Jill: Hello everyone! I'm Jill Bollwerk and this is Andy Pichler, and we're from Bollwerk & Associates. We're starting this video series that we're calling "Coffee with the Counselors" - get it? We're lawyers! We're planning to have a weekly chat about interesting legal topics that come up in our practice. We'll also be taking questions from viewers to address in future episodes.
This Week's Topic: Workplace Assault Cases
Andy: This week, we had several calls concerning assault in the workplace and whether these incidents were compensable under workers' compensation.
Jill: It was quite a "fisticuffs" kind of week, wasn't it?
Andy: It really was! We had two distinct cases. In the first case, a patron came in off the street and assaulted someone at their workplace over what appeared to be a personal matter. In the second case, we had a security guard who, as part of his job description, was authorized to detain patrons when necessary. During one such detention, the patron assaulted him.
Legal Analysis
Jill: So, two very different kinds of assaults. What do we typically tell clients in these situations?
Andy: Well, it depends on the nature of the assault itself. In the first case I mentioned, where somebody came in and assaulted for personal reasons, that's not going to be compensable in Missouri under the statute because of the personal nature of the assault.
Jill: Right, because it wasn't stemming from the nature of the work?
Andy: Correct. Whereas with the security officer, it was part of his job duties, so that would be compensable. However, there are important distinctions. For example, if he was detaining someone for purely personal reasons, like if it was his girlfriend's ex-lover and that was his motivation, it would be different.
Jill: But if the person was stealing something, and the security guard didn't know they were the girlfriend's ex-lover, that would be compensable?
Andy: That's correct.
Key Takeaway
Jill: So you really have to get a lot of facts before you can determine whether someone has a case or not. Every week, we get interesting phone calls that sometimes leave us scratching our heads. Sometimes we have to give disappointing news to people and tell them we don't think there's a case there. If something like this happens to you on the job, definitely call a lawyer because it varies from state to state and case to case.
Looking Ahead
Jill: What should we talk about next time?
Andy: We don't know yet, but given that it's the third of July, we might discuss firework-related injuries.
Jill: If you have ideas for topics you'd like us to discuss in our two-minute conversations, please leave them in the comments. We'll be happy to address them in future episodes if we can.
Thanks for listening to our first episode! Keep coming back if you want more information or if you just want to listen to people chat over coffee - we're pretty good at that!
Andy: Cheers!
Jill: Happy Fourth, everybody! Be safe!
