Welcome to the Law Firm of Schoep & McCashin

Located in Alexandria, Minnesota, the law firm of Schoep & McCashin represents people injured in accidents, injured at the workplace, and employees who suffer discrimination in the workplace. All personal injury cases are taken on a contingency basis. (You’ll pay no fees until we recover benefits or an award on your behalf.)

Schoep & McCashin has set a standard of distinction. Since 1998, our firm has worked for people injured in accidents, at the workplace, and employees who suffer discrimination or harassment. If you need an experienced and knowledgeable law firm in Minnesota to protect your rights, Schoep & McCashin will provide the commitment you need.

We represent these areas:

  • Personal Injury
  • Workers’ Compensation
  • Employment Discrimination

At Schoep & McCashin, we strive for the highest standards of dedication and accessibility, and respond to our clients’ needs with understanding and excellence. We do not represent insurance companies.

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Social Security Disability Attorney in Alexandria, MN — Schoep & McCashin, Chtd.

Many of the injured workers we represent eventually reach a point where the workers’ comp case is not enough. The injury that started as a temporary disability never fully resolves. Returning to the old job is not realistic. The light-duty work the employer offered cannot be sustained over the long term. At that point, the question becomes whether the worker qualifies for Social Security Disability — and the answer requires careful work in a federal program that operates very differently from Minnesota workers’ comp.
At Schoep & McCashin, Chtd., we help injured workers and other disabled adults in Alexandria and Douglas County apply for and pursue Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits.

Two Programs, Two Eligibility Standards
The Social Security Administration runs two parallel disability programs that get confused regularly. SSDI is funded by payroll taxes and pays benefits to workers who have worked recently enough and long enough to be “insured” under the program. Benefit amounts come from the worker’s earnings history. Eligibility requires sufficient work credits — generally meaning meaningful work activity within the recent past, with the specific requirements tightening for workers who have not worked in some time.
SSI is a needs-based program funded by general revenue. It pays a lower benefit amount to disabled adults whose income and assets fall below specified limits, regardless of work history. SSI gets reduced by other income the recipient receives, and the asset limits are strict.

The medical standard for disability is the same in both programs. The financial eligibility is what differs. Many of our clients qualify for one program. Some qualify for both — concurrent claims — where the analysis of which to apply for and how to optimize benefits is more nuanced than it first appears.

The Five-Step Process
Social Security uses a structured sequential evaluation to decide whether a claimant is disabled. Each step is a checkpoint, and the analysis stops as soon as the agency reaches a determination.
The first checkpoint looks at whether the claimant is currently working at substantial gainful activity — measured by monthly earnings above a specified threshold. Working above the threshold ends the inquiry with a denial regardless of medical condition.

The second checkpoint asks whether the claimant has a severe medically determinable impairment expected to last twelve months or longer.

The third checkpoint compares the claimant’s condition to the SSA’s Listing of Impairments. Conditions that meet a specific listing get approved at this step without further analysis.

The fourth checkpoint asks whether the claimant can still perform any of their past relevant work — the jobs they have held within the past fifteen years.

The fifth and final checkpoint asks whether the claimant can perform other work that exists in significant numbers in the national economy, considering age, education, work history, and remaining functional capacity. This step uses the medical-vocational guidelines — the “grids” — which produce more favorable outcomes for older workers with limited education and physically demanding job histories.

Most denials come at steps four and five. The agency is not arguing the worker is healthy. It is arguing the worker, despite their problems, could still do some kind of work.

Why Comp Cases and SSDI Cases Connect
Many Minnesota injured workers end up applying for SSDI when the comp injury prevents them from returning to gainful employment. The two programs interact in important ways. SSDI benefits may be reduced by workers’ comp payments under the offset rule in 42 U.S.C. § 424a. The combined monthly benefit is capped at 80 percent of the worker’s pre-disability earnings. Structuring a workers’ comp settlement to minimize the SSDI offset is a real planning issue — one we address when our clients have both cases pending at the same time.

