Court Opinion

ID: 9701018
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 21:59:12.950085+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:17.244664
License: Public Domain

PELLEGRINI, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the majority decision because it is directly contrary to other opinions of this Court. We have consistently held that collateral estoppel does not apply, even when the issue is identical between administrative agencies, because each agency enforces different laws that have different policy considerations. In the end, “who” decides matters.
In this case, Kim Heath (Claimant) was employed by the Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole (Parole Board) as a parole agent at Graterford Prison. She filed a claim petition for workers’ compensation under the Workers’ Compensation Act alleging that she was repeatedly sexually harassed by her immediate supervisor *47which caused her to experience anxiety that manifested into chest pains, heart palpitations and anxiety attacks. She was treated by two psychologists and ultimately was forced to leave her position. The Workers’ Compensation Judge (WCJ) found that Claimant sustained a work-related injury as a result of abnormal working conditions, but on appeal, the Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board (WCAB) reversed, finding that there was no corroborative testimony of the alleged occurrences of harassment. The WCAB also found that even though Claimant had been placed into a different job after she requested a transfer, and there was no desk or office with few assignments, this also did not constitute an abnormal working condition. On appeal to this Court, we affirmed but on different grounds. Claimant appealed to the Supreme Court which vacated our decision and remanded the matter to us to reconsider whether Claimant proved her claim with regard to the sexual harassment claim.
On remand, the majority affirmed the WCAB, noting that in May of 1998, it had been determined by the administrative process of the Parole Board that Claimant had not sustained any injury that was com-pensable under the Heart and Lung Act. It further noted that Claimant had appealed that decision on June 22, 1998, but a hearing was not held until March 24, 2003. At that time, the hearing examiner determined that because Claimant had already been denied benefits under the Workers’ Compensation Act (Act), the doctrine of collateral estoppel applied and he recommended that she be denied benefits under the Heart and Lung Act. The Parole Board adopted that finding and denied Claimant benefits under the Heart and Lung Act. Claimant appealed that denial to this Court which is now before us.
The majority reasons that because the WCAB found that Claimant was not entitled to workers’ compensation benefits under the Act for psychological injuries she alleged she sustained while working for the Parole Board, she was collaterally es-topped from seeking benefits from the Parole Board under the Heart and Lung Act for those same alleged injuries, especially when the standard of proof regarding whether Claimant was entitled to benefits for those psychological injuries was identical under both of those acts. I disagree because the doctrine of collateral estoppel does not preclude a claimant from seeking benefits from the Parole Board under the Heart and Lung Act, even when denied benefits by the WCAB under the Act.
The reason there can be no collateral estoppel between administrative agencies is because every administrative agency in the Commonwealth must be allowed to enforce its own acts. Each agency has to be able to make its own decisions based upon its own expertise. If collateral estop-pel was allowed, one agency’s hands would be tied by the findings and conclusions of another’s without being allowed to make independent findings and conclusions and applying its own expertise to the facts. Therefore, even if it means granting benefits to a claimant by one agency under one act when they have been denied to that same claimant by another agency under another act, it is better to have two different outcomes than to forego the rights of independent fact finding by an administrative agency under one of its own acts. See Cantarella v. Department of Corrections, 835 A.2d 870 (Pa.Cmwlth.2003); Bortz v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board (Reznor Division of Florida Industries), 656 A.2d 554 (Pa.Cmwlth.1995), affirmed, 546 Pa. 77, 683 A.2d 259 (1996); Schanz v. Bureau of Correction, 52 Pa.Cmwlth. 300, 415 A.2d 978 (Pa.Cmwlth.1980).
Also, we recently dealt with a similar fact pattern that led to a similar result in *48Scierka v. Department of Corrections, State Correctional Institution at Dallas, 852 A.2d 418 (Pa.Cmwlth.), petition for allowance of appeal denied, — Pa. - — -, 860 A.2d 491 (2004). In that case, the claimant, a female psychological services specialist employed at SCI-Dallas, was counseling a male inmate when he reached through the bars of his cell and touched her right breast while she was taking notes. She filed a claim with the Parole Board for benefits under its Act 6321 alleging a psychiatric injury. She also filed a claim for workers’ compensation benefits with the Department of Labor. While her claim was pending before the Parole Board, a WCJ granted her claim petition for a psychic injury. The Parole Board ultimately denied her claim for a psychic injury and denied her benefits. She filed an appeal to this Court arguing that the doctrine of collateral estoppel precluded the Parole Board from making contrary findings to those of the WCJ. Relying on Cantarella, also a case with similar facts, we held that the “doctrine of collateral estoppel does not preclude the [Parole Board] from making findings contrary to those made by a WCJ in a collateral workers’ compensation proceeding.” Scierka, 852 A.2d at 422.
Even though two different agencies can make different findings based on the same information, collateral estoppel cannot prevent them from acting independently to come to different conclusions. Because collateral estoppel does not apply in this case, I would remand the matter to the Board to make a decision on the merits.

. Act of December 8, 1959, P.L. 1718, as amended, (Act 632) 61 P.S. § 951. This section allows an employee of a correctional institution to be paid salary, medical expenses and workers’ compensation for any injury sustained while in the course of employment due to the actions of an inmate.