When a press machine exploded at the H. Hansen Industries plant in Toledo, a metal beam struck machinist Arthur Heilman, 58, knocking him out. Despite an emergency craniotomy, he never regained consciousness and died two days later.
His wife, Patricia, on her husband’s behalf, sought and won workers’ compensation benefits for his death. But given Arthur Heilman sustained spinal injuries and hardly moved between the accident and his death, she also sought “loss of use” benefits reserved for those who lose a body part or functional use of it on the job, court records show.
The Ohio Industrial Commission – a quasi-judicial body composed of three commissioners, all appointed by the governor, that hears workers’ compensation disputes that bubble up from the staff level – first dismissed Heilman’s claim in 2021, finding Patricia Heilman failed to prove her late husband’s loss of use. The Ohio Supreme Court reversed the decision, finding the commissioners improperly considered some of the conflicting opinions from physicians who studied the record…