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EMPLOYEE INJURED IN EMPLOYER PROVIDED HOUSING LIMITED TO WORKERS' COMP BENEFITS
In Marck Vaught v. State of California, 2007 Westlaw 4395435 (Cal.App. 4 Dist.), filed Dec. 18, 2007, State employee Marck Vaught attempted to sue the State after suffering injuries caused by a slip-and-fall sustained while living in State provided housing.
After working as a park ranger for the State for several years, Marck Vaught accepted a new position requiring him to be on call all the time. As an incentive, Vaught was offered a residence in a ranch house as an employee benefit.
After moving into the ranch house, the Vaught family discovered a leak in one of the bathrooms that Department personnel attempted to repair but did not completely fix. While attempting to get up from where Vaught was observing the leaking pipes, he slipped and fell sustaining injuries.
As a result of the slip-and-fall, Vaught and his wife sued the State for negligence and failure to make the ranch house habitable for human occupation.
The State filed a Motion for Summary Judgment on the grounds that the workers’ compensation exclusivity remedy rule barred the Vaughts’ action. The Court agreed and granted the Motion for Summary Judgment in favor of the State.
Pursuant to Labor Code Section 3602(a), an injured employee’s sole and exclusive remedy against an employer is the right to recover workers’ compensation benefits. The theory supporting such compensation is that exclusive remedy provisions are presumed a compensation bargain to which the employer assumes liability for industrial personal injury or death without regard to fault - in exchange for limitations on the amount of liability. The employee is afforded relatively swift and certain payment of benefits to relieve the effects of industrial injury without having to prove fault, but in exchange gives up a wider range of damages potentially available in tort.
The two-pronged requirement in Section 3600 that the injury sustained arose out of and in the course of employment, are liberally construed to extend benefits in favor of awarding workers’ compensation, not in permitting civil litigation.
When employees are injured while living on the employer’s premises, an extension of that general rule is applied. This is known as the "bunkhouse" rule.
An employee’s use of the employer’s premises constitutes a portion of employee compensation. (Aubin v. Kaiser Steel Corp., (1960) 185 Cal.App.2d 658).
The bunkhouse rule requires a causal connection between the injury and the employment for purposes of Section 3600, based upon when the employee’s contract contemplates or the nature of the employee’s work mandates residing on the employer’s premises.
In this case, the Court concluded Vaught resided in the ranch house because of work necessity and that he used a portion of the house as his office for storing equipment, park maps, and as a benefit out of necessity - not because the State sought a landlord-tenant relationship.
Compensation under the "bunkhouse" rule does not turn on whether the employee was injured while engaged in a purely personal activity, but rather whether there is some causal connection between the employment and injury sustained in the course of employment. In this action, the Court found the employee's activity was incidental to his employment with the State and the Court's decision was affirmed.
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Related Attorney(s):
Todd R. Howell
Related Practice Area(s):
Workers Compensation Defense
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LOS ANGELES ORANGE COUNTY VENTURA/OXNARD CENTRAL COAST
BAY AREA SACRAMENTO LAS VEGAS RENO PHOENIX
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