Out Of State Accident
I had a client call me. He's a local, he had a question about whether Illinois workers comp applies if his company hired him and he got involved on a work injury in another state.
His company is in Illinois but the crash happened out of state. Can he still do a comp claim under Illinois law or is it under different law? I just had a local driver who delivers to Indiana get into a crash in Indiana and I've had an over-the-road truck or to who got into who worked for an Illinois company but got into a crash in Georgia.
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The Law Is Set To Protect Workers
I guess either way it doesn't really matter whether you're an over-the-road or local driver for purposes of this. The rule in Illinois is that if you're hired in Illinois or even a substantial part of the hiring process occurs in Illinois, then Illinois has a public interest in making sure that you're taken care of if you get hurt. Remember the purpose of the workers comp laws is to compensate the injured worker. Right in the law, it's there to protect workers.
Now the way it's administered and some of the procedures and rules are a little bit arcane. It sometimes takes a really long time to get in front of a judge even if you sort of have an emergency.
Still Entitled To Compensation
Those parts belie the fact that right in the act it says that the purpose of workers comp is to protect and compensate injured workers. Illinois law basically says if there's a big part of the job if it's an Illinois company, they hired you in Illinois and you get hurt in the course of that employment whether it's here or somewhere else, then you're entitled to compensation under Illinois workers comp back.
It's a law. They can write it however they want and it's pretty much how the courts have interpreted it. So even if you got hurt outside of Illinois, if you got hired in Illinois or the big part of the interview process was in Illinois and it's headquartered in Illinois, these are the sorts of things that the court looks at to determine whether it's going to be a comp case.
