Harris v. Board Of Education Of Howard County

825 A.2d 365 (2003)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Vernell Harris (P), was fifty-eight years old and had been employed by Board (D) for twelve years. P's duties included preparing lunches for the students, tending to the cash register, cleaning the kitchen area, and laundering all linens used throughout the day. P's regular work involved lifting boxes of frozen food weighing approximately thirty-five pounds from the freezer and carrying them to the appropriate food preparation area. P was doing laundry with a co-worker, as she typically did at the end of her workday. The two women opened a forty-five-pound box of laundry detergent, but they found that the box was full of cockroaches. They immediately closed the box to prevent the insects from contaminating the food preparation area and moved the box outside. P and her assistant dragged the box out of the laundry room by sliding it through the kitchen and out of a side door. Once outside, they removed the bag of soap powder from the box. This required some pulling back and forth on their part. P pulled on the box while her assistant pulled out the soap powder bag. Once the soap powder was out of the box, they took the bag back inside to the laundry room and placed it in a different box that was elevated only about half as high as the original box. After bending down to scoop some soap detergent into a cup, Ms. Harris bent down a second time to tie up the bag of soap powder. At that point, her back 'cracked' and she screamed. P was unable to stand upright, and, when a co-worker brought her a chair, she was unable to sit. She appeared to be in excruciating pain. P walked to the cafeteria manager's office who gave her an incident form authorizing her to see a doctor at a nearby medical office. Dr. Jackson testified that it was her expert medical opinion, within a reasonable degree of medical certainty, that dragging the heavy box of laundry soap outside caused Ms. Harris's back injury. P filed a claim with the Workers' Compensation Commission, alleging that she was disabled as a result of her back injury on January 25, 1999. After a hearing, the Workers' Compensation Commission issued an order finding that P had sustained an accidental injury arising out of and in the course of her employment and was entitled to compensation. D appealed. The jury returned a verdict in favor of the employer. P filed a motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict or a new trial, but the motion was denied. P appealed. The court held there was sufficient evidence that P's injury did not arise out of 'unusual activity' to sustain the jury's verdict. P appealed.