Court upholds denial of benefits to worker injured while intoxicated
A Texas appellate court on Thursday upheld a denial of benefits to an injured worker based on a jury’s finding that he was intoxicated at the time of his accident.
Rigoverto Balderas was working at a Houston foam plastics facility in December 2015. While dumping styrene into a grinder, his left arm was pulled into the machine, causing serious injuries to the arm, upper left body and face, according to Balderas v. Zurich American Insurance Co., filed in the Court of Appeals for the 14th District of Texas in Houston.
A blood test performed on Mr. Balderas within hours of the accident showed a blood alcohol concentration of 0.117%. A person is considered legally impaired in Texas if he has a BAC over .08%, according to documents.
State law bars an employee from recovering compensation from an insurance company if he was intoxicated at the time of his injury. Mr. Balderas’ employer’s insurer denied the claim and was later granted a summary judgment.
The appeals court ruled there was legally sufficient evidence to support the earlier finding that Mr. Balderas was intoxicated at the time of his injury and rejected his argument that a blood alcohol test may be proved through a laboratory analysis of “whole blood” instead of just blood plasma.
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