If the Industrial Commission shall determine that any hearing has been brought, prosecuted, or defended without reasonable ground, it may assess the whole cost of the proceedings including reasonable fees for defendant's attorney or plaintiff's attorney upon the party who has brought or defended them.
N.C. Gen. Stat. § 97-88.1
Attorney's fees at original hearing
Known as the The North Carolina Workers' Compensation Act
The act spans §§ 97–97 (132 sections).
Applied in 69 court decisions — leading case 168 N.C. App. 175 - Estate of Apple Ex Rel. Apple v. Commercial Courier Express, Inc. (2005)
Most recently applied in 256 N.C. App. 635 - Hall v. U.S. Xpress, Inc. (December 2017)
1979, c. 268, s. 1.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: North Carolina General Assembly. Reproduced from public-domain North Carolina statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.