Idaho: Award of Attorney’s Fees Was Erroneous Where Claimant Was Not Entitled to Compensation Benefits

The Supreme Court of Idaho, in a split decision, held that in order to award attorney’s fees under the third instance of Idaho Code Ann. § 72–804, the Industrial Commission must determine that an employer or surety, without reasonable grounds, discontinued payment of compensation that was justly due and owing. Accordingly, where the Commission found that the workers’ compensation insurer had engaged in unreasonable conduct, that finding alone was insufficient to support an award of attorney’s fees. Since the Commission also found that the claimant was not entitled to any benefits, the claimant was similarly not entitled to attorney’s fees.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See Salinas v. Bridgeview Estates, 2017 Ida. LEXIS 125( (May 9, 2017)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 133.04.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law