Court’s benefits ruling might help ease life for other Nevada families

Danny Vredenburg was fun, outgoing and enjoyed a lust for life until he slipped on a flight of stairs at work and injured his back in March 2001. He worked as a bartender for the Flamingo Hilton in Laughlin, so his medical treatments were covered by workers’ compensation.

His doctors tried a variety of medical treatments to control the pain, even a morphine pump. The pain remained relentless. He couldn’t keep food down. He spent most of his time in bed. His personality changed, friends said.

On Jan. 21, 2004, he shot himself in the head, less than three years after the accident. He was 43. He couldn’t stand the pain any more.

He wrote his wife, Renee, “I’m finally at peace and out of pain. I’m tired of living my life in bed. … It’s better this happen now than in a few years.” He wrote his son, Anthony, then 12, that he hoped he turned out to be a good man. “If you love me, you’ll be glad I’m not hurting any more. Be good because I’ll be watching.”

This sad story of pain ending in suicide has legal ramifications for Nevada’s workers’ compensation system.

The Vredenburg case has changed the way the law is interpreted. Under a precedent-setting Nevada Supreme Court opinion last week, survivors of workers who commit suicide as a result of an industrial injury won’t automatically be rejected for death benefits as they were in the past.

After her husband’s death, Renee Sharon Vredenburg filed a claim for death benefits under workers’ comp. The law says that in a situation where a death is the result of an industrial injury, the spouse can receive two-thirds of the worker’s wages until death or remarriage. If there are children, they may receive half of the two-thirds.

The Flamingo Hilton-Laughlin denied the claim for death benefits, as did an appeals officer, and District Judge Michelle Leavitt. Each time, Vredenburg’s attorneys appealed and lost until the Nevada Supreme Court, in the first ruling of its kind in the state, sent the case back for reconsideration. And the court, for the first time, set some standards for future cases related to suicide and workers’ compensation.

None of the lawyers I spoke to thought there would be a rash of suicides by injured workers as a result of this ruling.

Vredenburg was represented by Craig Kenny and Billie-Marie Morrison (not related to this columnist). The hotel and third-party administrator Sedgwick CMS were represented by John Lavery.

Las Vegas attorney Gregg Kamer, who wasn’t involved in the case and usually argues on behalf of management, said the justices should be praised for making the right decision. He saw no need to distinguish between death by blood poisoning and death from suicide if both are the result of legitimate on-the-job accidents.

“This isn’t going to open the floodgates of hell,” he predicted.

Morrison said there was no question of medical malpractice in the case.

The Supreme Court opinion established a new standard in industrial injuries, saying a legitimate injury must have caused a psychological condition severe enough to override the employee’s rational judgment, causing the employee to commit suicide.

Using that standard, the Vredenburg case goes back to an appeals officer for reconsideration. Before this, death benefits after suicides were denied and considered “willful self-injury” by workers who deliberately injured themselves to receive benefits.

In Vredenburg’s case, the suicide was all about endless pain, which is often a contributing factor in the more than 31,000 suicides each year in the United States, and the more than 425,000 death attempts.

But Danny Vredenburg’s suicide and his wife’s willingness to fight through the legal system will end up helping the families of other Nevada workers whose on-the-job accidents leave them in devastating pain. So this isn’t just a story about one case.

Let’s just hope no injured worker suffering excruciating pain decides that suicide should be an option because it might help the family’s finances. Those death benefits are not a sure thing.

Jane Ann Morrison’s column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. E-mail her at Jane@reviewjournal.com or call (702) 383-0275.