Court Opinion

ID: 9717599
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:06:53.795241+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:54.118573
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE BARRY, concurring in part and dissenting in part: While I generally concur with the majority’s decision, I disagree with its specific finding that section 16 penalties may not be awarded for an unreasonable and vexatious delay in the payment of medical and maintenance expenses. The majority rests its position that such penalties may not be awarded on Childress v. Industrial Comm’n (1982), 93 Ill. 2d 144, 442 N.E.2d 841. I believe, however, that Justice Simon in his dissent in Childress does a better job of applying the rules of statutory construction than does the Childress majority. For the reasons stated by Justice Simon, I find that the phrase “unreasonable or vexatious delay” in section 16 includes a delay in the payment of medical and maintenance expenses. Accordingly, I would reinstate the Commission’s initial decision awarding the claimant attorney fees. Quoting from Childress, the majority here attempts to support its position by noting that section 19(g) provides for an award of attorney fees when an employer refuses to pay an injured worker’s section 8(a) expenses after a final award. In my view, section 19(g) does not prevent attorney fees from being awarded for a delay in the payment of medical and maintenance expenses at an earlier stage, any more than it prevents a similar award for a delay in disability benefits. Section 19(g) merely provides an additional means of gaining attorney fees. Also quoting from Childress, the majority states that the furnishing of “any such services” is not the payment of compensation. In so doing, the court implies that “such services” refers to all section 8(a) medical expenses. The Childress majority and the majority here, however, have taken the quoted language out of context, since it refers only to the employer’s furnishing of artificial limbs, eyes, and teeth. In reaching its decision, the Childress court relied heavily on Colclasure v. Industrial Comm’n (1958), 14 Ill. 2d 455, 153 N.E.2d 33. However, Colclasure is distinguishable. It held only that medical expenses were not “compensation” for the purposes of a provision which extinguished the right to “compensation” on an employee’s death. It also noted that medical expenses affect the entire family and, to further the purposes of the Act, should be payable after an employee’s death. Here, the insurance company discontinued the Quality Care assistance even though it appears to have been absolutely necessary for the claimant as of the date of the arbitrator’s initial hearing. This left the paraplegic claimant with only a rental wheelchair, some unidentified bathroom equipment, and a portable ramp. Just as the statute does not intend that an employer should be allowed to litigate vexatiously to delay the payment of disability benefits, I do not believe that it should be read so as to permit an employer to vexatiously delay the payment of necessary medical and maintenance expenses, forcing the employee to sue for those expenses at his own cost. Denying an employee attorney fees in such a case is repugnant to the Act’s goals. See Ill. Rev. Stat. 1987, ch. 48, par. 138.16a(A). Accordingly, I would confirm the August 1,1987, decision of the Commission in its entirety. Further, I urge the legislature to clarify whether medical and maintenance care should be considered “compensation” so that penalties may be imposed in cases such as this.