Services We Provide
Our SSDI practice supports clients with:

  • Initial SSDI and SSI applications
  • Requests for reconsideration after initial denial
  • Hearings before Administrative Law Judges at the Minneapolis or Fargo hearing offices serving
  • Alexandria claimants
  • Appeals Council review
  • Federal court appeals when administrative remedies are exhausted
  • Medical record development and treating-physician statements
  • Vocational expert cross-examination at hearings
  • Concurrent SSDI and SSI claims
  • Coordination with workers’ comp settlements to minimize SSDI offset
  • Continuing Disability Reviews
  • Overpayment notices and appeals
  • Auxiliary benefits for eligible spouses and children

Initial Denial Is Not the End
Most initial SSDI claims get denied — typically about two-thirds nationally. Reconsideration produces additional denials. The hearing level is where most legitimate claims actually get approved, because the claimant testifies before an Administrative Law Judge who reviews the complete record and assesses credibility. Approval rates at the hearing stage are substantially higher than at the initial application level, and represented claimants outperform unrepresented ones at every stage.

How We Approach the Work
SSDI representation runs on contingency. Federal law caps attorney’s fees at a percentage of past-due benefits, with a statutory maximum dollar amount, and fees come from back benefits when the claim is approved. The client pays nothing out of pocket. We develop the medical record with treating providers, prepare the client for hearing testimony, and present the case in the way the administrative law judge can actually decide in the claimant’s favor.

Contact Schoep & McCashin
If you cannot work because of an injury or illness — including an injury that started as a workers’ comp case — contact Schoep & McCashin for a free consultation about Social Security Disability. We have represented injured workers and disabled clients in Alexandria and west-central Minnesota since 1998.

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Car Accident Attorney in Alexandria, MN — Schoep & McCashin, Chtd.

A collision at the intersection of State Highway 29 and County Road 82. A rear-end crash on I-94 east of Alexandria. A T-bone at one of the busy intersections in the Lakes Area. A rollover on a county road during a Minnesota winter storm. Within hours of any serious car accident, a process starts that most drivers do not fully understand — and the early decisions often determine the value of the entire claim.
At Schoep & McCashin, Chtd., we represent injured drivers, passengers, and pedestrians in car accident cases throughout Alexandria, Douglas County, and the surrounding west-central Minnesota communities.

Minnesota Is a No-Fault State
Minnesota operates a no-fault auto insurance system under the Minnesota No-Fault Automobile Insurance Act, Chapter 65B of Minnesota Statutes. Every Minnesota auto policy must include Basic Economic Loss Benefits — generally called PIP, for Personal Injury Protection — that pay medical expenses and a portion of lost wages regardless of who caused the accident. The minimum coverage is $20,000 for medical expenses and $20,000 for wage loss and other economic losses, though many policies include higher limits.

PIP applies first. Your own auto carrier pays for medical bills and lost wages from the no-fault coverage before any claim against the at-fault driver becomes relevant. This affects nearly every aspect of how a Minnesota car accident case proceeds — what forms get filed, what deadlines apply, and how medical bills get handled during the claim.

The Threshold for Suing the At-Fault Driver
Minnesota’s no-fault system limits when injured drivers can step outside the system and sue the at-fault driver for pain and suffering. Under Minn. Stat. § 65B.51, the injured person can pursue a tort claim against the at-fault driver only if the injuries meet one of the statutory thresholds: more than $4,000 in reasonable medical expenses (excluding diagnostic X-ray costs), permanent injury, permanent disfigurement, sixty days or more of disability, or death.

The $4,000 medical threshold is the one most often contested. Soft-tissue cases involving neck and back strains often hover around the threshold, and whether the case can proceed depends on consistent medical treatment and credible documentation. Carriers fight threshold cases hard, and the cases that survive are the ones where the medical record was built carefully from the start.

