## Facts

- John E. Dodson worked as a long-distance truck driver for Dubose Steel, Inc., delivering steel on an out-of-state route.
- While driving for work, Dodson attempted to change lanes, provoking another driver, Troy Campbell, who believed Dodson nearly caused a collision.
- After further yelling at successive traffic lights, Dodson exited his truck, approached Campbell’s vehicle, and confronted him while striking the hood.
- As Campbell attempted to leave, his vehicle struck Dodson, causing a severe head injury; Dodson later died.
- Dodson’s widow, as personal representative of his estate, sought workers’ compensation benefits for the injury and for death benefits.
- A deputy commissioner found the death arose out of and in the course of employment and awarded benefits; the Full Commission issued modified findings but awarded the same benefits.
- The employer and carrier appealed, disputing compensability and arguing the statutory willful-intent exclusion applied.

## Issues

1. Whether Dodson’s fatal injury arose out of and in the course of his employment as a long-distance truck driver.
2. Whether benefits were barred because Dodson’s conduct showed a willful intention to injure another under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 97-12.
3. Whether competent evidence supported the Commission’s findings and whether those findings supported its legal conclusions.

## Decision

- The court affirmed the Full Commission’s award of medical, death, and burial benefits.
- The court held competent evidence supported the Commission’s finding that the dispute originated from Dodson’s work-related driving maneuver while performing his delivery duties.
- The court agreed that long-distance trucking exposed Dodson to an increased risk of traffic confrontations and being struck by a vehicle, supporting the “arising out of” element.
- The court rejected application of § 97-12, concluding the evidence supported that Dodson did not act with a willful intention to injure or kill Campbell.
- The court applied the limited appellate review standard and declined to reweigh evidence or disturb the Commission’s credibility determinations.

## Legal Principles

- Appellate review of workers’ compensation decisions is limited to whether competent evidence supports the Commission’s findings of fact and whether those findings support its conclusions of law; appellate courts do not reweigh evidence.
- An injury is compensable when it arises out of and in the course of employment; the “arising out of” requirement is satisfied when employment exposes the employee to a greater risk than the general public or when the causal origin of an assault is work-related.
- Work-related assaults may be compensable when the altercation originates in the employee’s performance of job duties and is not purely personal.
- N.C. Gen. Stat. § 97-12 bars compensation only when the injury or death is occasioned by the employee’s willful intention to injure or kill self or another; the exclusion requires a high level of intent and is construed narrowly.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed workers’ compensation benefits for a truck driver killed after a traffic confrontation that originated in a work-related driving maneuver, holding the death arose out of and in the course of employment and was not barred by the willful-intent exclusion.


Dodson v. Dubose Steel, Inc., 159 N.C. App. 1, 582 S.E.2d 389 (2003)