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Kelly v. Baltimore County1/31/2005
Inc., 334 Md. 480 (1994), the Court of Appeals analyzed the legislative intent behind L.E. § 9-745(b), noting that the statute has two distinct yet connected requirements: (1) that the decision of the Commission be presumed as prima facie correct, and (2) the party challenging the Commission's decision has the burden of proof. The appellant in that case argued that both provisions of L.E. § 9-745(b) merely anticipated that the Commission's decision will be used as a means for shifting the burden of proof at trial. Rejecting that contention, the Court stated:
y including both of these provisions, the legislature intended that the Commission's decision have a greater effect than merely placing the burden of proof on the party who challenges that decision.
Section 9-745(b)(2) already explicitly shifts the burden of proof to the appealing party. Thus, if the only effect of § 9-745(b)(1)'s presumption of prima facie correctness is to place the burden of proof on the party appealing the decision, this provision would be superfluous in light of subsection (b)(2).
Id. at 486.
In Holman, the Court of Appeals also rejected the appellant's contention that the decision of the Commission is not required to be presented to the jury, noting: "In order to effectuate the legislature's mandate that the Commission's `decision ... is presumed to be prima facie correct,' the jury should know what decision is presumed to be correct and who made that decision." Id. The Court went on to conclude: " f the jurors are told that the decision is prima facie correct, they obviously will consider it in weighing whether the party challenging the Commission's decision has met its burden of proof by a preponderance of the evidence." Id. at 486-87.
Although the instant case was decided by summary judgment before it was presented to a jury, the importance of L.E. § 9-745(b) and the presumption of correctness of the Commission's decision are significant to our consideration of whether the County successfully challenged the Commission's decision and demonstrated that a factual dispute did not exist. We conclude that the County did not successfully clear that hurdle.
At the hearing on the motion for summary judgment, the evidence presented to the circuit court in support of the County's motion consisted of the same record that was presented to the Commission. We recognize that the transcript of testimony taken before the Commission is sometimes submitted in lieu of an affidavit supporting a motion for summary judgment (see Theodore B. Cornblatt, Appellate Practice and Procedure, in Hot Tips in Workers' Compensation (MICPEL 2003)), and in this case, the County submitted no additional evidence at the motions hearing other than that which it had presented to the Commission. This evidence consisted of medical reports from Kelly's doctors and a report by Dr. Matz, who was hired by the County to conduct an examination of Kelly.
At the hearing on the motion, the County argued that Dr. Matz's report constituted undisputed expert evidence that established that Kelly's surgery was not causally connected to the October 2002 incident. The County further argued that Kelly failed to produce any medical testimony affirmatively establishing causation, which the County asserted was required of Kelly. To the extent that the circuit court granted the County's motion based on either or both of these arguments, the court erred.
Dr. Matz's Report
The County relied on Dr. Matz's report as evidence of non-causation at the Commission and motion hearings. However, Dr. Matz did not testify at the Commission hearing and did not provide an affidavit or deposition
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