The Kentucky Supreme Court has clarified when an injured subcontractor can sue the premises owner in the tort system. To discourage companies from hiring out their regular work to avoid the cost of workers’ comp insurance, Kentucky law requires that subcontractors doing a company’s regular work must be covered by the company’s workers’ comp insurance and, in exchange, the company would be exempt from lawsuits brought by the subcontractors. (Other states have similar laws.) The problem was in defining what work by subcontractors was included under the law. The Kentucky Supreme Court has now stated that the law “refers to work that is customary, usual, normal or performed repeatedly and that the business or a similar business would perform or be expected to perform with employees.” As part of its ruling, the court said that the family of a man who died of asbestos-related cancer and two other men who developed asbestosis could sue the premises owners for their work-related exposure to asbestos.
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