On March 27, 2012, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania issued a decision that could dramatically change the face of Pennsylvania construction law by overhauling the statutory employer defense. In this decision, the Superior Court added a screening element to the statutory employer defense, indicating that an employment relationship must exist between an injured worker and a general contractor seeking immunity from civil suit under the workers' compensation system. The case was Patton v. Worthington Associates, 43 A.3d 479 (Pa. Super. Ct. 2012).
Now, one year later, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania granted a request for appeal to review the lower court's decision. Since the Supreme Court grants only 5 percent of requests for appeal, general contractors and civil defense firms throughout the state believe that the decision will soon be overturned. Such a reversal would render the decision of the Superior Court a one-year hiccup in the 98-year history of the statutory employer defense. Yet, a decision to reverse both the Superior Court's decision and the decision of the underlying trial court would ignore changes in workers' compensation laws and the opportunity to add necessary interpretive dimensions to this antiquated defense.
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