Court of Appeals Concludes That Injury Did Not Arise Out of or In the Scope of Employment

In Cooper v. Kirkwood Community College, No. 11-1755 (Iowa App. Feb. 13, 2013), the court affirmed the decision of the commissioner that claimant's injury did not arise out of or in the course of employment.  The case had been before the Court of Appeals previously, at which time the court concluded that claimant was required to wait until the agency had made a determination on rehearing before filing a petition for judicial review.  When a subsequent petition was filed, the district court concluded that the petition had been timely filed, but found that claimant's conditions did not arise out of her employment.

Defendants first argued that because the second petition for judicial review was filed until after the dismissal of the first petition, it had been untimely filed.  The court disagreed, and indicated that because of the earlier interlocutory appeal, the 20 day "deemed denied" period for the rehearing was tolled pending the decision of the district court and court of appeals.  Otherwise, according to the court, any premature appeal which was  denied would spell the end of the litigation.  The court concluded that the rules of civil procedure had specifically abrogated such a conclusion, citing IRAP 1(d).

On the merits, claimant argued that the agency had applied the wrong standard - a tort standard - in concluding that the injury did not arise out of claimant's employment.  The court concluded that the determination of whether an injury arose out of employment was largely a factual issue, dependent on the opinions of medical experts.  In this case, according to the court, the medical evidence presented was carefully considered by the agency, which found that there was no connection between claimant's work and her injuries.  The court concluded that the agency's findings were not irrational, illogical or wholly unjustifiable.

Finally, the court found that the agency's rejection of the testimony of claimant's expert was supported by substantial evidence.

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