IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO 1 STATE OF NEW MEXICO, 2 Plaintiff-Appellee, 3

v. NO. 29,155 4 SUSIE CHAVEZ, 5 Defendant-Appellant. 6 APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF BERNALILLO COUNTY 7 Charles W. Brown, District Judge 8 Gary K. King, Attorney General 9 Santa Fe, NM 10 for Appellee 11 Hugh W. Dangler, Chief Public Defender 12 Santa Fe, NM 13 Josephine H. Ford 14 Albuquerque, NM 15 for Appellant 16

MEMORANDUM OPINION 17 KENNEDY, Judge. 18 Defendant appeals her convi ction for driving while intoxicated, in violation of 19 NMSA 1978, Section 66-8-102(A) (2008). In this Court’s notice of proposed 20 summary disposition, we proposed to affirm. Defendant has timely responded, 212 pursuant to an extension granted by this Court. We have c onsidered Defendant’s 1 arguments, and as we find that they are not persuasive, we affirm. 2 In our notice, this Court proposed to fi nd that there was substantial evidence to 3 support the metropolitan court’s finding that Defendant was impaired to the slightest 4 degree by alcohol. We relied on the followi ng evidence in support of the conviction: 5 Officer Richard Locke testified that he obs erved Defendant traveling fifty-one miles 6 per hour in a forty-mile-per- hour zone. [DS 1] When hesignaled Defendant to pull 7 over, she drove up over the curb and into a parking lot. [DS 1] Officer Locke 8 testified that in his opinion, it appeared th at Defendant had been drinking because she 9 smelled of alcohol, her eyes were bloodshot and watery, and her speech was slightly 10 slurred. [DS 1] Officer Locke testified that Defendant admitted to drinking. [DS 1] 11 In addition, a second officer, Officer Martinez, testified that Defendant’s breath 12 smelled strongly of alcohol, that her eyes were bloodshot and watery, and that her 13 speech was slurred. [DS 2] Officer Martinez testified that Defendant admitted to 14 drinking a glass of wine with dinner and th at she held onto the door as she got out of 15 her car. [DS 2] Officer Martinez also testified that De fendant was unable to complete 16 several field sobriety tests as instructed, that she swayed as she stood, and that her 17 breath alcohol content was .10/.09. [DS 2-3] 18 Defendant argues that despite this ev idence, the judge could not have found 193 beyond a reasonable doubt that she was impaired by alcohol—even to the slightest 1 degree—because the evidence could havesupported a finding that Defendant’s 2 apparent impairment was cause d by other factors. Defendant appears to believe that 3 because she was wearing high h eels when she was driving thatit was just as likely that 4 her impairment was caused by her shoes as it was by alc ohol. [MIO 5] Defendant 5 also suggests that the evidence was consis tent with a conclusion that a new car, a 6 general baseline lack of coor dination, or nervousness was the cause of her behavior. 7 [MIO 5, 6, 7] She cites the general propositions that “evidence equally consistent 8 with two hypotheses tends to prove neither” and “eviden ce equally consistent with 9 two inferences does not, without more , provide a basis for adopting either 10 one—especially beyond a reasonable doubt.” See State v. Garcia , 2005-NMSC-017, 11 ¶ 12, 138 N.M. 1, 116 P.3d 72 (internal quotation marks omitted). However, we do 12 not believe that the evidence inthis case was equally consis tent with an inference, on 13 the one hand, that Defendant was impaired to the slightest degree by alcohol and, on 14 the other, that Defendant wa s not at all impaired by alcohol, but was only impaired by 15 high heels, a new car, a baseline lack of coordination, and nervousness. Instead, we 16 believe that there is substantial evidence to support an inference that Defendant was 17 impaired at least to the slightest degree by alcohol, even if other factors also may have 18 contributed to her poor motor skills. 194 In an effort to support De fendant’s claim that there was insufficient evidence 1 to support the judgment, Defendant takes the evidence apart piece by piece and 2 attempts to show why a number of the facts presented at trial would not be sufficient 3 to support a conviction standing alone. [M IO 5-8 (arguing that neither speeding, 4 driving over the curb, slurred speech, bloodshotand watery eyes, inability to complete 5 the field sobriety tests as instructed, nor breath alcohol content are sufficient standing 6 alone to prove impairment)] However, this Court reviews the evidence as a whole and 7 in the light most favorable to the judgment. See State v. Graham , 2005-NMSC-004, 8 ¶ 13, 137 N.M. 197, 109 P.3d 285 (indicating that an appellate court reviewing the 9 sufficiency of the evidence may not use a “divide-and-conquer” approach by which 10 it views the probative value of individual pieces of evidence). Under this standard of 11 review, we conclude that there was sufficient evidence to support Defendant’s 12 conviction. 13 Therefore, for the reasons stated in this opinion and in our notice of proposed 14 summary disposition, we affirm. 15 IT IS SO ORDERED. 16

___________________________________ 17 RODERICK T. KENNEDY, Judge 18

WE CONCUR : 195 ___________________________ 1 CYNTHIA A. FRY, Chief Judge 2

___________________________ 3 JONATHAN B. SUTIN, Judge 4