Utah court bars dismissing Kroger comp claim over failed medical exams

None of the three exams the employer arranged succeeded. The first physician refused to finish, alleging the worker was “very confrontational and very hostile” after learning she could not record the session. A second doctor cancelled before meeting her. A third ended the exam during a dispute over air conditioning, which the worker said aggravated her pain condition.

An administrative law judge suspended the claim and assessed costs. On appeal, the Labor Commission Appeals Board went further and dismissed the claim entirely. It described a “pattern of antagonistic and obstructive behavior” and treated the failed exams as ordinary discovery violations, the kind that let a tribunal dismiss a case under the state’s civil procedure rules. It also imposed monetary sanctions on the worker’s attorneys.

The Supreme Court reversed that dismissal. The workers’ comp statute says an employee who obstructs an exam has her claim “suspended during the period of the refusal or obstruction.” Because lawmakers spelled out one specific penalty, the court reasoned, they meant to rule out the rest. An agency rule, even one that borrows the courts’ broader discovery sanctions, “cannot trump a statutory provision.” Suspension, the court held, “is the only available sanction here.”

The court did not decide whether the worker actually obstructed anything. That finding stays in place, so her claim remains frozen rather than revived. She simply cannot have it thrown out for good.

The justices also passed on the money question. Because the sanctions fell on her attorneys and not on her, the court held she was the wrong party to challenge them.