Court Opinion

ID: 9650343
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 15:31:23.75259+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:20.465236
License: Public Domain

CONCURRING OPINION BY
Judge SMITH-RIBNER.
I concur in the majority’s decision to reverse the order of the Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board (Board) holding Pope & Talbot (Pope) hable for the payment of workers’ compensation benefits to Bernard Pawlowski (Claimant) and instead to reinstate the WCJ’s remand decision finding Plainwell Tissue Company (Plain-well) liable for Claimant’s 1999 elbow injury. I agree that Plainwell was not prejudiced in this matter despite Pope’s failure to join Plainwell in Claimant’s claim petition proceeding because Plainwell had the opportunity to present its medical evidence on the issue of whether Claimant’s 1999 elbow injury was a recurrence or an aggravation of his 1997 elbow injury at the hearings held by the WCJ on the parties’ consolidated petitions. I also agree -with the majority that Pope established Plain-well’s liability for Claimant’s injury.
Although I concur in the decision to impose liability upon Plainwell rather than Pope, I disagree with the broad general proposition expressed by the majority that “an employer can pursue the defense that the injuries of a claimant are the liability of another employer without having to join that second employer.” Majority Op. at 368. The Court’s holding in McNulty v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board (McNulty Tool & Die), 804 A.2d 1260 (Pa.Cmwlth.2002), does not stand for the proposition that in all cases the employer can establish an affirmative defense without joining another employer. The McNulty Court held that “[e]ven where a reinstatement petition has been filed following a suspension, the burden is on the employer, in the nature of an affirmative defense, to demonstrate that the disability is, in fact, attributable to a new injury for which a different employer might be liable.” Id. at 1264.
Therefore, I believe that the majority’s reasons for imposing liability upon Plain-well even though it was not joined by Pope should be limited to the unique facts presented here rather then extended to cover any and all cases where an employer asserts as an affirmative defense that a non-joined employer is the one responsible for paying benefits. See 34 Pa.Code § 131.36 (petition for joinder). I also disagree with the assertion that “Claimant should have commenced litigation against both Pope and Plainwell by fifing either a reinstatement or review petition.” Majority Op. at 368. Neither the Workers’ Compensation Act, Act of June 2, 1915, P.L. 736, as amended, 77 P.S. §§ 1-1041.4, 2501-2708, *372nor the Board’s regulations require a claimant to name more than one employer in a petition. See Neidlinger v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board (Quaker Alloy/CMI Int’l), 798 A.2d 384 (Pa.Cmwlth.2002) (holding that the named employer is the only one potentially liable for disability before a petition to join another party is filed).