Blog Posts in March, 2023

What is Missouri’s Parental Responsibility Law?

In our last blog post about car accidents and personal injury law in Missouri, we looked at how Missouri handles minors who negligently hurt you or damage your property, or who negligently contributed to their own injuries. But what happens when a minor deliberately hurts you or destroys your property by, for example, driving a car into your vehicle? Missouri’s Parental Responsibility Law Like ...

Missouri Strictly Construes Its Workers’ Compensation Laws

In our last blog post about workers’ compensation law in Missouri, we looked at the definition of a “dependent” for survival benefits . The term had been, once again, strictly construed by the Labor and Industrial Relations Commission (LIRC) in order to deny a claim for benefits. It has not always been this difficult to recover compensation for work-related injuries in Missouri. What it Means to ...

Can Minors Be Negligent in Missouri?

Occasionally, children or young adults can act in ways that unintentionally cause injuries to themselves or to others. This can happen in two ways: The minor can behave negligently and hurt someone else, or The minor can get hurt because they were behaving negligently. If they were an adult, they would be liable for the damages they caused. Because they were underage, though, that would be unfair. ...

What is a Dependent for Survival Benefits?

The Missouri Labor and Industrial Relations Commission (LIRC) has, once again, shown that it will go to great lengths to deny any workers’ compensation claim that it can, all under the guise of “strictly construing” the provisions of the state’s workers’ compensation law . Most recently, it reached to great lengths to interpret the law in a way that would deprive a dependent ex-wife of survivor ...