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Laws of North Carolina (Last Updated: May 12, 2015) |
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Chapter15B. Victims Compensation. |
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Article1. Crime Victim's Compensation Act |
§15B-2. Definitions
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As used in this Article, the following definitions apply, unless the context requires otherwise:
(1) Allowable expense. - Reasonable charges incurred for reasonably needed products, services, and accommodations, including those for medical care, rehabilitation, medically-related property, and other remedial treatment and care.
Allowable expense includes a total charge not in excess of five thousand dollars ($5,000) for expenses related to funeral, cremation, and burial, including transportation of a body, but excluding expenses for flowers, gravestone, and other items not directly related to the funeral service.
Allowable expense for medical care, counseling, rehabilitation, medically-related property, and other remedial treatment and care of a victim shall be limited to sixty-six and two-thirds percent (66 2/3%) of the amount usually charged by the provider for the treatment or care. By accepting the compensation paid as allowable expense pursuant to this subdivision, the provider agrees that the compensation is payment in full for the treatment or care and shall not charge or otherwise hold a claimant financially responsible for the cost of services in addition to the amount of allowable expense.
(2) Claimant. - Any of the following persons who claims an award of compensation under this Article:
a. A victim;
b. A dependent of a deceased victim;
c. A third person who is not a collateral source and who provided benefit to the victim or his family other than in the course or scope of his employment, business, or profession;
d. A person who is authorized to act on behalf of a victim, a dependent, or a third person described in sub-subdivision c. of this subdivision;
e. A person who was convicted of a first offense under G.S. 14-204 and whose participation in the offense was a result of having been a trafficking victim under G.S. 14-43.11 or G.S. 14-43.13 or a victim of a severe form of trafficking under the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act (22 U.S.C. § 7102(13)).
The claimant, however, may not be the offender or an accomplice of the offender who committed the criminally injurious conduct, except as provided in sub-subdivision e. of this subdivision.
(3) Collateral source. - A source of benefits or advantages for economic loss otherwise compensable that the victim or claimant has received or that is readily available to the victim or the claimant from any of the following sources:
a. The offender.
b. The government of the United States or any of its agencies, a state or any of its political subdivisions, or an instrumentality of two or more states.
c. Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid.
d. State-required, temporary, nonoccupational disability insurance.
e. Worker's compensation.
f. Wage continuation programs of any employer.
g. Proceeds of a contract of insurance payable to the victim for loss that the victim sustained because of the criminally injurious conduct.
h. A contract providing prepaid hospital and other health care services, or benefits for disability.
i. A contract of insurance that will pay for expenses directly related to a funeral, cremation, and burial, including transportation of a body.
j. A charitable gift or donation by a third party, including a charity care write-off of expenses by a medical provider, regardless of whether the gift or donation is subsequently rescinded.
(4) Commission. - The Crime Victims Compensation Commission established by G.S. 15B-3.
(4a) Consumer reporting agency. - As defined in G.S. 75-61(4).
(4b) Credit report. - As defined in G.S. 75-61(3).
(5) Criminally injurious conduct. - Conduct that by its nature poses a substantial threat of personal injury or death, and is punishable by fine or imprisonment or death, or would be so punishable but for the fact that the person engaging in the conduct lacked the capacity to commit the crime under the laws of this State. Criminally injurious conduct includes conduct that amounts to an offense involving impaired driving as defined in G.S. 20-4.01(24a), and conduct that amounts to a violation of G.S. 20-166 if the victim was a pedestrian or was operating a vehicle moved solely by human power or a mobility impairment device. For purposes of this Article, a mobility impairment device is a device that is designed for and intended to be used as a means of transportation for a person with a mobility impairment, is suitable for use both inside and outside a building, and whose maximum speed does not exceed 12 miles per hour when the device is being operated by a person with a mobility impairment. Criminally injurious conduct does not include conduct arising out of the ownership, maintenance, or use of a motor vehicle when the conduct is punishable only as a violation of other provisions of Chapter 20 of the General Statutes. Criminally injurious conduct shall also include an act of terrorism, as defined in 18 U.S.C. § 2331, that is committed outside of the United States against a citizen of this State.
(6) Dependent. - An individual wholly or substantially dependent upon the victim for care and support and includes a child of the victim born after his death.
(7) Dependent's economic loss. - Loss after a victim's death of contributions of things of economic value to his dependents, not including services they would have received from the victim if he had not suffered the fatal injury, less expenses of the dependents avoided by reason of the victim's death. Dependent's economic loss will be limited to a 26-week period commencing from the date of the injury, and compensation shall not exceed three hundred dollars ($300.00) per week.
(8) Dependent's replacement service loss. - Loss reasonably incurred by dependents after a victim's death in obtaining ordinary and necessary services in lieu of those the victim would have performed for their benefit if he had not suffered the fatal injury, less expenses of the dependents avoided by reason of the victim's death and not subtracted in calculating dependent's economic loss.
Dependent's replacement service loss will be limited to a 26-week period commencing from the date of the injury and compensation shall not exceed two hundred dollars ($200.00) per week.
(9) Director. - The Director of the Commission appointed under G.S. 15B-3(g).
(10) Economic loss. - Economic detriment consisting only of allowable expense, work loss, replacement services loss, and household support loss. If criminally injurious conduct causes death, economic loss includes a dependent's economic loss and a dependent's replacement service loss. Noneconomic detriment is not economic loss, but economic loss may be caused by pain and suffering or physical impairment.
(10a) Household support loss. - The loss of support that a victim would have received from the victim's spouse for the purpose of maintaining a home or residence for the victim and the victim's dependents. A victim may be compensated fifty dollars ($50.00) per week for each dependent child. Compensation for household support loss shall not exceed three hundred dollars ($300.00) per week and shall be limited to 26 weeks commencing from the date of the injury. A victim may receive only one compensation for household support loss. Household support loss is only available to an unemployed victim whose spouse is the offender who committed the criminally injurious conduct that is the basis of the victim's claim under this act.
(11) Noneconomic detriment. - Pain, suffering, inconvenience, physical impairment, or other nonpecuniary damage.
(12) Replacement services loss. - Expenses reasonably incurred in obtaining ordinary and necessary services in lieu of those the injured person would have performed, not for income but for the benefit of himself or his family, if he had not been injured.
Replacement service loss will be limited to a 26-week period commencing from the date of the injury, and compensation may not exceed two hundred dollars ($200.00) per week.
(12a) Substantial evidence. - Relevant evidence that a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion.
(13) Victim. - A person who suffers personal injury or death proximately caused by criminally injurious conduct.
(14) Work loss. - Loss of income from work that the injured person would have performed if he had not been injured and expenses reasonably incurred by him to obtain services in lieu of those he would have performed for income, reduced by any income from substitute work actually performed by him, or by income he would have earned in available appropriate substitute work that he was capable of performing but unreasonably failed to undertake.
Compensation for work loss will be limited to 26 weeks commencing from the date of the injury, and compensation shall not exceed three hundred dollars ($300.00) per week. A claim for work loss will be paid only upon proof that the injured person was gainfully employed at the time of the criminally injurious conduct and, by physician's certificate, that the injured person was unable to work.