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National Liability and Fire Insurance Company v. Allen5/4/2000
On Petition for Review from the Court of Appeals for the Ninth District of Texas
Argued on September 22, 1999
Justice Owen filed a dissenting opinion, in which Justice Hecht joined.
We overrule National Liability's motion for rehearing. We withdraw our opinion of February 3, 2000 and substitute the following in its place.
This workers' compensation case presents three issues: (1) whether section 410.253 of the Texas Labor Code's simultaneous-filing requirement is mandatory and jurisdictional; (2) whether Rule 5 of the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, commonly known as the "mailbox rule," applies to section 410.253 filings; and (3) whether facts and evidence in a Workers' Compensation Commission hearing record must comply with the Texas Rules of Evidence to be admissible at trial in a modified de novo judicial review of a Commission decision. Our decision in Albertson's, Inc. v. Sinclair, 984 S.W.2d 958 (Tex. 1999), controls the answer to issues one and two. Thus, we hold that section 410.253's simultaneous-filing requirement is mandatory but not jurisdictional and that the mailbox rule applies to section 410.253 filings. We conclude that, under section 410.306(b) of the Texas Labor Code, facts and evidence in the Commission record must comply with the Texas Rules of Evidence to be admissible at trial. Accordingly, we affirm the court of appeals' judgment.
I. BACKGROUND
Donald Allen suffered a work-related back injury. Allen's employer's carrier, National Liability and Fire Insurance Company, contested Allen's claim for workers' compensation benefits. At the contested case hearing, Allen and National Liability disputed whether Allen timely notified his employer that his injury was work-related. Allen testified that, while he was in the hospital recovering from back surgery, he told his superintendent, Tom Angers, that his injury was work-related. Angers testified that he did not recall Allen telling him that the injury was work-related. The hearing examiner found that Allen did not timely notify his employer that his injury was work-related, and therefore the injury was not compensable. The Commission Appeals Panel affirmed the hearing examiner's conclusion. Allen sought judicial review of that decision in district court.
Allen filed his judicial review petition in the district court on June 7, 1993. The Commission received a copy of the petition on June 14, 1993. The only issue at trial was whether Allen had timely notified his employer that his injury was work-related. Allen again testified that shortly after surgery he had told Angers that his injury was work-related. National did not call Angers as a witness. Instead, it attempted to introduce Angers' former testimony from the Commission hearing. Allen objected on hearsay grounds. The trial court refused to admit Angers' Commission testimony on the ground that it was hearsay and that National did not show that Angers was unavailable to testify. The jury found that Allen had timely notified his employer. The trial court rendered a judgment vacating the Commission's decision.
National appealed, asserting that: (1) Allen failed to prove that he timely filed a copy of his petition for judicial review with the Commission, and therefore the district court lacked jurisdiction to entertain Allen's suit; and that (2) the trial court erred in excluding Angers' Commission testimony. The Commission joined National on the first point of error. The court of appeals held that simultaneously filing a petition for judicial review with the Commission and the district court is mandatory and jurisdictional, but that, under the mailbox rule, Allen had timely filed his petition
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