In what is believed the largest occupational disease workers compensation awards on record in Utah, a Utah Labor Commission administrative law judge has awarded a former Thiokol Corp. employee more than $160,000 in wage compensation and medical benefits after a seven-year legal battle.
Administrative law judge Barbara Elicerio also ordered Thiokol and its workers compensation insurance carrier to pay future medical benefits for 54-year-old Charles Nobles, Garland, Box Elder County. She also ordered that Nobles be placed on the payroll of the Employer's Reinsurance Fund effective Aug. 25, 1993, and he will receive $309 per week for life.Nobles was diagnosed as having peripheral neuropathy in his legs, and doctors blamed the condition on volatile chemicals the employees was exposed to after 1969 when he began working as an inspector at Thiokol.
Brian D. Kelm, Nobles' attorney, said, "It's been a long time coming, and we're very pleased to have it this close to being over. I know it's been extraordinarily taxing on the Nobles since they told me many times they were on the verge of bankruptcy, losing their house and losing their marriage."
Kelm said his client began to have unexplained symptoms in his knees and legs in 1986. The pain got worse, and he was unable to work after Aug. 28, 1990. He was in severe and constant pain and was restricted in his lifting, bending, pushing, pulling, standing, walking, driving and in his con-cen-tration.
Thiokol denied his workers compensation benefits, claiming that his exposure to chemicals such as tricholorethylene, toluene, zylene, methyl ethyl ketone and chemlok didn't cause his medical problems.
A Labor Commission medical panel and administrative law judge ruled otherwise and awarded compensation and medical benefits from Aug. 28, 1990, to the present and continuing for the rest of his life.
Thiokol sent Nobles to a doctor of its choice to prove the chemicals didn't cause the medical problems. A hearing was held in March 1996 and the case was sent to a medical panel, which agreed with the original treating physician's diagnosis.
The administrative law judge sent Nobles to the Utah Department of Rehabilitation Services and officials there concluded that he couldn't be rehabilitated. The latest order followed.