Alabama Workers' Comp Blawg

  • 07
  • Sep
  • 2026

A 1985 Workers’ Comp Accident, a Divorce, a Remarriage and Death Benefits 41 Years Later

 

Here is one for the workers’ compensation time capsule.

 

Maine resident Donald Nadeau suffered a job-related injury on April 28, 1985. He lived another 35 years, dying in September 2020 from complications tied to that injury. By then, however, much had changed. Nadeau and Carol Brewster divorced in 1997, and she remarried in 2011. She received no alimony and was not financially dependent on him when he died, yet she sought workers’ compensation death benefits.

 

That led to a Maine Supreme Judicial Court decision on August 6, 2026 - more than 41 years after the accident.

 

Brewster’s position was simple: look at the statute.

 

The Maine law governing the 1985 accident measured dependency “at the time of his injury.”

 

According to Verrill Dana, LLP attorney, Elizabeth Connellan Smith, “when this provision was originally included, it was designed to address young widows of woods workers, who in rural Maine, often would be left with no resources if the worker was killed in a logging accident, or widows of workers who were exposed to asbestos and developed asbestosis years later. That rarely happens anymore.”

 

In 1985, Brewster was unquestionably Nadeau’s dependent wife: they lived together, she worked part time, and they shared finances.

 

The employer argued she had to be dependent both when Nadeau was injured and when he died. By 2020, she was not: they had been divorced 23 years, she had remarried nine years earlier, and she conceded no economic loss from his death.

 

Brewster responded that the Legislature chose the date of injury as the dependency date, and courts could not add a second requirement simply because the result seemed counterintuitive.

 

On August 6, 2026, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the award.

 

The Court held the statute unambiguous: dependency is determined at injury, not again at death. Because the Legislature expressly used the date of death elsewhere, adding that requirement to § 58 would insert language the Legislature omitted.

 

WWAD

 

What would Alabama do? I am pleased to report that, in Alabama, the interesting dependency issue that occupied the Maine courts would have ended much sooner.

 

Alabama Code § 25-5-62 focuses on dependency status at the time of death. So, the fact that they were blissfully married at the time of the accident would not be relevant when considering eligibility for death benefits. In fact, they could still be married at the time of death and, unless the widow can prove that she was financially dependent on the decedent at the time of death and a reasonable amount of time prior to same, she would not be eligible to receive benefits.

 

About the Author:

 

This article was prepared by Mike Fish, an attorney with Fish Nelson & Holden, LLC, a law firm dedicated to representing self-insured employers, insurance carriers and funds, and third-party administrators in all matters related to workers’ compensation. Fish Nelson & Holden is a member of the National Workers’ Compensation Defense Network. If you have any questions about this article or Alabama workers’ compensation in general, please contact Fish by e-mailing him at mfish@fishnelson.com or by calling him directly at 205-332-1448.

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