ADJ11674512 — California WCAB decision

What the panel ordered

The Workers' Compensation Appeals Board rescinded the Joint Findings and Order issued on November 16, 2020, and returned the matter to the trial level for further proceedings consistent with this decision.

Petitions for reconsideration filed by cost petitioner and defendant challenging the Joint Findings and Order issued by the WCJ on November 16, 2020; WCJ's order partially upheld pre-deposition interpreting services payment; WCJ report recommended denial of reconsideration; WCAB rescinded the Joint Findings and Order and returned the matter to WCJ for further proceedings.

Read the official decision →

What was disputed, and how it came out

Each issue the panel decided, with the reasoning it gave. An outcome is what this panel did on this record — not a rule, and not a prediction.

Other disputed issueRemanded

The WCJ's order on payment for pre-deposition interpreting services was rescinded due to insufficient evidence that the services were actual, reasonable, and necessary, and the burden of proof was clarified to be on the cost petitioner to establish this.

The facts that decided it

What the panel treated as outcome-determinative, and which side it favoured.

The WCJ's order allowed payment for pre-deposition interpreting services but did not establish that such services were actual, reasonable, and necessary.

Favours Defendant prevailed

The rules the panel named

Authorities as the decision cited them, with how this panel applied each one.

Labor Code section 5705

Burden of proof rests upon the party holding the affirmative of the issue under Labor Code section 5705.

Cost petitioner must prove that pre-deposition interpreting services were actual, reasonable, and necessary.

From the decision · page 4Pursuant to section 5705, "[t]he burden of proof rests upon the party or lien claimant holding the affirmative of the issue." (Lab. Code, § 5705.) Thus, cost petitioner has the burden of proving all elements necessary to establish the validity of its petition for costs. Here, this includes proving that the pre-deposition preparation interpreting services it claims to have provided were actual, reasonable, and necessary. (See Lab. Code, § 5811(b)(2).)

Labor Code section 5313; Blackledge v. Bank of America, ACE American Insurance Company (2010) 75 Cal.Comp.Cases 613, 621-22 (Appeals Board en banc); Hamilton v. Lockheed Corporation (2001) 66 Cal.Comp.Cases 473, 475 (Appeals Board en banc)

WCJ must make and file findings on all facts involved and state determination of rights with reasons, based on admitted evidence.

WCJ's decision must be based on admitted evidence and clearly designate the evidence forming the basis of the decision.

From the decision · page 3A WCJ is required to "make and file findings upon all facts involved in the controversy and an award, order, or decision stating the determination as to the rights of the parties. Together with the findings, decision, order or award there shall be served upon all the parties to the proceedings a summary of the evidence received and relied upon and the reasons or grounds upon which the determination was made." (Lab. Code, § 5313; see also Blackledge v. Bank of America, ACE American Insurance Company (2010) 75 Cal.Comp.Cases 613, 621-22 [2010 Cal. Wrk. Comp. LEXIS 74] (Appeals Board en banc).) As required by section 5313 and explained in Hamilton v. Lockheed Corporation (2001) 66 Cal.Comp.Cases 473, 475 [2001 Cal. Wrk. Comp. LEXIS 4947] (Appeals Board en banc), "the WCJ is charged with the responsibility of referring to the evidence in the opinion on decision, and of clearly designating the evidence that forms the basis of the decision." The WCJ's opinion on decision "enables the parties, and the Board if reconsideration is sought, to ascertain the basis for the decision, and makes the right of seeking reconsideration more meaningful." (Citation omitted.) (Id. at p. 476.)

ADJ11674512 · March 30, 2021

What the panel ordered

What was disputed, and how it came out

The facts that decided it

Your case already resembles someone else’s. Find whose.

The rules the panel named

What proof carried it

About this page