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Banegas v. State Industrial Insurance System3/16/2001
xisting at the time of the injury.
(b) If the deceased employee leaves dependents only partially dependent upon his earnings for support at the time of the injury causing his death, the monthly compensation to be paid must be equal to the same proportion of the monthly payments for the benefit of persons totally dependent as the amount contributed by the deceased employee to the partial dependents bears to the average monthly wage of the deceased employee at the time of the injury resulting in his death.
(c) The duration of compensation to partial dependents must be fixed in accordance with the facts shown, but may not exceed compensation for 100 months." NRS 616C.505(8).
Annabelle, SIIS, and REECO all suggest distinct constructions of NRS 616C.505(8). It is well established that when the language of a statute is plain and unambiguous, a court should give that language its ordinary meaning and not go beyond it. See City Council of Reno v. Reno Newspapers, 105 Nev. 886, 891, 784 P.2d 974, 977 (1989). However, if a statute is susceptible to more than one natural or honest interpretation, it is ambiguous. See Randono v. CUNA Mutual Ins. Group, 106 Nev. 371, 374, 793 P.2d 1324, 1326 (1990). We conclude that the language of NRS 616C.505(8) is ambiguous.
When a statute is ambiguous, the Legislature's intent is the controlling factor in statutory interpretation, and the statute should be construed consistently with what reason and public policy would indicate the Legislature intended. Robert E. v. Justice Court, 99 Nev. 443, 445, 664 P.2d 957, 959 (1983).
In this case, the legislative history does not provide extensive insight into the intent behind NRS 616C.505(8) because, although a complete revision of the industrial insurance statutes was adopted in 1947 and amendments to various sections of the statutes have been enacted during every regular legislative session since 1913, NRS 616C.505 remains largely unchanged since the original industrial insurance statutes were adopted in 1913. In fact, committee minutes for NRS 616C.505 are virtually nonexistent. Mindful of the limited legislative history, we address the parties' interpretations of NRS 616C.505(8) in turn.
First, Annabelle contends that the Legislature intended NRS 616C.505(8) as a catchall category providing death benefits to any person who is factually dependent upon the deceased at the time of injury. Annabelle suggests that NRS 616C.505 allows payment of death benefits in descending order of entitlement first to persons who share a legally recognized relationship to and are conclusively presumed dependent on the deceased employee, then to persons who share a legally recognized relationship to and were in fact dependent on the deceased employee, and finally to persons who share no legally recognized relationship to but were in fact dependent on the deceased employee. Specifically, Annabelle contends that the introductory phrase of subsection 8 of NRS 616C.505, "in all other cases," indicates that the Legislature intended to provide death benefits to persons who are totally or partially financially dependent on the deceased employee at the time of the accident or injury causing death regardless of their legal relationship to the deceased employee. Thus, Annabelle contends that she is entitled to death benefits under NRS 616C.505(8) because it is undisputed that she was in fact dependent on Robert for substantially all of her financial support at the time of his death.
At first glance, the phrase "in all other cases" suggests that subsection 8 is a catchall category for factual dependents. However, this construction of NRS 616C.505(8) would produce an unreasonable result. Se
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