Comparative Fault in Minnesota
Minnesota follows a modified comparative fault rule under Minn. Stat. § 604.01. The injured plaintiff can recover damages so long as their share of fault does not exceed the at-fault parties’ combined fault — typically expressed as the 50-percent bar. If the plaintiff is 50 percent or less at fault, recovery is reduced proportionally. If the plaintiff is more than 50 percent at fault, recovery is barred entirely.

This makes fault allocation a significant battleground in Minnesota car accident cases. Every percentage point matters financially. The difference between a 49 percent and 51 percent finding determines whether the case has value at all.

Car Accident Matters We Handle
Our car accident practice covers:

  • Rear-end and chain-reaction collisions
  • T-bone and intersection crashes
  • Head-on collisions
  • Distracted driving accidents
  • Drunk and drugged driving collisions
  • Hit-and-run cases
  • Uber, Lyft, and rideshare accidents
  • Uninsured and underinsured motorist claims under the rider’s own policy
  • Pedestrian and bicycle collisions
  • Multi-vehicle pile-ups on I-94, Highway 29, and other regional roads
  • Wrongful death claims arising from fatal collisions
  • Catastrophic injury cases involving brain or spinal cord damage
  • Winter weather accidents and questions of road conditions

The Six-Year Statute of Limitations
Minnesota imposes a six-year statute of limitations on personal injury claims under Minn. Stat. § 541.05 — substantially longer than the two or three years that most states allow. The longer window provides flexibility, but it should not be confused with permission to wait. Evidence still disappears quickly, witness memories still fade, and a case investigated promptly is invariably stronger than the same case worked years later. Acting early preserves the case.

How We Approach the Work
Car accident cases run on contingency. There are no fees unless we recover compensation for the client. We advance the costs of investigation, expert witnesses where needed, medical record retrieval, and the development of the case necessary to make it strong at every stage — including, where appropriate, accident reconstruction and biomechanical analysis.

Contact Schoep & McCashin
If you or a loved one has been hurt in a car accident in Alexandria, Douglas County, or anywhere in west-central Minnesota, contact Schoep & McCashin for a free consultation. The earlier we get involved, the more we can do to protect the case and pursue full compensation.

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Employment Discrimination Attorney in Alexandria, MN — Schoep & McCashin, Chtd.

The phone calls are familiar by now. A long-tenured employee was let go after asking about FMLA leave, and the timing is hard to explain. A worker who reported sexual harassment finds herself written up for performance issues two weeks later. A man in his sixties watches younger employees get the promotions while his applications go unanswered. An employee with a disability requests a reasonable accommodation and is told the position no longer fits the company’s needs.

These conversations bring people to an employment lawyer because something has happened that doesn’t add up — and Minnesota law often provides remedies the workers had not realized they had.
At Schoep & McCashin, Chtd., we represent employees who have been discriminated against, harassed, or retaliated against by their employers across Alexandria, Douglas County, and the surrounding region.

Minnesota Has Its Own Discrimination Law
The Minnesota Human Rights Act, codified in Chapter 363A of Minnesota Statutes, prohibits employment discrimination on a broad set of protected bases — race, color, creed, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, status with regard to public assistance, membership or activity in a local human rights commission, disability, sexual orientation, age, and familial status. The Act covers most Minnesota employers with one or more employees, broader than federal law’s coverage of employers with fifteen or more.

The MHRA can be enforced two ways. The Minnesota Department of Human Rights (MDHR) accepts charges and investigates them, similar to how the EEOC processes federal charges. After receiving the MDHR’s findings — or after a year passes — the worker has the option to bring the case directly in state district court. Some plaintiffs skip the MDHR entirely and file in court immediately, which is permitted under Minnesota practice.

Federal law adds another layer. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, the ADA, the ADEA, the FMLA, and other federal statutes apply to Minnesota workers concurrently with state law. A properly pleaded case often includes both Minnesota and federal claims, which preserves every available remedy and forum.

