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State v. Sparks3/1/1999
lished by medical evidence supported by objective findings[.]" Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-102(a)(xi)(G).
In accordance with our standard of review, this Court is tasked with interpreting the statute to determine whether the hearing examiner correctly construed and applied this language when he ruled that Sparks' injury was not excluded from coverage because it did not result primarily from the normal activities of day-to-day living.
In its argument to this Court, the Division contends that the language of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-102(a)(xi)(G) is unambiguous, and, consequently, there is no need to interpret the statute. The Division's position is that since Sparks was injured doing a very simple physical activity that most people accomplish frequently, her injury is precisely the kind for which the legislature intended to deny benefits. Despite the earnestness of the Division's arguments, we agree with the hearing examiner that the language of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14102(a)(xi)(G) is ambiguous. The phrase A day-to-day living at is extremely broad and essentially amorphous. We do not know whether it alludes to the daily activities of the employee or the daily activities of the entire population. It indeed is possible for that language to encompass almost any possible human physical effort. We do not assume that, by adopting this language, the legislature intended to abolish worker's compensation benefits in Wyoming. As the hearing examiner pointed out, that could be a possible consequence of adopting the Division's view.
We hold that the language of the statute is ambiguous simply because of its lack of any meaningful definitional standards, and we, therefore, proceed to interpret the statute.
This Court has considered only one other case in which Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-102(a)(xi)(G) was involved. Cabral v. Caspar Bldg. Systems, Inc., 920 P.2d 268 (Wyo. 1996). In that case, the hearing examiner determined that a back injury caused by bending to pick up a pack of cigarettes was not compensable because it was the product of a normal activity of day-to-day living. Id. at 270. We said that the plain language of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-102(a)(xi)(G) imposed the burden upon the party resisting compensation to produce evidence to demonstrate that the injury was the result of normal activities of day-to-day living.
Cabral, 920 P.2d at 270. We affirmed the denial of benefits on other grounds, without endeavoring to arrive at a definition of what the phrase A normal activities of day-to-day living at connotes. Id. at 271.
Decisions of the courts of our sister states are persuasive authority, and they are often helpful when we address novel questions. However, resort to persuasive authority is not available to us in this instance. Kansas is the only one of our sister states that has enacted a "day-to-day living" exception to its definition of compensable injury . Kan. Stat. Ann. § 44508(e) (1998) reads, in relevant part:
"An injury shall not be deemed to have been directly caused by the employment where it is shown that the employee suffers disability as a result of the natural aging process or by the normal activities of day-to-day living."
No appellate court in Kansas has had an occasion to construe this language of the Kansas statutes.
Consequently, we turn to analogous legal principles in the area of employment law for some guidance in determining what the A normal activities of day-to-day living at are. The legislature, by Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 27-14-101(b) (Michie 1997), has specifically renounced any rule affording liberal construction to worker's compensation statutes. Our definition of the phrase, A normal act
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