It is estimated that the Workers Compensation Fund could be missing, depending on the source, anywhere from $20 million to $60 million. The Department's mismanagement and lack of clear leadership has left the system in such disarray that a person that had been disbarred by the Indiana Bar Association from practicing law in 1998 was some how allowed to sit on the bench as an appeals judge in the District for the past 16 years. That's right; a person deemed by another State as unfit to practice law due to a propensity to falsify documents and other "chronically deceptive behavior" was allowed by the DC Department of Employment Services to sit on the bench and deliver almost two decades of potentially incorrect and damaging decisions. The amount of people, victims, employers and insurers effected by this "oversight" is close to immeasurable and it's true impact nearly insurmountable.
I became aware of this particularly ugly case of complete institutional deterioration via the work of a friend who represents a microcosm of those effected by its impact. I intend to track the progress of this saga and will be actively promoting its unraveling throughout visual storytelling. DC Council Member Vincent Orange played host to an initial hearing on the matter last Friday, so I stopped by to get a feel for things and capture a few moments of the hearing.
