RI Supreme Court Rules on Firefighter Cancer Law

Dec. 18, 2019
The Rhode Island Supreme Court says state law does not contain a "conclusive presumption" that all cancer that afflicts firefighters is job-related.

CRANSTON, RI — Rhode Island state law does not contain a “conclusive presumption” that all cancer that afflicts firefighters is job-related, according to the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

“The General Assembly could have mandated that there be a conclusive presumption with respect to the cause of cancer in firefighters,” Justice William P. Robinson III wrote in a concurring opinion, “but there is simply no clear language in the statute indicating that the General Assembly did so.”

The origins of the case trace back to a 2015 decision by the state’s Retirement Board, which refused to grant a disability pension to a Cranston firefighter, also a smoker, who argued that his colon cancer was a job-related medical condition under Rhode Island law.

The firefighter, Kevin Lang, died from his colon cancer in 2017, but the legal matter has been pursued by his estate.

At the time of the original Retirement Board decision, some argued that state law presumes any form of cancer afflicting any firefighter is job-related and the retirement board has no discretion to deny a disability pension.

Disability pensions in the state system equal almost 67 percent of pay, tax free, and represent a significant amount of the pension liabilities in certain Rhode Island communities.

Lang, who had been a Cranston firefighter for more than 18 years, had been diagnosed with cancer in September 2012.

A subcommittee that investigated and made a recommendation to the retirement panel, had rejected Lang’s application for a disability pension in 2014, saying it found nothing to link the condition to his firefighting experience.

Three doctors who examined Lang were unable to definitely determine a “causal relationship” between his cancer and his experiences on the job.

The case made its way to the Supreme Court via the Workers Compensation Court and via that court’s appellate division.

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©2019 The Providence Journal (Providence, R.I.)

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