United States: 7th Circuit Certifies Question to Illinois Supreme Court

Generally speaking, workers’ compensation benefits are beyond the reach of creditors. The rule is not so clear in Illinois, said the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals in a recent case. It certified to the Illinois Supreme Court a question asking if that exemption applies to medical providers who have provided the injured worker with medical care. The 7th Circuit noted the 2005 amendments to Illinois’ exemption statutes and wondered if the law was still settled. In the instant case, an injured worker settled her claim two days after filing bankruptcy. She owed considerable sums for her treatment and the medical providers contended their debts were exempt from the automatic stay afforded by the Bankruptcy Law. We’ll await the decision from the Illinois high court.

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

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See In re Hernandez, 2019 U.S. App. LEXIS 7912 (7th Cir. Mar. 18, 2019)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 89.07.

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

For a more detailed discussion of the case, see