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In a classic example of how the News Media distort facts and misunderstand certain subjects, in this case the subject of workers’ compensation, KTNV of Las Vegas, Channel 13 Action News, published a column and ran a news clip two days ago on September 2^nd 2016 about a cab driver workers’ compensation claimant, who in February of 2015 made national news when he was shot at six times.  He was hit by two of the bullets while picking up two customers on the Las Vegas Strip. 

The reporter called the event a “moment Frank Grady can’t erase from his mind,” as the claimant, Frank Grady expressed, “I have trouble sleeping.” 

The reporter went on to tell viewers “the compensation he (Grady) got will shock you,” and that the “scars are still fresh from being shot twice.”   

In the written article and the film clip both, reporter Lesley Marin states “O’Grady will only receive $748 in workers’ compensation because he only suffers 1 percent of permanent disability.” 

This statement is completely misleading.   To write that the claimant will only receive $748 in workers’ compensation denies the fact of the total temporary disability payments he most likely received throughout the year-and-a-half he was off work, and mischaracterizes the $748 as his total compensation.   

The letter that was reported as “making the pain worse” for Frank O’Grady was a document of Permanent Partial Disability (PPD) that showed the PPD rating at 1%.  After adjustments for age and occupation, the amount came to $748.00. 

But this was after receiving a year-and-a-half’s worth of total temporary disability. Clearly the rating doctor felt the claimant could return to work after a year-and-a-half of recovery time with minimal permanent disability.   But the news agency from Las Vegas did not report it like this.

For these reporters to call Permanent Partial Disability the “workers’ compensation” and then to call York Risk Services Group “the insurance company” just goes to demonstrate that the general media cannot distinguish between a third-party-administrator and an insurance company, plus cannot understand that a letter containing a document spelling out $748 in Permanent Partial Disability is not the claimant’s total workers’ compensation benefit amount by any stretch of the imagination.

This is an example of media sensationalism geared to getting the public in a state of outrage by not knowing the language of workers’ compensation while having very limited knowledge of the system.  One of the reporters, Lesley Marin, was shown in the video clip attempting to reach claims adjuster, Yvette Holden, by ringing the bell at the front door of York’s offices.  The voice-over narrative stated that KTNV Las Vegas had been trying to get ahold of the “insurance company”, York Risk Services, for weeks.  

Certainly the claimant can appeal the 1% rating and litigate for a new rating.  But for reporters to mischaracterize $748 as the total workers’ compensation benefit amount is to distort the true facts to the public. 

KTNV, September 2, 2016: Local Cab Driver Shot Twice On Job Fighting For Workers' Compensation 

by journalist Lonce LaMon, lonce@adjustercom.com; copyright Lonce LaMon and adjustercom, all rights reserved