Retaliation Often Strengthens the Case
The most common pattern in employment cases is not the original discrimination — it is the retaliation that followed. An employee complains about discrimination or harassment. The complaint gets minimized or dismissed. Within weeks, the employee starts getting written up for things that never produced discipline before. The performance reviews change tone. The schedule gets shifted in inconvenient ways. Eventually, the employee gets fired for “performance” or “fit.”

Both Minnesota and federal law prohibit retaliation against workers who engage in protected activity — reporting discrimination, requesting accommodation, taking FMLA leave, opposing harassment, participating in an internal investigation. Retaliation claims often have stronger evidence than the underlying discrimination claims, because the timeline alone tells the story.

Services We Provide
Our employment practice supports workers with:

  • Race, sex, age, and disability discrimination under federal and Minnesota law
  • Sexual harassment and hostile work environment claims
  • Pregnancy discrimination under the Pregnancy Discrimination Act and Minnesota law
  • Disability discrimination and reasonable accommodation under the ADA and MHRA
  • Religious discrimination and accommodation claims
  • FMLA interference and retaliation
  • Whistleblower claims under Minn. Stat. § 181.932 (the Minnesota Whistleblower Act)
  • Wage and hour claims under the Fair Labor Standards Act and Minnesota law
  • Wrongful termination in violation of public policy
  • Charges before the Minnesota Department of Human Rights
  • Charges before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
  • Direct actions in state and federal district court
  • Severance agreement review and negotiation
  • Settlement negotiations and mediation
  • Trial and appellate work in employment cases

Time Limits Are Tight
Minnesota employment claims operate under shorter deadlines than people often realize. A charge with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights must generally be filed within one year of the discriminatory act. Federal charges with the EEOC must be filed within 300 days of the act for charges that involve a state agency, or 180 days if not. Civil actions under the MHRA must be filed within one year of the act (with the limitations period tolled during the agency proceedings). The Minnesota Whistleblower Act has its own two-year statute of limitations.

Missing any of these deadlines generally bars the case regardless of how strong the underlying facts are. Acting early preserves options that quickly disappear.

How We Approach the Work
Employment cases involve weighing what the worker wants against what is realistic. Some workers want their jobs back. Some want compensation. Some want public accountability. Some want only to make sure what happened to them doesn’t happen to the next employee. Different goals produce different strategies — and matching the legal approach to the actual goal is part of what good employment representation requires.

Contact Schoep & McCashin
If you have been discriminated against, harassed, or retaliated against at work in Alexandria or anywhere in west-central Minnesota, contact Schoep & McCashin for a confidential consultation. The early conversation usually clarifies more than people expect about what their options actually are.

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Workplace Injury Attorney in Alexandria, MN — Schoep & McCashin, Chtd.

Not every workplace injury is just a workers’ comp case. A construction worker hurt on a Minnesota job site may have a comp claim against his employer and a separate negligence claim against the general contractor or another subcontractor on the site. A delivery driver injured in a traffic accident may have a comp claim and a third-party auto liability claim. A factory worker hurt by defective machinery may have a comp claim and a product liability claim against the manufacturer of the equipment. These overlapping claims — what Minnesota practitioners call third-party actions — frequently produce recoveries that are significantly larger than what comp pays alone.

At Schoep & McCashin, Chtd., we evaluate both sides of every workplace injury case. The comp claim runs through the Office of Administrative Hearings. The civil claim, where one exists, proceeds in state district court under regular tort principles.

Why Both Sides Often Matter
Minnesota’s exclusive remedy rule lives in Minn. Stat. § 176.031. The injured worker generally cannot sue the employer in civil court for a workplace injury — comp is the only remedy against the employer, outside a narrow set of intentional-conduct exceptions. But the exclusive remedy rule only shields the employer. Everyone else whose negligence contributed to the injury remains exposed to ordinary civil liability — a different contractor on the site, the property owner, the manufacturer of defective equipment, an at-fault driver in a work-related collision, a separate company sharing the worksite.

