James Hoerschgen v. Von Hoffman Corp.

disputed issues, without clearly identifying the evidence upon which those conclusions rest. As a result, we have an award in which the issues appear to have been resolved, but we are left to guess at what the fact-finder believed the facts to be. The courts have spoken to this problem before and made clear the importance of rendering affirmative findings in these matters.¹

Employee worked for employer for almost 40 years. Employee's last position was as a bindery shift manager. Employee's tasks included supervising anywhere from 12 to 45 people, ordering parts to keep machinery running, managing inventory, dealing with people problems, and other issues.

Employee has suffered from heart problems since 1976. Employee's father, mother, and daughter all have experienced health problems related to cardiac conditions. In employee's case, chronically high levels of cholesterol combined with an inability to tolerate the medications doctors prescribed to correct this condition resulted in employee's developing coronary artery disease. Beginning in April 2002, employee was off work for his heart condition. Employee had multiple stents placed in his arteries and underwent bypass surgery on September 11, 2002. He returned to work in January 2003.

In March or April 2004, a new supervisor, Garrett Shropshire, came to work for employer. Employee didn't like working for Mr. Shropshire. Mr. Shropshire's mannerisms and supervisory style caused employee some stress. Employee provided numerous examples of stressful situations created by Mr. Shropshire. From employee's testimony, we find the following facts as to the stressful incidents and situations employee experienced working for Mr. Shropshire.

Employee experienced frustration when Mr. Shropshire assigned him a particular task but then assigned the same task to another employee. For example, Mr. Shropshire once told employee to repair a spiral binding machine. Employee ordered the parts for the repair, but by the time they came in, Mr. Shropshire had directed another employee to fix the machine. Incidents like this confused employee and made it difficult for him to know what he was supposed to be doing at work.

Mr. Shropshire didn't provide a lot of leeway for his subordinates to express themselves or advance their own ideas. Mr. Shropshire did, however, take recommendations from employees and even adopted some of employee's own ideas, although not to the extent employee would have liked. There was a lot of trial and error going on during this time period, as employer was undergoing a change in corporate ownership. Mr. Shropshire sometimes commented that he would rather have inexperienced managers than his

---

¹ See, for example, the court's comments in *Stegman v. Grand River Reg'l Ambulance Dist.*, 274 S.W.3d 529, 532 (Mo. App. 2008): "Here, there are literally pages of testimony summarization. There are also pages of substantial discussion of abstract legal theory. The ALJ certainly diligently summarized all of the evidence as an impartial and uncritical scrivener. No doubt it was a useful reference tool for the ALJ's own use in understanding the facts. But because of the absence of findings (that is, the lack of critical evaluation and the failure to draw pertinent inferences from the evidence), the summaries, with all due respect, are of little value to this court."

present group. Mr. Shropshire was not quick with encouragement or praise, but employee acknowledged that he did, at least on occasion, tell employee he was doing a good job.

Mr. Shropshire was loud and animated during meetings. He also used vulgarity. He once told a coworker, Dan Rice, to come bend over and spread his legs because he was going to get it good. Vulgar language and profanity were common in the workplace. Mr. Shropshire never cursed directly at employee, did not call him vulgar names, did not get in employee's face, did not get violent or threaten to use violence toward employee, and did not yell at employee.

Mr. Shropshire instructed the managers to start rotating shifts. Employee didn't like this, as he had worked first shift for most of his almost 40 years working for employer. But employee acknowledged on cross-examination that part of the idea was to foster group similarity and cross-training among the managers and that he wasn't specifically targeted by Mr. Shropshire for rotation to different shifts.

Mr. Shropshire once put his arm around employee's shoulders as they walked together. Employee took offense at this and felt very uncomfortable, but appeared at a loss to explain why. Instead, employee urged (as he did with many of his complaints about Mr. Shropshire) that it was more the way Mr. Shropshire did things that bothered him. We find employee's testimony as to some intangible or inexpressible sense of "the way Mr. Shropshire did things" unconvincing in terms of providing a clear or credible picture of Mr. Shropshire's actions.

Employee described waking up from nightmares crying, suffering constant chest pain, not being able to think right, and disturbed sleep patterns as symptoms of the stress he encountered working for Mr. Shropshire. Employee testified that he'd never in his life experienced stress like that. We find this testimony from employee difficult to believe, especially in light of his admissions on cross-examination, when he was confronted with the medical records setting forth a considerable history of psychiatric issues predating Mr. Shropshire's coming to work for employer in 2004. We note that employee testified on direct examination that his stress prior to encountering Mr. Shropshire was nothing more than normal stress that never interfered with his ability to do his job. But employee admitted on cross-examination that doctors diagnosed him with chronic anxiety disorder and depression in 2002 and 2003, that his heart problems and surgery in 2002 caused him to be very depressed, and that he told Dr. Schlegel (who in 2002 was prescribing Zoloft for employee) that he was having a lot of anxiety related to coworkers who were leaving employer. These contradictions, in our view, further damage the credibility of employee's testimony as to the level of stress he experienced working for Mr. Shropshire. Ultimately, we find that employee was experiencing a lot of stress in his life, and having considerable difficulty managing it, before Mr. Shropshire came to work for employer.

Employee presented testimony from his wife, Yvonne Hoerschgen, and his longtime friend and coworker, Dan Rice. We find Ms. Hoerschgen lacking in credibility owing to her contradictory statements about whether employee experienced psychiatric problems before encountering Mr. Shropshire, in addition to her lack of firsthand knowledge of what it was like working with Mr. Shropshire. We find Mr. Rice lacking credibility owing to Mr. Rice's longstanding friendship with employee and also Mr. Rice's own history of

Injury No.: 04-144251

Employee: James Hoerschgen

interpersonal problems with Mr. Shropshire. We do not find Mr. Rice's testimony to be an unbiased source of evidence as to the level of stress Mr. Shropshire caused employees. Accordingly, we decline to find any facts from the testimony of these two witnesses.

Several other of employee's coworkers testified as to what they experienced working with Mr. Shropshire, as summarized in the administrative law judge's decision. We find the following facts from the credible testimony of Preston Hunter, Heather Sneller, Todd Bone, Mike Bax, and Mike McKenna. Mr. Shropshire's management style was loud and aggressive and he had high expectations, but his behavior was not so unusual that it caused these individuals stress beyond the normal type of stress they regularly encountered at work for employer. Mr. Shropshire did not treat employee differently from any of the other managers.

The parties presented conflicting expert medical testimony as thoroughly summarized in the administrative law judge's award. After careful consideration, we find Drs. Caffrey and Mankowitz more credible than Drs. Halfaker and Kennett. Dr. Mankowitz, in particular, convincingly explained that stress does not cause plaque to build up in arteries, but rather high cholesterol and poorly controlled blood pressure are responsible for employee's cardiac condition. We credit Dr. Mankowitz's ultimate opinion that employee's stress at work was unrelated and had no bearing on the development or progression of employee's coronary artery disease. Relying on the credible testimony from Dr. Mankowitz, we find that employee's cardiac condition is a product of his preexisting and longstanding high levels of cholesterol and uncontrolled high blood pressure.

Whether employee suffered a mental injury for purposes of $\S$ 287.120.8 RSMo

We agree with the administrative law judge that employee failed to meet his burden of proving he suffered a mental injury ar