Tale of Two Disability Pension Rulings: Brookfield IL and FDNY

Two cases from two fire departments on the issue of whether disabled firefighters qualify for accidental (line-of-duty) pensions, give us the opportunity to explore the factors that pension boards must consider when awarding or denying such pensions.

Both firefighters sustained back injuries. Both sought accidental disability pension benefits. Both were awarded ordinary disability pensions. Both appealed.

Brookfield, Illinois – Witteman v. Brookfield Firefighters’ Pension Fund
In Witteman v. Brookfield Firefighters’ Pension Fund, Nicholas Witteman, a firefighter/paramedic, claimed he injured his back while lifting a 350–400 lb. patient out of a recliner and onto a stretcher. He applied for a line-of-duty disability pension under the Illinois Pension Code. The Board of Trustees held extensive hearings and issued a 66-page decision. While the Board agreed Witteman was permanently disabled, it denied his request for a duty pension and awarded a non-duty pension instead.

The Board cited several factors undermining his claim:

• He failed to report the injury immediately despite knowing the requirement to do so, and having promptly reported a prior back injury years earlier.
• His testimony was inconsistent, and he amended his disability application mid-hearing to change how the injury allegedly occurred.
• None of the four other firefighters on the scene corroborated his account of lifting the patient, and their testimony suggested he did not participate in the maneuver he described.
• The Board found his demeanor evasive and his explanation for the delay in reporting not credible.

Medical experts initially opined the injury was work-related based on his description. However, when asked to assume he did not lift the patient, two of the three reversed their opinions, concluding the disability was not caused by a duty-related act. The appellate court upheld the Board’s decision, emphasizing that determining witness credibility and weighing evidence lies squarely within the pension board’s authority.

FDNY – Byrnes v. Kavanagh
In Byrnes v. Kavanagh, retired FDNY firefighter James Byrnes challenged the denial of his application for Accidental Disability Retirement (ADR) benefits under the New York City Administrative Code. Byrnes had a 42-year career with at least 14 documented line-of-duty injuries, 12 involving his lower back and 9 his right knee. His final injury occurred in August 2019, after which FDNY’s Bureau of Health Services found him disabled due to conditions of the lumbar spine and right knee and placed him on limited service.

Despite that finding, the FDNY Pension Fund’s Medical Board denied ADR benefits, concluding his disabilities were unrelated to any of his service injuries, including the 2019 incident. Byrnes was awarded only Ordinary Disability Retirement benefits and commenced an Article 78 proceeding.

The Supreme Court of New York found the denial “arbitrary and capricious,” noting:

• The Medical Board acknowledged the disabling conditions but offered no rational explanation for finding them unrelated to the extensive record of repeated injuries to the same body parts.
• The Board failed to reconcile its conclusion with FDNY Health Services’ contemporaneous finding linking the disability to the 2019 injury.
• The decision lacked “some credible evidence” as required under New York law and instead appeared conclusory, without medical analysis distinguishing the cumulative impact of Byrnes’s long history of line-of-duty trauma.

Quoting from the decision:

• Despite acknowledging that Petitioner was, in fact, disabled as a result of injuries to the lumbar spine and right knee, the Medical Board concluded that these disabling conditions were not causally related to any of Petitioner’s fourteen service-related injuries — including the most recent one on August 24, 2019.
• The Board’s denial of ADR benefits rested on the position that Petitioner’s disabling conditions were not the natural and proximate result of his FDNY service.
• The Court finds that the Medical Board’s determination lacks a rational basis and fails to reflect an analysis of the Petitioner’s extensive medical and service history.
• The record includes documented and repeated injuries to the same anatomical regions now found to be the cause of Petitioner’s disability.
• The Medical Board’s conclusion — that these injuries are completely unrelated to the Petitioner’s present disabling conditions — appears conclusory and unsupported by any specific medical explanation distinguishing the cumulative impact or causation of those prior injuries.
• Further, the Medical Board’s determination does not meaningfully address the July 7, 2020, finding by FDNY’s Bureau of Health Services, which attributed Petitioner’s disability to his August 24, 2019, injury — a decision grounded in contemporaneous medical evidence.
• The record is devoid of any analysis refuting the causal connection or explaining how such a finding should be disregarded. The absence of such discussion renders the determination arbitrary and capricious.

The court remanded the case back to the Pension Board for reconsideration consistent with its ruling, emphasizing that when injuries aggravate a latent or preexisting condition, they can still qualify as line-of-duty disabilities.

Taken together, the Brookfield and FDNY rulings show the common legal threads and the jurisdictional differences in accidental disability determinations. Both cases turned on causation: whether the disabling condition was the natural and proximate result of a line-of-duty act. In Witteman, the Illinois board exercised its authority to resolve factual disputes and assess credibility, with the appellate court affirming that its findings were not against the manifest weight of the evidence even where medical opinions initially supported the claim. In Byrnes, the New York court applied the “arbitrary and capricious” standard and found the Medical Board’s conclusion unsupported because it failed to reconcile extensive line-of-duty injury history and contemporaneous medical findings tying the disability to service.

Both decisions underscore that in accidental disability cases, the outcome rests not only on medical diagnoses but on the factual record, the weight given to contemporaneous evidence, and whether the pension board’s reasoning shows a rational connection between the evidence and the conclusion under the applicable state law.

Here are copies of the two decisions.