Padilla v. Chavez
| Decision Date | 06 January 1987 |
| Docket Number | No. 9475,9475 |
| Citation | 1987 NMCA 1,732 P.2d 876,105 N.M. 349 |
| Parties | Albert J. PADILLA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. George CHAVEZ, d/b/a McDonald's of Las Vegas, and Pacific Employers Insurance Company, Defendants and Third-Party Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Vicente B. JASSO, Superintendent of Insurance of the State of New Mexico, and the New Mexico Subsequent Injury Fund, Third-Party Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | Court of Appeals of New Mexico |
After finding claimant fifty percent permanently, partially disabled and apportioning that disability eighty percent to the 1982 subsequent accidental injury for which claim was made and twenty percent to a prior work-related accidental injury, the trial court concluded that the Subsequent Injury Fund (Fund) was not liable for any portion of the worker's compensation benefits awarded claimant. This determination was based on the fact that the employer did not have actual knowledge of claimant's pre-existing physical impairment and the certificate of pre-existing impairment was not executed or filed until after the subsequent injury. Fierro v. Stanley's Hardware, 104 N.M. 50, 716 P.2d 241 (1986). The employer, McDonald's of Las Vegas, and its carrier (employer) appeal only from that portion of the judgment holding that the Fund is not liable. Employer argues that the Fund should be liable for its apportioned share of the benefits where employer has made diligent efforts to ascertain the existence of a pre-existing injury, even though employer does not gain any actual knowledge of a pre-existing injury. We affirm the trial court.
In the present case, claimant had suffered a work-related accidental injury approximately twelve years before he was hired by employer. In the intervening years, claimant had returned to strenuous labor with no apparent disability. The "diligent effort" made by employer to ascertain claimant's pre-existing impairment consisted of questions on the written application and during the interview as to whether claimant had any prior health problems or physical defects which could affect his employment. Claimant responded in the negative. Employer did not learn of the previous accident and injury until it undertook discovery in the present case. It then joined the Fund as a third-party defendant. NMSA 1978, Sec. 52-2-5(B).
Employer argues that the policies of the Subsequent Injury Act (Act), NMSA 1978, Sections 52-2-1 to -13, would be frustrated if the trial court is affirmed. The Act is intended to encourage the hiring and retention of handicapped persons and to make logical and equitable adjustments of the employer's liability. Sec. 52-2-2; Vaughn v. United Nuclear Corp., 98 N.M. 481, 650 P.2d 3 (Ct.App.1982), reaffirmed in Fierro. The purpose of filing a certificate is to provide notice to the employer of any pre-existing disability and to document the nature and extent of the disability. Vaughn. In Vaughn, this court determined that there was substantial compliance with the filing requirements of the Act when the employer had actual knowledge of the pre-existing injury even though the certificate was filed after the subsequent injury.
We decline to extend the rationale of Vaughn to the present situation. To permit an employer's efforts in ascertaining knowledge to substitute for actual knowledge when the certificate is...
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