What is Iowa’s Willful Injury Defense?

Do You Know the Rule?

Iowa’s workers’ compensation statute does not allow employees, or their surviving family members, to collect benefits when the employee, effectively, knowingly harmed himself. This is the willful-injury defense outlined in Iowa Code section 85.16(1) (2016), and it allows employers and carriers to withhold compensation under certain circumstances. 

When it applies 

The defense applies in three scenarios: 

1. Intent to harm self or another. The injury was caused by the employee’s willful intent to injure himself or herself or to willfully injure another. 

2. Intoxication. The injury was caused by the employee’s intoxication.  

2. A third-party’s willful act. The injury was caused by the willful act of a third party directed against the employee for reasons personal to such employee. 

Suicide

These cases typically involve situations where the employee purportedly committed suicide. Employers will have to look for clear evidence of the employee’s intent to commit suicide, such as a suicide note or verbal expressions of the intent to coworkers. 

Establishing intoxication 

For the intoxication defense to apply, the employer must show all of the following: 

• The intoxication did not arise out of and in the course of employment. 

• The intoxication was due to the effects of alcohol or another narcotic, depressant, stimulant, hallucinogenic, or hypnotic drug not prescribed by an authorized medical practitioner. 

• The intoxication was a substantial factor in causing the injury. 

To show that the intoxication was due to alcohol or drugs, employers can look to drug tests indicating that the employee had alcohol or drugs in his blood at the time of, or right after, the injury.  

Establishing a third-party’s willful act 

To establish the defense based on a third-party’s action, the employer will have to show that the injury arose from a personal situation, such as a dispute between the employee and third-party unrelated to the employee’s job. 

Employee’s burden to overcome the defense 

Once the employee shows the above, the onus is on the employee. He or she can move forward with the claim by establishing one of the following: 

• The employee was not intoxicated at the time of the injury; or  

• The intoxication was not a substantial factor in causing the injury. 

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