Opinion ID: 2623082
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Worker's Job as a Correctional Officer Required Heavy Physical Capacity

Text: {7} The evidence before the WCJ was a written job description of a correctional officer provided by Worker. See Moya, 2007-NMCA-057, ¶ 23. The job description contains three sections relevant to our determination, the same sections upon which the WCJ and the Court of Appeals focused. Id. ¶¶ 23-24. The section entitled ESSETIAL DUTIES states that a correctional officer must have the [a]bility to respond quickly to emergencies; including . . . carrying an injured or unconscious person various distances to safety, up or down stairs and ladders. The sections entitled FREQUENCY and LIFTING set forth the frequency with which a correctional officer must lift various weights: lifting one to ten pounds occurs 67% of the time; lifting eleven to twenty pounds occurs 34% to 66% of the time; lifting twenty-one to thirty-five pounds occurs 11% to 33% of the time; lifting thirtysix to fifty pounds occurs 1% to 10% of the time; and lifting more than fifty pounds occurs 1% to 10% of the time. {8} For purposes of the physical capacity determination, work is deemed heavy when the worker must have the ability to lift over fifty pounds occasionally or up to fifty pounds frequently. Section 52-1-26.4(C)(1). Medium work requires the ability to lift up to fifty pounds occasionally or up to twenty-five pounds frequently. Section 52-1-26.4(C)(2). {9} The Court of Appeals determined that a correctional officer was required to lift up to thirty-five pounds frequently and more than thirty-five pounds rarely. Maya, 2007-NMCA-057, ¶ 24. As the Court of Appeals reasoned, [t]he lifting requirements detailed by the exhibit establish that the vast majority of the lifting involved weight less than thirty-five pounds and that lifting more than thirty-five pounds was involved rarely, 10% of the time or less. Id. Therefore, the Court of Appeals concluded that Worker's work as a correctional officer required medium physical capacity. Id. {10} Our review of the record leads to a different conclusion. According to the job description, Worker could have been required to lift more than fifty pounds 1% to 10% of the time and on an emergency basis when carrying injured or unconscious persons. Thus, Worker's job as a correctional officer required him to lift more than fifty pounds at times. Regardless of how rarely that might have occurred, the capacity to lift more than fifty pounds was never contemplated by the statutory classification of medium physical capacity. See § 52-1-26.4(C)(2). `[W]e will not read into a statute . . . language which is not there, particularly if it makes sense as written.' Cobb v. State Canvassing Bd., 2006-NMSC-034, ¶ 34, 140 N.M. 77, 140 P.3d 498 (quoting Regents of Univ. of N.M. v. N.M. Fed'n of Teachers, 1998-NMSC-020, ¶ 28, 125 N.M. 401, 962 P.2d 1236). Therefore, we conclude that substantial evidence does not support either the WCJ's or the Court of Appeals' conclusion that Worker's work as a correctional officer required only medium physical capacity. Rather, the evidence of record establishes that Worker's work required heavy physical capacity. See § 52-1-26.4(C)(1).