A successful third-party claim recovers categories of damages that comp does not include at all — full medical expenses (not just the comp-approved portion), pain and suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, full lost-earning-capacity damages, and loss of consortium for spouses. The case proceeds under Minnesota tort law, with damages decided by a jury rather than calculated under a statutory formula.

Workplace Injury Matters We Handle
Our practice covers:

  • Construction site accidents involving multiple contractors
  • Falls from heights, scaffolding, and roof work
  • Caught-in and crushing injuries involving industrial machinery
  • Trench collapses and excavation incidents
  • Electrocution and arc flash injuries
  • Repetitive trauma and Gillette injuries
  • Industrial machinery accidents and equipment defects
  • Vehicle collisions during the course of employment
  • Defective product injuries occurring at work
  • Toxic exposure cases including asbestos and chemical exposure
  • Slip, trip, and fall injuries on third-party premises
  • Fatal workplace accidents and death benefits
  • MNOSHA citation issues affecting injury cases

MNOSHA and the Investigation Trail
Minnesota has its own state-plan OSHA program, MNOSHA, which enforces workplace safety standards through investigations, inspections, and citations. Employers must report fatalities to MNOSHA within eight hours and hospitalizations within twenty-four hours under Minnesota Rules Chapter 5205. The investigation that follows a serious workplace injury often produces evidence relevant to both the comp case and the third-party civil case. MNOSHA citations against contractors, property owners, or equipment manufacturers can support the civil negligence claim — and the MNOSHA file is often where the real story of what went wrong gets documented.

Subrogation and the Comp Carrier’s Lien
When both a comp claim and a civil third-party claim exist for the same injury, the comp carrier has subrogation rights against the civil recovery under Minn. Stat. § 176.061. The carrier can recover the benefits it paid out of the civil settlement or verdict, but the worker is entitled to credit for the attorney’s fees and litigation costs that produced the recovery — the formula commonly known as Naig credits, after the Minnesota Supreme Court’s decision in Naig v. Bloomington Sanitation. How the two cases get structured, including the timing of settlement and the language used in releases, can substantially affect what the injured worker actually keeps after the carrier’s subrogation interest is satisfied.

How We Approach the Work
Every workplace injury case begins with evaluating both the comp side and the third-party side. Some are comp-only cases. Some have substantial civil components that would otherwise be overlooked. Some have third-party cases worth far more than the comp claim. The difference often becomes clear only after the underlying facts get developed and the responsible parties identified. We do that early work so the worker recovers from every available source.

Contact Schoep & McCashin
If you or a family member has been hurt at work in Alexandria, Douglas County, or anywhere in west-central Minnesota, contact Schoep & McCashin for a confidential consultation. We evaluate both the comp side and the civil third-party potential at no cost.

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Workers’ Compensation Attorney in Alexandria, MN — Schoep & McCashin, Chtd.

A factory worker at one of Alexandria’s manufacturing operations injures her back during a parts transfer. A truck driver hauling freight along the I-94 corridor falls awkwardly stepping out of the cab and tears something in his knee. A nurse at Alomere Health develops a repetitive trauma condition from years of patient lifting. A construction worker on a Douglas County job site falls from scaffolding. Within hours of any of these incidents, the same set of forms begins moving — the employer files a First Report of Injury, the insurance carrier opens a claim, and the injured worker is handed paperwork they did not write and barely have time to read.

This is where most Minnesota workers’ compensation cases either go right or go wrong, and it almost always happens before anyone has talked to a lawyer.

At Schoep & McCashin, Chtd., we represent injured workers across Alexandria, Douglas County, and the surrounding west-central Minnesota communities in proceedings before the Office of Administrative Hearings, Workers’ Compensation Division.

