Feds Probing Illinois State Agencies’ Workers’ Compensation Payouts

Two federal prosecutors are investigating possible workers’ compensation abuses at Illinois government agencies after disclosures of millions of dollars in payouts and questionable practices by arbitrators.

The Associated Press obtained five subpoenas from U.S. attorneys in the central and southern districts demanding injury-claim data and five years’ of email and personnel records for Workers’ Compensation Commission arbitrators and other state employees.

The Belleville News-Democrat reported in December on nearly $10 million in awards for work-related injuries paid out to more than half the staff at the Menard Correctional Center in Chester, prompting a state fraud investigation.

Subsequent newspaper reports raised questions about the actions of Workers’ Compensation Commission arbitrators who decide injury claims, several of whom have received their own settlements.

Federal prosecutors demanded emails and personnel records from commission arbitrators Jennifer Teague and John Dibble. The state put Teague and Dibble, who make $115,840 a year, on paid administrative leave Feb. 15, the day after four subpoenas were issued by U.S. Attorney James Lewis of the central district.

Teague was suspended following a News-Democrat report that she tried to conduct a high-profile workers’ comp hearing “on the sly with no press,” according to an email, and offered to speed up another hearing in return for a quicker payment in her own injury case. The newspaper reported that Dibble, who approved 125 of the Menard prison cases, also received a workers’ comp payment of $48,790 for a November 2009 fall that did not show up in commission records.

Dibble declined comment. Teague did not respond to a message left on her personal phone.

The lone subpoena from U.S. Attorney Stephen Wigginton of the southern district of Illinois, dated Feb. 23, demands all email account information for Dibble and Teague.

The AP also obtained state Insurance Department subpoenas issued in early March to the Department of Corrections for all workers’ comp data from Menard since January 2006 and the names and employment information of every Menard worker since January 2007.

A spokeswoman for Lewis declined comment. A Wigginton spokesman did not respond to a request for comment, nor did spokeswomen for the Department of Central Management Services, which handles the state’s self-insurance fund, or the Insurance Department, both of which received subpoenas.

John Simpson, a Springfield attorney Gov. Pat Quinn named to lead the state’s inquiry, referred questions to the Insurance spokeswoman.

The Belleville newspaper reported that of nearly $10 million paid out to 389 employees at Menard, which opened in 1878, $5.9 million was paid to workers, usually prison guards, who claimed injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome from working manual locking systems.

Subsequent articles revealed the Dibble payment for carpal tunnel suffered in a fall at a state office and Teague’s alleged attempt, outlined in e-mails obtained by the newspaper, to keep a workers’ comp hearing for Illinois State Police trooper Matt Mitchell secret despite state law requiring it be open to the public.

Mitchell pleaded guilty to reckless homicide after a November 2007 crash on Interstate 64 in which his squad car, traveling 126 mph, hit one traveling in the oncoming lane, killing two teen sisters from Collinsville. The commission denied Mitchell’s claim for injury compensation, which he has appealed to the commission.

The former assistant attorney general in that case, a CMS administrator who handles workers’ comp claims and another arbitrator are also subjects of the subpoena to CMS.

The federal subpoena to Corrections seeks all documents related to Menard claims since January 2006. Subpoenas to CMS, Insurance, and the Workers’ Compensation Commission also seek information on claims from seven other state agencies.

In February, the Belleville paper reported on the state’s system of paying settlements to employees based on a doctor’s diagnosis only, including 3,500 uncontested settlements in 2010 that in part covered $1.9 million paid out for repetitive stress injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome. It specifically mentioned $358,000 in settlements paid to employees in the agencies subpoenaed.