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JORDAN v. J.C. PENNEY CO.4/30/1997
Appellant Mary Jordan appeals from the decision of the Workers' Compensation Commission, which adopted the decision of the Administrative Law Judge, denying her claim for benefits. We reverse.
Appellant is a sixty-one-year-old high-school graduate who worked as a sales clerk for J.C. Penney for seventeen years. She seeks benefits for an injury that occurred on September 14, 1993, based on her testimony that as she reached into a jewelry case while helping a customer, she felt an immediate severe pain in her back. She became faint and ill and was carried to her home where she stayed for a week on pain medication until she could see Dr. Wilbur Giles in Little Rock. Dr. Giles performed an MRI and then a surgical procedure called a lumbar laminectomy, removing a large ruptured disc from the lumbar region.
Appellee contends that appellant did not sustain an accidental injury in the course of her employment and that she is therefore not entitled to benefits.
The Administrative Law Judge heard testimony from appellant and from her supervisor, Mr. Clayton Alexander. Additionally, appellant's medical records were introduced. Despite her testimony to the contrary, the Administrative Law Judge found that appellant did not suffer a specific incident type injury in the course of her employment, see Ark. Code Ann. § 11-9-102(5)(A)(I) (Repl. 1996), and denied appellant all benefits. The Commission adopted the ALJ's decision.
The only question for this court to review is whether the decision of the Commission denying benefits to appellant is supported by substantial evidence. Based on the abstracted testimony
and medical evidence, we find it is not and reverse and remand to the Commission for an award of benefits consistent with this opinion.
This court reviews decisions of the Workers' Compensation Commission to see if they are supported by substantial evidence. Deffenbaugh Indus. v. Angus, 39 Ark. App. 24, 832 S.W.2d 869 (1992). Substantial evidence is that relevant evidence which a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion. Wright v. ABC Air, Inc., 44 Ark. App. 5, 864 S.W.2d 871 (1993). The issue is not whether this court might have reached a different result from that reached by the Commission, or whether the evidence would have supported a contrary finding. If reasonable minds could reach the result shown by the Commission's decision, we must affirm the decision. Bradley v. Alumax, 50 Ark. App. 13, 899 S.W.2d 850 (1995).
To make this court's review process a meaningful one, the Commission has the duty to translate the evidence on all issues before it into findings of fact. Sanyo Manufacturing Corp. v. Leisure, 12 Ark. App. 274, 675 S.W.2d 841 (1984). Despite this stringent standard of review, we have recognized:
Those standards must not totally insulate the Commission from judicial review and render this court's function in these cases meaningless. We will reverse a decision of the Commission where convinced that fair-minded persons with the same facts before them could not have arrived at the conclusion reached by the Commission.
Wade v. Mr. C. Cavenaugh's, 25 Ark. App. 237, 242, 756 S.W.2d 923, 925 (1988) (citing Boyd v. General Industries, 22 Ark. App. 103, 733 S.W.2d 750 (1987)).
With the above standard of review in mind, this court assesses the evidence to see if reasonable persons could reach the same conclusion. Here, the evidence is limited to the testimony of two individuals and the appellant's medical records.
Only two witnesses testified before the ALJ — the claimant/appellant and her supervisor, Mr. Clayton Alexander.
The appellan
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