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Ardoin v. SWDI11/2/2005
Court composed of Sylvia R. Cooks, Oswald A. Decuir, and Marc T. Amy, Judges.
AFFIRMED.
At issue in this workers' compensation case is an exception of improper venue. The exception was maintained by the judge for District 2 of the Office of Workers' Compensation, which district is headquartered in Rapides Parish and encompasses Evangeline Parish where the claimant now resides. The claimant appeals the ruling of the OWC judge, and for the following reasons, we affirm.
The claimant, Ray Ardoin, filed two disputed claims for compensation against his employer, SWDI, Inc., a garbage collecting contractor doing business in Lafourche Parish. The first claim resulted from an accident which occurred on June 16, 2003, and the second stemmed from an accident on August 13, 2003, both in Lafourche Parish. At the time of both accidents, Ardoin was a resident of Lafourche Parish; the parties indicate he was in the custody of the Louisiana Department of Corrections and was participating in a work release program with SWDI. He was housed in a corrections facility in Raceland. The parties further indicate that Ardoin was released from state custody shortly after the accidents and returned to his lifelong home in Evangeline Parish.
The Workers' Compensation Act contains venue provisions at La.R.S. 23:1310.4, which provides in pertinent part:
A. (1) At the time a claim is initiated with the director, the claimant shall elect the situs of necessary hearings by the workers' compensation judge.
(2) If the claimant is a domiciliary of the state of Louisiana, he shall be required to elect either the judicial district of the parish of his domicile at the time he sustained his injury, the judicial district of the parish where the injury occurred, or the judicial district of the parish of the principal place of business of the employer.
B. After the election has been made as provided above, all future hearings affecting the claimant's case shall be held in the workers' compensation district so designated unless the workers' compensation judge, upon agreement by the claimant and the employer, shall transfer such cause for hearing to any other workers' compensation district agreed upon. In addition, hearings may be held in any workers' compensation district if the workers' compensation judge determines that good cause has been shown.
In this appeal, the parties have focused their arguments on the domicile of the claimant at the time of the accidents. Ardoin contends that while he resided in Lafourche Parish during his incarceration, his domicile remained in Evangeline Parish. The disputed claims for compensation filed by Ardoin list his address as Evangeline Parish, but both identify his place of residence at the time of the accidents as Lafourche Parish. In briefs to the OWC and to this court, Ardoin asserts that he never intended to change his domicile when he was involuntarily sent to Lafourche Parish, citing bank accounts, voter registration, and divorce proceedings all in Evangeline Parish, albeit without evidentiary proof. Ardoin relies on jurisprudence which holds there is a presumption "that the previously established domicile of the person, or his domicile of origin, has not been changed. Succession of Barger, 217 So.2d 779 (La.App. 4 Cir. 1969)." LaFleur v. Seaboard Fire & Marine Ins. Co., 296 So.2d 860, 863 (La.App. 3 Cir. 1974), writ refused, 300 So.2d 185 (La.1974).
To the contrary, SWDI references the longstanding jurisprudential rule that a person's domicile is presumed to be in the place where he resides, citing Alter v. Waddill, 20 La.Ann. 246 (1868). In this case, the place of residence was Lafourche P
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