Top 25 Noteworthy Panel Decisions (July-December 2013). LexisNexis has picked the top "noteworthy" panel decisions issued by the California Workers' Compensation Appeals Board during the period July through December 2013. You'll find many helpful cases in this list, including a case of first impression in which a WCAB panel interpreted a provision of SB 863, i.e., LC 4652(b)(2), which excuses a defendant from advancing permanent disability, a case in which the WCAB panel addressed whether a defendant must provide pre-payment for a vocational report for purposes of an Ogilvie analysis, and a "bonus" case on the issue of defendant's liability for attorney's fees after filing a DOR when applicant was unrepresented per the SB 863 amendment to LC 4064. Read more.

The Top 10 Bizarre Workers' Comp Cases for 2013, by Thomas A. Robinson, JD. During the past several Januarys, I've shared with readers my annual list of bizarre workers' compensation cases for the prior year. In doing so, I reenact, in part, a tradition that my mentor, Arthur Larson, and I shared prior to his death some years ago. Each January, Arthur and I would meet in Arthur's home on Learned Place, near Duke University's campus and review our respective lists of unusual or bizarre workers' compensation cases reported during the previous 12 months. Often our respective lists would overlap a bit, but he'd always have several with truly quirky fact patterns that I had missed. One thing we always kept in mind: one must always be respectful of the fact that while a case might be bizarre in an academic sense, it was intensely real. It affected real lives and real families. And so, to continue in the spirit of that January ritual, here follows my list (in no particular order) of 10 bizarre workers' comp cases during 2013. Read more.