Business
Workers Seeking Compensation for Injuries Face New Challenge: Fewer Lawyers
FARGO, N.D.—Oak Reile was delivering a pallet of washer fluid, cigarettes and candy to a local convenience store in 2020 when he slipped and fell, breaking two vertebrae and paralyzing him from the armpits down.
After months of hospitalization and rehab, Reile slid into a deep depression. Sometimes he would tell his wife, Kirsten, “You should’ve just let me die,” she says. He started seeing a therapist, but the state workers’ compensation agency denied the claim, arguing depression wasn’t a physiological effect of his injury.
The Reiles, frustrated by other denials too, decided to fight. That was when they discovered another hurdle to getting medical bills paid for on-the-job injuries in North Dakota: There are just two lawyers left in the state who will represent injured workers. Both are in their late 60s and plan to retire soon.
The pool of lawyers pursuing workers’ compensation cases is shrinking in some states. State laws have dialed back payouts and benefits enough that young lawyers are turning to more-lucrative specialties, rather than replacing veteran attorneys who are retiring.
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