Arkansas: Employee Fails to Overcome Presumption of Impairment Following Positive Drug Test

An Arkansas appellate court affirmed a decision by the state’s Workers’ Compensation Commission that a worker who suffered a partial traumatic amputation of a finger as she tried to dislodge material from a jammed cutting machine, and who subsequently tested positive for marijuana at a hospital emergency department, failed to rebut the presumption that her injury was “substantially occasioned” by her use of the illegal drug. in spite of her strong contention that she had not used marijuana. The employee later admitted she had used marijuana on a “sporadic” basis for thirty years, but she stated further that her use took place only on weekends. She testified further that she had not used marijuana for approximately four weeks prior to the accident. The court held substantial evidence supported the Commission’s findings, including it finding that the finding that claimant was not a credible witness.

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 Blair v. American Stitchco, Inc., 2020 Ark. App. LEXIS 48 (Jan. 22, 2020)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 130.03.

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

For a more detailed discussion of the case, see

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