Court Opinion

ID: 9643117
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 20:20:00.489065+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:57.628091
License: Public Domain

David Newbern, Justice. Tamara Tackett, the appellant, was injured in a car accident while working for the appellee, Crain Automotive. She filed a workers’ compensation claim and was off the job for a time. When she was given a medical release to return to work, she was told her job had been eliminated due to slow business. She sued Crain Automotive for discharging her in retaliation for her having filed her worker’s compensation claim. She asserted that Crain Automotive had hired others to do the work she once did. We affirm the Trial Court’s decision granting Crain Automotive’s motion, which cited Ark. R. Civ. P. 12(b), to dismiss Ms. Tackett’s claim. By Act 796 of 1993, the General Assembly eliminated the cause of action for retaliatory discharge described in Walmart v. Baysinger, 306 Ark. 239, 812 S.W.2d 463 (1991). Section 41 of the Act declares its effective date to be July 1, 1993, and concludes as follows: “Furthermore, the provisions of this act shall apply only to injuries which occur after July 1, 1993.” Ms. Tackett’s compensable injuries occurred prior to July 1, 1993. In its brief in support of its motion to dismiss, Crain Automotive stated Ms. Tackett was discharged after July 1, 1993. In her response, Ms. Tackett did not disagree with that statement.  If Ms. Tackett’s physical or compensable injury were the subject of her present claim, no doubt Act 796 would not apply. The claim with which we now are concerned, however, is her claim for retaliatory discharge which is not a compensable injury under the Workers’ Compensation Act. Ms. Tackett’s discharge, and her complaint alleging that it was retaliatory, occurred after the cause of action was abolished. Although we and a United States District Court have, subsequent to July 1, 1993, considered cases of retaliatory discharge, the cases were ones in which the complaint was filed before that date. Leggett v. Centro, Inc., 318 Ark. 732, 887 S.W.2d 523 (1994); Brown v. Pepsico, Inc., 844 F.Supp. 517 (W.D.Ark. 1994).  While we might agree that Ms. Tackett had, as she puts it, a “vested interest” in having remedies for her physical or compensable injuries evaluated according to the law at the time they occurred, she has cited no authority, and we know of none, in support of her argument that her wrongful discharge claim should be governed by any law other than that in effect at the time it occurred. We have no doubt that it was the intent of the General Assembly to abolish the cause of action for wrongful discharge as of July 1, 1993. Affirmed. Glaze, Corbin, and Brown, JJ., dissent.