Court Opinion

ID: 9856559
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:50:30.295479+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:39:22.105379
License: Public Domain

FULLER, Justice
Pro Tern., dissents from parts I and II and concurs in part III of the majority opinion:
In my view, claimant established by at least one of the methods recognized in Dumaw v. J.L. Norton Logging, 118 Idaho 150, 795 P.2d 312 (1990), a prima facie case of odd-lot status as a matter of law from the record before this Court. Claimant produced undisputed evidence: (1) that showed what other types of employment she had attempted, or; (2) that showed others, on behalf of claimant, had searched for other work for her, and such work was not available.
In my view, the Commission misapplied the odd-lot doctrine. The Commission failed to consider properly these undisputed facts: claimant made efforts for sewing positions, which she could not perform well enough to be hired (Tr., pp. 38-39); the Symms Fruit Ranch job was too painful and was only seasonal (Tr., pp. 44-50); claimant was not able to do Checkmate Industries’ job due to nonphysical reasons (Tr. p. 247). The Commission should have concluded that while claimant may be physically able to perform some work, she was not able to be employed regularly in a well-known branch of employment. See Lyons v. Industrial Special Indemnity Fund, 98 Idaho 403, 565 P.2d 1360 (1977).
BISTLINE,
Justice, concurring fully in the opinion of FULLER, J. Pro Tern:
After reading and studying many decisions of the Industrial Commission, and after forty years of varied experience in the realism of workers’ compensation law, and particularly upon becoming conversant with the decision of the Industrial Commission in Mrs. Weygint’s struggle for benefits, one is brought to wonder if the time is now or nigh that the people of this state *205pause to reflect and decide whether the common law system, which was rejected by the legislature as being inconsistent with modern industrial conditions, might better serve Idaho workers who suffer injuries.