New York: Claimant’s Alford Plea Regarding Sale of Drugs Did Not Constitute Sufficient Evidence to Justify Finding of § 114-a Violation

Where a claimant pleaded guilty to violating probation by committing a crime that involved the sale of a controlled substance or a narcotic and two days later, in an Alford plea, claimant further pleaded guilty to two separate counts of criminal sale of a controlled substance, it was nevertheless within the province and discretion of the state’s Workers’ Compensation Board to decide that there was insufficient proof that claimant had received income from the sale of narcotics that would disqualify him from receiving additional workers’ compensation benefits. The appellate court acknowledged that under N.Y. Work. Comp. Law § 114-a, if a person makes a false statement or representation as to a material fact, he or she shall be disqualified from receiving any compensation directly attributable to such false statement or representation. The court noted as well the employer and carrier’s allegation that claimant had not disclosed his illicit drug sales activities to the employer or to the Board. The court nevertheless indicated that the Board was within its powers to find that the criminal convictions alone were insufficient to establish that claimant had actually received income from the drug sales.

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 

See In the Matter of the Claim of Pompeo v. Auction Direct USA LP, 2017 N.Y. App. Div. Lexis 5843 (July 27, 2017)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 39.03.

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