Opinion ID: 3014238
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Mrs. Soubik

Text: him, and their homes were close to each Mrs. Soubik testified during the other on the same street. He noticed that 1989 hearing on her survivor claim. She Soubik’s health was slipping because also stated that her husband took Soubik could not walk well or walk up Brondicon for his black lung problem. stairs because it would “take his wind.” She stated that it “sort of loosened up his The day that Soubik died, Koshinskie phlegm [so] that he had to spit up.” She noticed that he was winded from walking also testified that he took medication for outside. his heart after having a heart attack in d. John Soubik 1986, shortly before his death. The day he died, he became short of breath and was John Soubik testified at the 1997 taken to the hospital where he was put in hearing that every time he came home to an oxygen tent. He stayed in the tent until visit his parents, he could see his father’s he died. condition had deteriorated. He observed that his father had “considerably slowed She also testified during the 1997 down,” and heard him make “gasps for hearing that she personally observed her air” and have a “trying to catch his breath husband’s breathing difficulty for “a long feeling.” He also saw his father raise his period of time” before his death. Even chest “like he was trying to get air,” and after he retired from work and started “hold[] on to the bannister a lot going receiving Social Security disability down the stairs.” John Soubik also took benefits, he would breathe heavily and spit his father to the hospital where he was up blood and mucus every day. The “hooked. . . up to that breathing problem was particularly pronounced in apparatus.” the evening. She also saw that, just before his death, he could barely walk and was e. Frank Alberts very weak.8 Alberts testified at the 1997 hearing c. Walter Koshinskie that he had known Mr. Soubik, his brotherin-law, for about 50 years at the time of Soubik’s death in 1986. Alberts had 8 Mrs. Soubik also testified that her brother died of pneumoconiosis, i.e. black 9 lung disease, and that she had seen her He also testified at the April 1986 brother daily for about 20 years before his hearing on M r. Soubik’s claim, but that death. But this testimony is never linked testimony focused on establishing that to any observations she made of her Soubik had worked as a coal miner and husband’s illness. hauler. 7 worked with him for about a decade noted that Mrs. Soubik and “the miner’s starting in the mid-1930s. He “could see sons and sister-in-law” had testified that [Soubik] gradually slowing down. . . over Mr. Soubik had become short of breath a period of years” and “could see his over time, but he did not discuss that breathing was getting slower. . . and he’d evidence. have to fight for his breath” starting in C. Soubik I about 1974 or 1975. He saw Soubik have trouble catching his breath “pretty In Soubik I, we reversed the BRB’s regular.” Periodically, he saw him decision affirming the ALJ’s denial of coughing or spitting when they would benefits, and we remanded for “further visit. He noticed that Soubik had trouble consideration of the lay evidence.” We going up the steps in his house as he got agreed with the ALJ that the only dispute older. was causation. Accordingly, Mrs. Soubik had to establish that Mr. Soubik’s death f. Adeline Cecilia Dilliplane was due to pneumoconiosis, i.e., that Ms. Dilliplane had known Mr. pneumoconiosis “was a substantially Soubik since 1969 when her son married contributing cause or factor” leading to her the Soubiks’ daughter. She stated that Mr. husband’s death or that his “death was Soubik had trouble helping her son build a caused by com plications of house. “[H]e would do some things and pneumoconiosis” under 20 C.F.R. § then he would stop because he’d start 718.205(c).10 We also concluded that Mrs. wheezing. He’d start coughing.” She said Soubik could prove her claim using that she thought he had breathing problems “medical evidence alone, non-medical comparable to hers, and she had serious evidence alone, or the combination of problems with asthma. Over time, they medical and non-medical evidence” under saw each other less often but regularly. Hillibush v. Dep’t of Labor, 853 F.2d 197, During visits she would hear him wheeze 205 (3d Cir. 1988). Hillibush explicitly and “knew he was having a bad. . . held that lay testimony must be considered breathing problem.” in a survivor’s case under 20 C.F.R. § 718.204.