purposes may not be thwarted by technical refinement of interpretation. See, Friedeman v. State, 215 Neb. 413, 339 N.W.2d 67 (1983); Wilson v. Brown-McDonald Co., 134 Neb. 211, 278 N. W. 254 (1938). In interpreting the act as we have herein, this employee has now become exempted from the provisions of the Nebraska Workmen’s Compensation Act until such time as she receives more than $5,000 in benefits. What is it that the employer compromised? I cannot believe that this is what the Legislature intended. If, indeed, the majority is correct in its view, one would hope that the Legislature would see fit to correct the provisions of the act so as to permit § 48-118 to be consistent with the intended beneficent purposes of the Workmen’s Compensation Act.