JERRY W RODES V GLASS ALTERNATIVES CORP
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STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS
JERRY W. RODES and MELANIE RODES,
UNPUBLISHED
March 20, 1998
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v
No. 198962
Emmet Circuit Court
LC No. 96-003625 NZ
GLASS ALTERNATIVES CORPORATION,
Defendant-Appellee.
Before: O’Connell, P.J., and White and Bandstra, JJ.
PER CURIAM.
Plaintiffs appeal as of right from an order granting defendant’s motion for summary disposition.
We affirm.
In this case, we are asked to decide whether defendant is immune from tort liability under the
exclusive remedy provision of the Worker’s Disability Compensation Act (WDCA), MCL 418.131;
MSA 17.237(131). The trial court relied upon Farrell v Dearborn Mfg Co, 416 Mich 267; 330
NW2d 397 (1982), in concluding that defendant was immune from tort liability. Plaintiffs argue that
Farrell, a case that involved short-term, temporary employee leases, is distinguishable and inapplicable
in this case. We disagree. The question regarding the liabilities of a labor broker and its customer in
relation to the exclusive remedy provision of the WDCA, was recently addressed by the Supreme
Court in Kidder v Miller-Davis Co, 455 Mich 25, 41 n 8; 564 NW2d 872 (1997), where the Court
stated that “[t]he fact that the contract was for twelve months, renewable yearly, does not change the
fact that CLS was a labor broker providing temporary workers.”
In comparing Kidder and Farrell to the circumstances of the present case, we conclude that a
labor broker relationship existed between DART and defendant such that a coemployer relationship
was formed, thus precluding a separate tort action by plaintiffs against defendant, the customer of the
labor broker (i.e., DART). Kidder, supra at 40. Furthermore, in applying the economic reality test to
the employer-employee relationship in the present case, we conclude that DART, the labor broker, and
defendant, its customer, were coemployers, and that each employer was protected by, and entitled to,
the benefit of the exclusive remedy provision of the WDCA. Kidder, supra at 42-47.
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In light of our disposition of this issue, we need not address plaintiffs’ other issue regarding the
validity of the employment agreement.
We affirm.
/s/ Peter D. O’Connell
/s/ Helene N. White
/s/ Richard A. Bandstra
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