Court Opinion

ID: 9764012
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:07:20.761706+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:52.439635
License: Public Domain

ANN K. COVINGTON, Judge,
dissents.
I respectfully dissent.
To obtain an award of compensation under Missouri’s workers’ compensation law, the claimant, Drewes, must show that her injury arose out of and in the course of employment. Sec. 287.120.1, RSMo 1994; Duff v. St. Louis Mining & Milling Corp., 255 S.W.2d 792, 794[3] (Mo. banc 1953).
By amendment in 1993, the legislature more explicitly defined “injury” and more fully described when an injury should be deemed to “arise out of and in the course of employment”:
3. (1) In this chapter the term “injury” is hereby defined to be an injury which has arisen out of and in the course of employment. The injury must be incidental to and not independent of the relation of employer and employee. Ordinary, gradual deterioration or progressive degeneration of the body caused by aging shall not be compensable, except where the deterioration or degeneration follows as an incident of employment.
(2) An injury shall be deemed to arise out of and in the course of employment only if:
(a) It is reasonably apparent, upon consideration of all the circumstances, that the employment is a substantial *516factor in causing the injury; and (b) It can be seen to have followed as a natural incident of the work; and (c) It can be fairly traced to the employment as a proximate cause; and (d) It does not come from a hazard or risk unrelated to the employment to which workers would have been equally exposed outside of and unrelated to the employment in normal nonemployment life.
Section 287.020.3, RSMo 1994. The legislature’s use of the conjunction “and” reflects the legislative requirement that the claimant must meet all elements of section 287.020.3(2) to prove that an injury arose out of and in the course of employment.
Section 287.020.3(2)(d) is dispositive of Drewes’ claim; her claim must fail because her injury resulted from a hazard or risk unrelated to her employment to which she would have been equally exposed outside of and unrelated to the employment in normal nonemployment life. Section 287.020.3(2)(d). There is no evidence that Drewes’ fall in the first floor break room resulted from a hazard or risk to which Drewes would not have been equally exposed outside of her employment. Id. Drewes was not injured while performing her work duties. She fell as she was carrying her lunch during a lunch break. At the time of her fall, she was in the building’s common break room, which is open to all of the inhabitants of the building. The risk to Drewes was no greater than the risk to any inhabitant of the building or any member of the general public who might have ventured into the break room.
Even assuming, arguendo, that the break room was part of the TWA premises, thus arguably related to Drewes’ employment, there is no evidence that her fall was caused by any characteristic or condition of the break room. Drewes inexplicably fell. She was no more likely to fall in the break room during her lunch break than in her “normal nonemployment life.” Section 287.020.3(2). Because Drewes’ injury resulted from “a hazard or risk unrelated to the employment,” it cannot be deemed to have arisen “out of and in the course of employment.” The injury, therefore, is not compensable under Missouri’s workers’ compensation law.
The majority departs from Abel v. Mike Russell’s Standard Service, 924 S.W.2d 502 (Mo. banc 1996), which is not distinguishable. See Kasl v. Bristol Care, Inc., 984 S.W.2d 852, 854 (Mo. banc 1999) (Limbaugh, J., dissenting). The claimant in Abel was a gas station attendant who fainted while cheeking credit card receipts at a gas pump. He sustained a head injury when he fell to the pavement. This Court affirmed the decision of the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission denying Abel compensation, explaining that there were no conditions of Abel’s workplace that made his workplace “any different from or any more dangerous than those a member of the general public could expect to confront in a non-working setting.” Id.
The connection between Drewes’ injury and her employment in the present case is even more attenuated than the connection in Abel. Unlike Abel, who was injured while carrying out his work, Drewes was taking an unpaid lunch break in the common area of the building where her office was located. Just as in Abel, the claimant in this case, Drewes, has failed to show that any condition of the work caused her injury. She simply fell. In view of Abel, this majority’s decision to affirm the award of compensation to Drewes is difficult to understand.
In sum, the majority concludes that Drewes’ lunch was “incidental to employment” under the personal comfort doctrine, then replaces the terms “work” and “employment” with “lunch” in the requirements of subsection (2). I would not read the statute so broadly. I read both section 287.020 and Abel to require a holding that Drewes’ injury cannot be deemed to have arisen out of and in the course of employment.
I would reverse the decision of the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission.