Applying for disability retirement

Applying for disability retirement
Bowns v McCall, 263 AD2d 668
Vecchi v NY State and Local Employees’ Retirement System, 263 AD2d 669

In order to qualify for accidental disability retirement benefits, a member of the New York State Employees’ Retirement System [ERS] must prove:

1. That he or she was injured while at work; and

2. The injury was the result of an accident within the meaning of the Retirement and Social Security Law [RSSL], i.e., that the injury resulted from an “unexpected and sudden mischance” and not from a risk “inherent in the regular duties of the applicant.”

The first test is relatively simple to demonstrate; the second test -- that the injury resulted from an accident within the meaning of RSSL -- is substantially more difficult to prove.

To meet the second test the employee has the burden of presenting substantial evidence that his or her injury resulted from a “sudden or unexpected event” in contrast to being merely the result of physical exertion undertaken in the performance of his or her routine or regular employment duties.

In both the Bowns and Vecchi cases the Appellate Division sustained the Comptroller’s determination that for the purposes of qualifying for a RSSL disability retirement allowance, the disability suffered by these employees as a result of an on-the-job incident did not result from an accident within the meaning of the RSSL.

The Bowns case

Norman Bowns, a maintenance assistant employed by the State Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, filed an application for accidental disability retirement benefits claiming a disabling back injury he sustained while he and a co-worker were moving a heavy six-drawer file cabinet away from a wall. Bowns said that the cabinet became stuck and, when pushed, began to tip towards him and he had “catch the cabinet and support its weight in order to keep it from falling on him.”

This, Bowns argued, constituted an accident because “moving a file cabinet was unusual and unrelated to his normal work.” The court sustained the Comptroller’s finding that Bowns’ injury did not result from an accident because Bowns’ supervisor had specifically assigned him to perform this task and Bowns’ job duties included occasional assignments to perform manual labor jobs outside of his regular department.

The Vecchi decision

The Appellate Division also sustained the Comptroller’s rejection of Joanne Vecchi’s application for accidental disability retirement benefits. Vecchi, a school bus driver/cleaner, testified that she slipped on wet pavement following a rainstorm and although she attempted to balance herself, her foot caught on some gravel and she fell.

The court said that there was substantial evidence that Vecchi’s “injury occurred in the ordinary course of her duties and resulted from her own misstep, not from an unexpected event.” In other words, the mishap was not an accident for the purposes of qualifying for accidental disability retirement benefits.
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