Pending Request for Attorney’s Fees doesn’t Save PFB from Statute of Limitations

Case File

An employee's initial petition for benefits, which was later voluntarily dismissed before the employer's acceptance of compensability or adjudication of any entitlement to compensation or medical benefits did not continue to toll the limitation statute's running where, as part of the dismissal, the employee purported to leave pending his demand for attorney's fees. Simply Research subscribers have access to the full text of the decision.

Case

Murphy v. Polk County Board of County Commissioners, No. 1D2022-2752 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 09/03/25)

What Happened

A worker alleged that he injured his right knee as he stepped out of a garbage truck while working for a Florida county. He filed his initial PFB on Jan. 11, 2017, seeking compensability for the injury, which happened on Sept. 10, 2016.

The county denied compensability and denied the worker's entitlement to medical or disability benefits. The worker voluntarily dismissed without prejudice the PFB but asserted that entitlement to "the amount of an attorney fee and taxable costs" remained at issue.

On May 28, 2019, the worker filed a second PFB regarding the same date of accident. The employer responded by asserting a statute-of-limitations defense. The Judge of Compensation Claims dismissed. A similar fate befell two additional PFBs the worker filed, with the last coming on July 14, 2021, and the JCC's dismissal happening on Aug. 18, 2022.

The worker appealed to court.

Rule of Law

The Florida Workers' Compensation Law bars the filing of a petition for benefits beyond the two years from when the employee became aware that he suffered an accidental work-caused injury. A pending, legally sufficient PFB filed within that two-year period tolls the two-year period.

Under Rice v. Reedy Creek Improvement Dist., 924 So. 2d 882 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 2006), as long as at least one petition remains pending at all times between the filing of the first petition and the hearing on the last petition regarding an accident date, a claimant's voluntary dismissal of the first petition would not operate to dismiss the entire case as to that accident date but only the individual petition. Thus, the statute would continue to be tolled for the entire period.

What the Court Said

Looking to the "workers' compensation regime," the court explained that benefits fall into two categories: 1) compensation for disability and death; and 2) medical and attendant and that attorney's fees were "neither of these forms of benefits."

Thus, in the court's view, the fact that the worker left open his ask for attorney's fees did not, for purposes of tolling the statute of limitation under the WCL, mean that he had a pending PFB. Instead, once the worker dismissed his first PFB, there "never was going to be a resolution or disposition of a claim for benefits that would give rise to an entitlement to the fees he still ostensibly was demanding."

Verdict: The court affirmed the JCC's dismissal of the fourth PFB.

Takeaway

Under the Florida Workers' Compensation Law, a demand for attorney's fees is "collateral" to a petition for benefits' claim for benefits and cannot serve as a standalone basis to deem a PFB still pending for tolling purposes.

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