## Facts

- Cloverleaf Express operated a trucking business hauling freight, primarily for Wal-Mart.
- Lyle Fouts drove one of Cloverleaf’s company-owned tractor–trailers; Cloverleaf paid for fuel, maintenance, and repairs.
- At Cloverleaf’s request, Fouts signed a certificate of noncoverage under Arkansas workers’ compensation statutes; Cloverleaf did not pay workers’ compensation premiums for him.
- Fouts was paid per load, and Cloverleaf did not withhold income taxes.
- Cloverleaf directed Fouts’s pick-ups and expected him to be available when called, effectively limiting outside work.
- On December 15, 2000, while at a Wal-Mart facility, Fouts helped lift and reposition a fallen conveyor used for loading freight and suffered a myocardial infarction; he had significant preexisting heart disease and prior surgeries.
- Fouts (and later his survivors/estate) sought workers’ compensation benefits for the cardiac injury and death.
- An ALJ denied the claim based on lack of employee status; the Workers’ Compensation Commission reversed, found employee status, ruled the certificate did not bar coverage, and found the cardiac event compensable.
- Cloverleaf appealed the Commission’s award.

## Issues

1. Whether a certificate of noncoverage under Ark. Code Ann. §§ 11-9-102 and 11-9-402 can exclude an otherwise statutory employee from workers’ compensation coverage.
2. Whether substantial evidence supported the Commission’s finding that Fouts was an employee rather than an independent contractor.
3. Whether substantial evidence supported the Commission’s finding that Fouts’s work-related exertion was the major cause of his myocardial infarction and resulting death, making the claim compensable.

## Decision

- The Arkansas Court of Appeals affirmed the Commission’s award of benefits.
- The court upheld the Commission’s interpretation that certificates of noncoverage apply only to sole proprietors and partners, not to employees.
- The court held substantial evidence supported the Commission’s finding that Fouts was an employee, emphasizing Cloverleaf’s control and ownership of the equipment and operational costs.
- The court held substantial evidence supported compensability of the cardiac injury and death, including medical testimony that the lifting exertion was the major cause.

## Legal Principles

- A certificate of noncoverage may not be used by an employer to waive or eliminate workers’ compensation coverage for an employee; its statutory effect is limited to specified business-owner categories (e.g., sole proprietors and partners).
- Employee status in workers’ compensation turns primarily on the right of control and the economic realities of the relationship; factors supporting employee status include employer control over assignments and schedules, ownership of essential equipment, and integration of the work into the employer’s regular business.
- Cardiovascular injuries are compensable only if statutory requirements are met, including proof (often via medical evidence) that the work-related exertion was the major cause of the injury or death, even with preexisting heart disease.

## Conclusion

The court upheld workers’ compensation benefits for a truck driver who died after exertion at a customer’s facility, ruling that the employer could not rely on a certificate of noncoverage to defeat coverage, and that substantial evidence supported both employee status and the finding that work exertion was the major cause of the fatal cardiac event.


Cloverleaf Express v. Fouts, 91 Ark. App. 4, 207 S.W.3d 576 (Ark. Ct. App. 2005)