Court Opinion

ID: 9719584
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:56:29.017434+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:08.176830
License: Public Domain

Bogdanski, J.
(dissenting). I cannot agree that §31-297 (b), the preclusion statute, is limited to situations in which the employer contests a plaintiff’s right to compensation on the grounds that the injury alleged was not compensable because “it did not arise out of and in the course of employment.” To my mind the express language of the statute and our decision in Menzies v. Fisher, 165 Conn. 338, 347, 334 A.2d 452 (1973), both militate against such a narrow interpretation of this statute.
Section 31-297 (b), by its terms, provides that whenever liability to pay compensation is contested, the employer must file notice of his intention to contest the claim and of the specific reasons therefor. The use of the word “whenever” in this statute is significant. This term, which is used to delimit the applicability of the statutorily required notice of disclaimer, is defined in Webster’s International Dictionary, Third Edition, as meaning “at any or *120all times that; in any or every instance in which.” (Emphasis added.) Had the legislature intended a narrow application of this statute they would surely have used a more restrictive term such as “when” or “if.” Instead, the statute contains the term “whenever,” a term which means “in any or every instance in which.” (Emphasis added.)
In Menzies, when this court was first called upon to interpret § 31-297 (b), we focused upon the mischief sought to be remedied by the legislature in enacting the statute, noting that the objective of the legislature was to ensure that employers would bear the burden of promptly investigating claims and that employees would be timely apprised of the specific reasons for denials of their claims.
We observed in Menzies (p. 343) that the notice of disclaimer required by § 31-297 (b) was intended to “diminish delays in the proceedings, [to] discourage arbitrary refusal[s] of bona fide claims and [to] narrow the legal issues which were to be contested.” Those considerations of public policy, which led to the enactment of the statute, would seem to be as applicable when an employer contests the right of a claimant to receive compensation for a specific injury as when the employer contests the right of a claimant to periodic benefits under the statute for a loss of earnings due to an allegedly work-related injury.
I can see no injustice in the statute’s requiring a defending employer or insurance carrier to investigate a case seasonably and to respond specifically to claims as filed. As we stated in Menzies (p. 348), “If an employer has . . . grounds for denying liability for compensation, there is no sound reason why he should not be required to advise the claimant *121as to the substantive grounds on which liability is denied. The rule . . . requires only the simplest procedure and compliance with it enables the principal issues to be framed before a hearing is commenced.”
In my view, an employer’s denial of a claim for benefits under the specific injury portion of the workmen’s compensation statute is a “contest” of “liability to pay compensation” within the meaning of §31-297 (b), and as such the statute requires that the employer give notice of his intention to contest the claim, as a precondition to a defense on the merits.