Carter v. Town of Clinton

41 A.3d 296, 304 Conn. 571, 2012 WL 1398646, 2012 Conn. LEXIS 148
CourtSupreme Court of Connecticut
DecidedMay 1, 2012
Docket18200
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 41 A.3d 296 (Carter v. Town of Clinton) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Connecticut primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Carter v. Town of Clinton, 41 A.3d 296, 304 Conn. 571, 2012 WL 1398646, 2012 Conn. LEXIS 148 (Colo. 2012).

Opinion

41 A.3d 296 (2012)
304 Conn. 571

John A. CARTER
v.
TOWN OF CLINTON.

No. 18200.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Argued February 1, 2012.
Decided May 1, 2012.

*297 Jill Morrissey, with whom was David J. Morrissey, Naugatuck, for the appellant (plaintiff).

*298 Henry J. Zaccardi, with whom was Sheila A. Huddleston, Hartford, for the appellee (defendant).

ROGERS, C.J., and NORCOTT, PALMER, ZARELLA, McLACHLAN, EVELEIGH and HARPER, Js.

McLACHLAN, J.

This appeal requires us to consider the application of the medical care exception to the one year statute of limitations set forth in General Statutes § 31-294c.[1] The plaintiff, John A. Carter, appeals[2] from the decision of the compensation review board (board), affirming the decision of the workers' compensation commissioner for the third district (commissioner) dismissing his claim seeking heart and hypertension benefits pursuant to General Statutes § 7-433c[3] for lack of subject matter jurisdiction on the basis that the notice of claim was untimely filed. The plaintiff argues that the board improperly rejected his argument that the statute of limitations was tolled by the medical care exception set forth in § 31-294c (c). Because we *299 conclude that the board properly concluded that the plaintiff had failed to establish that the medical care exception applied to toll the statute of limitations, we affirm the decision of the board.

The board's decision sets forth the following relevant facts and procedural history. "The [plaintiff] worked for the [defendant, the] town of Clinton as a police officer from 1972 through 1998. He sustained a right shoulder injury on February 20, 1996, that required surgery, and returned to regular duty in July, 1996. On October 2, 1996, [in] the line of duty, he was attempting to lift a heavy person when he felt a pop and sharp pain in his right shoulder that traversed his upper back. He also reported a sense of going into shock, with dizziness, shortness of breath, lightheadedness, and a crushing pain in the front and back. He completed an injury report for [the defendant], and went to the hospital for treatment, reporting increasing pain and discomfort in his shoulder.

"The attending physician at the hospital opined that he had a labral tear. A [computed tomography scan] of his scapula showed no abnormalities, and the [plaintiff] was referred to [John Daigneault, an orthopedic surgeon] for an orthopedic evaluation. After the [plaintiff] reported pain, clinking and grinding in the scapular area, [Daigneault] performed scapular reduction surgery in 1997, which was authorized by the [defendant]. In 1998, pain continued, beginning to radiate into the neck and jaw. A cervical spine [magnetic resonance imaging] showed two herniated discs and degenerative changes, leading to fusion surgery in April, 1998. The [plaintiff] then retired from the police force because of his injuries. [Daigneault] identified a 20 [percent] permanent partial impairment of the right shoulder from the October, 1996 injury, and a 10 [percent] impairment from the February, 1996 injury. [Myron E. Shafer, an orthopedic surgeon] rated the [plaintiff] with a 25 [percent] permanent impairment of the right arm on January 7, 1998, noting a great deal of pain, discomfort and sensitivity.

"At the request of the [plaintiff's] primary physician, [Bernard Sheehan], the [plaintiff] underwent an [electrocardiogram] in September, 1998, that showed no acute changes. According to the [plaintiff], [Sheehan] had thought a stress test unnecessary despite the [plaintiff's] spoken fear that something was wrong with his heart. In March, 2000, another [electrocardiogram] was described as normal by [Sheehan]. The [plaintiff] was given pills to provide relief from presumed acid buildup. [Sheehan] prescribed a stronger antacid on April 3, 2000, noting the continuation of severe shoulder pain. On April 5, 2000, the [plaintiff] suffered an acute myocardial infarction, and was transported to the hospital where he had an angioplasty, followed by four-vessel coronary artery bypass surgery on April 7, 2000.

"The [plaintiff] filed a form 30C[4] on June 20, 2001, claiming that the right shoulder condition was misdiagnosed and that his October 2, 1996 symptoms were caused by a cardiac problem. The [defendant] contested this claim both on the basis of a lack of direct causal relation between the lifting incident and the myocardial infarction, and because the 2001 form 30C was untimely for a 1996 injury." On January 5, 2007, the commissioner dismissed the claim due to lack of *300 subject matter jurisdiction, finding that the plaintiff had not produced sufficient evidence to show that his April 5, 2000 myocardial infarction was causally related to the October 2, 1996 incident. The commissioner also found that the statute of limitations was not tolled by the plaintiff's allegation that his heart condition was misdiagnosed following the October 2, 1996 incident, and that his June 20, 2001 notice of claim was untimely. The commissioner denied the plaintiff's motions to correct and for reconsideration. The board subsequently affirmed the decision of the commissioner, and this appeal followed.

The sole issue in this appeal is whether the board correctly concluded that the medical care exception in § 31-294c did not apply to toll the statute of limitations for the plaintiff's claim for benefits pursuant to § 7-433c. The plaintiff contends that, because he claims that the October 2, 1996 incident caused him to experience symptoms of angina, his claim for benefits pursuant to § 7-433c falls under the medical care exception in § 31-294c (c), regardless of the commissioner's factual finding of no causal connection between the October 2, 1996 incident and his heart disease. In response, the defendant argues that, under the board's time-tested interpretation of § 31-294c (c), in order for a claimant to fall under the medical care exception, he must prove either: (1) that his employer previously furnished medical care for the specific condition at issue in the late claim; or (2) that a late claimed condition was causally related to a timely reported incident for which the employer furnished medical care. Because the plaintiff has not satisfied either of these showings, the defendant argues, the board correctly affirmed the decision of the commissioner dismissing the claim for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. We agree with the defendant.

"The principles that govern our standard of review in workers' compensation appeals are well established. The conclusions drawn by [the commissioner] from the facts found must stand unless they result from an incorrect application of the law to the subordinate facts or from an inference illegally or unreasonably drawn from them.... It is well established that [a]lthough not dispositive, we accord great weight to the construction given to the workers' compensation statutes by the commissioner and [the] board.... [W]e do not afford deference to an agency's interpretation of a statute when ... the construction of a statute previously has not been subjected to judicial scrutiny or to a governmental agency's time-tested interpretation...." (Citation omitted; internal quotation marks omitted.) Jones v. Redding, 296 Conn. 352, 362-63, 995 A.2d 51 (2010).

Pursuant to § 7-433c (a), a firefighter or police officer[5]

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
41 A.3d 296, 304 Conn. 571, 2012 WL 1398646, 2012 Conn. LEXIS 148, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/carter-v-town-of-clinton-conn-2012.