Attorney General's News Release

November 8, 1996

Platte County trucking firm pleads guilty to workers' compensation noncompliance; record penalty assessed

Jefferson City, Mo. — A Platte County trucking firm will pay a record penalty after pleading guilty last week to charges of failing to carry workers' compensation insurance brought by Attorney General Jay Nixon.

K&P Trucking will pay $35,500 in penalties and fines for failing to carrying workers' compensation insurance, as required by law, and for failure to report an injury. In addition, the corporation also must pay all medical bills and disability awards for work-related injuries its employees suffered prior to March 1, 1996. If the corporation violates the terms of its probation, it faces an additional suspended penalty of up to $165,000.

Both the suspended penalty and the penalty to be paid are the largest ever obtained in a workers' compensation case in Missouri.

Kenneth Pratt, owner of the trucking firm, also pleaded guilty to three counts of workers' compensation fraud. Pratt will be personally responsible for seeing that the penalty, the medical bills and the disability awards are paid by the corporation. If they are not paid, Pratt faces up to three years in prison.

“The few businesses in Missouri that do not carry workers' compensation insurance cannot shirk their responsibility and leave their employees unprotected,” Nixon said. “When the law requires a business to have coverage and it does not, we have aggressively enforced that law.”

The Attorney General's Office has authority under Missouri law to prosecute cases of workers' compensation fraud or noncompliance.

Inquiries from consumers should be directed to consumer@ago.mo.gov or 1-800-392-8222 (from within Missouri) or 573-751-3321 (outside Missouri).

All media inquiries should be directed to Press Secretary John Fougere.

E-mail      Phone: 573-751-8844         Fax: 573-751-5818