Another Win for Kentucky Workers!

I believe that when a lawyer takes a case, he should be willing to take it all the way. Sometimes that means all the way to the Kentucky Supreme Court.

We were hired by a nice lady who was injured at the American Greetings factory. She tried to get lost wage and medical benefits, but American Greetings and their workers compensation insurance carrier refused to pay her one dime. They claimed that the injury did not "arise out of her employment".

We argued that the insurance company should be ordered to pay what they owe. Unfortunately, the original judge on the case sided with the insurance company, and dismissed our lady's case. We thought that was totally wrong, so we appealed to the Kentucky Workers Compensation Board, and we won.

But the insurance company still refused to pay! Their lawyer appealed to the Kentucky Court of Appeals, so we had to keep on fighting, and we won. But the insurance company lawyer appealed again! This time to the Kentucky Supreme Court.

We kept on fighting for our client, and we won.

If you read the opinion, it will show you just how hard insurance companies are willing to fight in order to NOT PAY BENEFITS to injured workers. Get on the internet and check out:

http://opinions.kycourts.net/sc/2010-SC-000179-WC.pdf

At the Frank Jenkins Law Office, we take pride in how hard we fight for our clients. If you hire us to handle a workers comp case, or any other type of injury case, we will fight for you as hard as we can!

Great News for Kentucky Workers!

The Kentucky worker's compensation law sets out the benefits you get when injured on the job. It basically pays for lost wages and medical treatment made necessary by your work-related injury.

There is a formula in the law that determines how much money you get per week for a permanent "partial" disability. The most important part of the formula is the "impairment rating". The impairment rating is determined by doctors, using a big book put out by the AMA (American Medical Association) called the Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment.

The Kentucky system has been using the 5th Edition of the AMA Guides for years. Recently the AMA came out with a 6th Edition, but the lawyers who represent injured workers smelled a rat. It turned out that the new edition would have slashed percentage ratings on many common work injuries! This means that money benefits for injured workers would be slashed!

So a group of concerned people worked hard and convinced the KY Legislature to pass a bill keeping the 5th Edition permanently. This bill should become law very soon. It maintains current benefit levels, and keeps injured workers from financially sinking even farther in their time of need.

Worker's Comp benefits are "stingy" enough as it is. So it's great news that the 5th Edition AMA Guides have been made permanent!