Kansas: Marijuana Test Results Should Have Been Admitted into Evidence

Reiterating that in Kansas, because of multiple concerns, the rules of evidence do not apply to workers’ compensation hearings, a Kansas appellate court held the state’s Workers’ Compensation Board should not have excluded the results of a marijuana lab test performed by an outside lab that had been federally certified for such testing. Personnel in a Topeka hospital sent a urine sample to LabCorp after the hospital’s own tests showed marijuana metabolites present in the urine of a severely injured worker who had been brought to the hospital for treatment (the worker subsequently died from his injuries). The Board excluded the LabCorp, finding the employer had failed to show an appropriate chain of custody (the employer did offer an affidavit prepared by a representative of the lab that detailed how the urine specimen in question had been handled). The Court reasoned that LabCorp was a disinterested party and its business records established how and when the testing was performed. Having a live witness was unnecessary.

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 Woessner v. Labor Max Staffing, 2019 Kan. App. LEXIS 11 (Feb. 15, 2019)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 36.03.

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

For a more detailed discussion of the case, see