INDIANAPOLIS, IN — A stripper who was injured while working in a club has had her right to receive worker’s compensation upheld in an appeal’s court this week.Angela Hobson was injured on a pole at Shangri-La West in Fort Wayne. She had to have surgery for a herniated disc in her cervical spine following the spill on December 20, 2001. She has suffered ongoing neck pain and numbness since her injury. Hobson says that that she reported the injury to the club, but that the club later denied knowing that she got hurt.

Last year, the worker’s compensation board awarded Hobson temporary total disability benefits and other compensation totaling more than $10,000 and found that the club did not have a worker’s compensation policy and was not approved as a self-insurer.

Shangri-La appealed, arguing that the board was wrong when it found Hobson more credible than its witnesses. The court declined to reweigh the evidence and upheld the original award, adding a 5-percent increase due to the passage of time.

The court also instructed the board to determine whether Hobson is entitled to double compensation due in part to the allegation that Shangri-La violated state law by not having worker’s compensation insurance. The former owner of the club claims to have missed a payment on the insurance, which is why the club was uninsured at the time of Hobson’s injury.