Illinois: Employer’s Right to Workers’ Compensation Lien is Absolute

Under the plain language of 820 ILCS 305/5(b) (2016), an employer's right to reimbursement of the full amount of benefits paid or to be paid to the injured or deceased worker is absolute; it may not be diminished or, as in this case, strikes by a trial court based upon allegations that the employer and/or carrier did not cooperate sufficiently in the third-party suit that produced a settlement. The court indicated the estate had not cited any Illinois case that suggested that a court had the power to limit or strike an employer's lien based on conduct on the part of the employer or its insurer. Absent such a showing, it was error for the trial court to do so. 

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. 

See Estate of Rexroad v. Mid-West Truckers Risk Mgmt. Ass’n, 2018 IL App (5th) 170342, 2018 Ill. App. LEXIS 283 (May 15, 2018)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 117.01.

Source:Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law