A restaurant manager who was shot in a robbery in his home garage after work hours is eligible for workers compensation benefits, an appeals court in Georgia ruled on Friday. 

Jay Kil worked as a manager of the restaurant Legend Café in Atlanta. After returning from work each day, Mr. Kil and his roommate — another restaurant worker — "would spend around an hour reviewing the restaurant's daily sales, receipts, accounts, and inventory,” according to documents in Kil v. Legend Brothers LLC, filed in the Court of Appeals of Georgia, Second Division in Atlanta.

After closing the restaurant in the early morning of May 19, 2016, the two co-workers drove home together and had plans to review the restaurant's records at home as they normally did. “Almost as soon as they pulled into the garage, three men ran up to the car and demanded at gunpoint that they hand over a ‘bag of money.’ (The pair) told the attackers that they did not have any money, and the attackers demanded that they exit the car and open the trunk,” documents state.

“After exiting the car, one of the attackers noticed that Kil had a gun in his sweater. At that point, the attackers fled, but while they were fleeing, one of them shot Kil in the forearm. Kil spent over two weeks in the hospital and underwent multiple surgeries. Kil has not worked, nor has he been able to work, since the shooting,” according to the court record.

After filing a comp claim for benefits, both an administrative law judge and later the state Board of Workers’ Compensation awarded him benefits, ruling that his injury arose within the scope and course of employment. On appeal, a state superior court reversed, finding that Mr. Kil was not at work at the time of the armed robbery and shooting—that he was home.

Reversing the ruling back to that of the ALJ and full board, the appeals court ruled that the superior court “improperly submitted its factual findings” and stated that the board “concluded that the ‘continuous employment’ doctrine did not apply but that there was sufficient evidence to conclude that Kil's injury otherwise occurred in the course of his employment.”

Agreeing with the board’s reasoning that although “the restaurant had closed for the day, the Employee's job responsibilities had not yet ended,” documents state.

The restaurant and attorneys involved could not immediately be reached for comment.