Minnesota’s Comp System Runs Through Its Own Court
Minnesota workers’ compensation operates under Chapter 176 of Minnesota Statutes. Unlike some states that handle comp through administrative agencies attached to general workforce departments, Minnesota built its own dedicated tribunal — the Workers’ Compensation Division within the Office of Administrative Hearings (OAH). Disputes get heard by Compensation Judges in proceedings that combine elements of administrative practice and civil trial work. Appeals go to the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals (WCCA), which has nationwide reputation for the depth of its written decisions, and from there to the Minnesota Supreme Court.

The system is no-fault. The worker does not have to prove the employer was negligent, but the trade-off is that benefits are calculated under formulas in the statute rather than determined by a jury. Temporary total disability pays two-thirds of the worker’s pre-injury weekly wage, subject to maximums that adjust each October. Temporary partial benefits cover wage loss during light-duty work. Permanent partial disability is rated using the comprehensive PPD schedules in Minnesota Rules 5223.0300 through 5223.0650 — schedules that read like detailed anatomical maps and that produce very different outcomes depending on how the rating gets argued.

The PPD Rating Is Where Cases Get Decided
How a permanent partial disability rating gets calculated drives the long-term value of most Minnesota comp claims. The rating itself is a percentage applied to a statutory schedule that produces a dollar figure. Different physicians applying the same Minnesota rules to the same injury can produce dramatically different percentages, depending on how they interpret the regulations, what objective findings they emphasize, and how they apply the categories the rules use.

When a comp carrier’s chosen physician comes back with a low rating and the worker’s treating physician disagrees, the disputed PPD becomes its own piece of litigation. The case turns on which rating the Compensation Judge accepts, and the preparation for that fight starts long before the hearing.

Services We Provide
Our practice represents injured workers with:

Temporary total and temporary partial disability benefits

  • Permanent partial disability ratings under Minnesota Rules 5223.0300 et seq.
  • Permanent total disability under Minn. Stat. § 176.101
  • Medical treatment authorization and treatment parameter disputes
  • Independent Medical Examinations and adverse-medical-examination defenses
  • Petitions before the Office of Administrative Hearings
  • Cumulative trauma and Gillette injury claims
  • Specific injury and continuous trauma analysis
  • Apportionment disputes between work and non-work causes
  • Vocational rehabilitation disputes and QRC issues
  • Retraining benefits under Minn. Stat. § 176.102
  • Settlement negotiations and stipulations for settlement
  • Mileage reimbursement and out-of-pocket expense claims
  • Death benefits for surviving family members under § 176.111
  • Discontinuance disputes and Notices of Intention to Discontinue (NOIDs)
  • Appeals to the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals
  • Penalty claims for unreasonable delay or denial

The Gillette Injury Concept
Minnesota has a distinctive doctrine for injuries that develop over time rather than from a single event. Named after the 1960 Minnesota Supreme Court case Gillette v. Harold, Inc., a Gillette injury occurs when ordinary work activities — repetitive motions, lifting, awkward postures, vibration — cumulatively produce a disabling condition. The legal date of injury for a Gillette claim is the date the condition becomes disabling, not the date the work activities began.

This matters enormously for workers whose injuries developed gradually. The carrier will often argue the condition is degenerative or unrelated to work. Establishing the Gillette claim requires documentation of the work activities, medical opinion connecting the activities to the diagnosis, and careful proof of when the condition became actually disabling. These cases are won on the medical record and the work history, both built carefully from the start.

How We Approach the Work
Workers’ comp cases are rarely decided at one big hearing. They get resolved through dozens of smaller decisions across the life of the claim — which physician is treating, what gets documented in the medical records, how light-duty restrictions are written, when to dispute an NOID, when to push for a hearing on PPD, when settlement makes sense and when it doesn’t. We handle that ongoing work so the injured worker can focus on actually recovering.

Contact Schoep & McCashin
If you have been hurt at work in Alexandria, Douglas County, or anywhere in west-central Minnesota, contact Schoep & McCashin for a confidential consultation. Initial consultations on workers’ compensation matters are free, and our practice has focused on representing injured workers since the firm was founded in 1998.

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