Petition for rehearing granted, opinion filed 8/20/98 withdrawn,

motion to dismiss granted, and appeal dismissed by unpublished

order filed 9/8/99.
UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

In Re: A. H. ROBINS COMPANY,

INCORPORATED,

Debtor.

No. 98-1308

GERALDINE VELU,

Claimant-Appellant,

v.

DALKON SHIELD CLAIMANTS TRUST,

Trust-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of Virginia, at Richmond.

Robert R. Merhige, Jr., Senior District Judge;

Blackwell N. Shelley, Bankruptcy Judge.

(CA-85-1302-R)

Submitted: July 31, 1998

Decided: August 20, 1998

Before WIDENER, HAMILTON, and MICHAEL, Circuit Judges.

_________________________________________________________________

Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.

_________________________________________________________________

COUNSEL

Geraldine Velu, Appellant Pro Se. Orran Lee Brown, Sr., DALKON

SHIELD CLAIMANTS TRUST, Richmond, Virginia, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See

Local Rule 36(c).

_________________________________________________________________

OPINION

PER CURIAM:

Geraldine Velu, a disappointed Dalkon Shield Claimant, appeals

from the district court's order denying her motion to vacate an alternative dispute resolution (ADR) decision. Because the district court

did not abuse its discretion, we affirm.

Velu claimed that the Dalkon Shield caused uncontrollable bleeding, pelvic inflammatory disease (PID), and infertility. None of the

records she submitted to the Dalkon Shield Claimants Trust (Trust)

substantiated her claims of PID or infertility as the result of her using

the Dalkon Shield. Therefore, the Trust extended her an offer based

only on uncontrolled bleeding.

Velu rejected the offer and elected to proceed to ADR. In doing so,

she agreed that the ADR process would be governed by the Second

Amended ADR Rules and that the referee's decision would be final

and binding.

A hearing before the ADR referee was scheduled for June 26,

1997. In accordance with ADR Rule 8, the Trust submitted to the referee those documents it proposed to present as evidence at the hearing. Included were Velu's Option 3 claim form and all medical

records she had previously sent to the Trust. Velu was served with

copies of these documents. Velu also submitted to the referee six

medical records which were duplicative of the material submitted by

the Trust. None of the records show that Velu suffered from PID

when the Dalkon Shield was in place.

The referee found that Velu was entitled to $6000 in damages for

uncontrolled bleeding. The referee found that Velu did not satisfy her

burden of proof regarding PID and infertility, however.

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Following the hearing, Velu, for the first time, produced a medical

record from October 1973 documenting PID while wearing the

Dalkon Shield. She asked the Trust to agree to have the referee reconsider his decision in light of this new evidence. The Trust refused, and

Velu then asked the district court to vacate the ADR decision so that

she could introduce the October 1973 record at a new ADR proceeding.

The district court denied the motion. Velu conceded that, prior to

the ADR hearing, she received copies of the documents that the Trust

intended to present at the ADR proceeding. She was on notice that

none of the Trust's materials documented PID. Further, none of the

material that Velu herself submitted to the referee contained the critical document. Velu did not assert until after the referee's decision that

a record was missing. The court concluded that Velu had not met her

burden of proving all the claimed injuries. Because Velu did not demonstrate by clear and convincing evidence that the referee had exhibited flagrant misconduct in reaching his decision, the district court

denied the motion to vacate the ADR decision.

The decision of an ADR referee is "binding and final," and a

Dalkon Shield Claimant generally relinquishes the right to judicial

review. See In re A. H. Robins, Inc. (Bledsoe v. Dalkon Shield Claimants Trust), 112 F.3d 160, 163 (4th Cir. 1997). The ADR Agreement

which Velu signed and the Second Amended ADR Rules by which

she agreed to be bound provide no mechanism for judicial review of

a referee's decision. Nonetheless, the district court may grant relief

from an ADR decision "`where the moving party demonstrates flagrant referee misconduct by clear and convincing evidence.'" Id. We

review the district court's refusal to vacate an ADR decision for abuse

of discretion. See id.

Here, there was no flagrant misconduct. The referee decided the

matter on the basis of the evidence before him. Velu's negligence in

failing to procure the critical document until after the hearing may not

be imputed to the referee. In the absence of flagrant misconduct by

the referee, we find that the district court did not abuse its discretion

and affirm the order denying Velu's motion to vacate the ADR decision.

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We dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal contentions are fully presented in the materials before the court and argument would not aid the decisional process.

AFFIRMED

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