Court Opinion

ID: 9942176
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-20 17:01:24.220238+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:47:48.277827
License: Public Domain

Case: 23-1832    Document: 18    Page: 1   Filed: 02/20/2024

        NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

   United States Court of Appeals
       for the Federal Circuit
                 ______________________

                    JOHN HASSAN,
                   Claimant-Appellant

                            v.

       DENIS MCDONOUGH, SECRETARY OF
              VETERANS AFFAIRS,
               Respondent-Appellee
              ______________________

                       2023-1832
                 ______________________

    Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for
 Veterans Claims in No. 22-6701, Chief Judge Margaret C.
 Bartley.
                 ______________________

                Decided: February 20, 2024
                 ______________________

    JOHN HASSAN, Center Moriches, NY, pro se.

     ANNE DELMARE, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil
 Division, United States Department of Justice, Washing-
 ton, DC, for respondent-appellee. Also represented by
 BRIAN M. BOYNTON, MARTIN F. HOCKEY, JR., PATRICIA M.
 MCCARTHY.
                  ______________________
Case: 23-1832    Document: 18      Page: 2    Filed: 02/20/2024

 2                                     HASSAN v. MCDONOUGH

     Before PROST, SCHALL, and REYNA, Circuit Judges.
 PER CURIAM.
                          DECISION
     John Hassan appeals the order of the United States
 Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (“Veterans Court”)
 that denied his petition for extraordinary relief in the form
 of a writ of mandamus. Hassan v. McDonough, No. 22-
 6701 (Vet. App. Feb. 13, 2023), App. 1. * For the reasons set
 forth below, we dismiss for lack of jurisdiction.
                         DISCUSSION
                               I
     This appeal arises out of what appears to be a long-
 running dispute between Mr. Hassan and the Department
 of Veterans Affairs (“VA”). The dispute came to the Veter-
 ans Court on October 27, 2022, when Mr. Hassan peti-
 tioned the court to compel the VA to assist with plumbing
 repairs in his home. App. 1. In support of his petition, Mr.
 Hassan alleged that the VA would not respond, or respond
 appropriately, to his calls for help. Id. On December 2,
 2022, the court ordered the Secretary to respond to Mr.
 Hassan’s petition. Doing so, the Secretary stated that, be-
 tween 2012 and 2016, the VA had attempted to assist Mr.
 Hassan with necessary plumbing repairs so that he could
 receive vocational rehabilitation and educational services
 in his home, but that Mr. Hassan had declined to cooperate
 in the effort. Id. at 1–2. On December 29, 2022, Mr. Has-
 san submitted correspondence to the Veterans Court. In it,
 he stated that the Secretary’s response was inaccurate and
 that he had never refused the VA’s services. Id. at 2.

     *  “App.” citations are to the appendix filed with Re-
 spondent-Appellee’s Informal Response Brief, ECF No. 7.
Case: 23-1832     Document: 18      Page: 3   Filed: 02/20/2024

 HASSAN v. MCDONOUGH                                         3

     In its February 13, 2023 Order, the Veterans Court de-
 termined that Mr. Hassan had failed to demonstrate enti-
 tlement to a writ of mandamus. Id. Rejecting Mr. Hassan’s
 claims to the contrary, the court found that the VA is will-
 ing to assist Mr. Hassan with plumbing repairs in his home
 but is unable to do so because Mr. Hassan has refused to
 remove extreme clutter, including boxes piled to the ceiling
 that prevent access. Id. The court concluded:
     Ultimately, Mr. Hassan’s assertion that VA is re-
     fusing to facilitate repairs and will not return his
     calls is contradicted by the evidence provided by
     the Secretary—and Mr. Hassan himself—demon-
     strating that VA has been ready to assist Mr. Has-
     san with plumbing repairs for more than a decade,
     that it is currently actively engaged with Mr. Has-
     san and continuing to offer services, and that it is
     Mr. Hassan who is refusing to facilitate repairs and
     who has declined VA’s assistance. . . . [U]nder the
     circumstances present here, the Court concludes
     that Mr. Hassan has not demonstrated a clear and
     indisputable right to a writ or that a writ is war-
     ranted because he refused VA’s assistance and pre-
     vented access to the areas of his home in which
     repairs are needed.
 Id. at 2–3. Accordingly, the Veterans Court denied Mr.
 Hassan’s petition. Id. at 3.
                               II
     Our jurisdiction to review decisions of the Veterans
 Court is limited by statute. 38 U.S.C. § 7292. We have
 jurisdiction to decide an appeal insofar as it presents a
 challenge to the court’s decision regarding a rule of law, in-
 cluding a decision about the interpretation or validity of
 any statute or regulation. Id. § 7292(a), (d)(1). However,
 we lack jurisdiction to entertain a challenge to a factual
 determination or a challenge to the application of a law or
 regulation to the facts of a particular case, unless the
Case: 23-1832     Document: 18     Page: 4    Filed: 02/20/2024

 4                                      HASSAN v. MCDONOUGH

 appeal presents a constitutional issue. Id. § 7292(d)(2).
 Although we possess “jurisdiction to review the [Veterans
 Court’s] decision whether to grant a mandamus petition
 that raises a non-frivolous legal question,” and although we
 may determine whether the veteran “has satisfied the legal
 standard for issuing the writ,” we may not “review the fac-
 tual merits of the veteran’s claim.” Beasley v. Shinseki, 709
 F.3d 1154, 1158 (Fed. Cir. 2013).
     We have reviewed the decision of the Veterans Court
 and have considered the arguments raised by Mr. Hassan
 in his appeal. Based upon the part of the Veterans Court’s
 decision that we have quoted above, however, it is clear
 that the court denied Mr. Hassan’s petition based solely
 upon what it found to be the facts of the case. Specifically,
 the court determined that, based upon those facts, Mr.
 Hassan had failed to establish entitlement to a writ of man-
 damus. Mr. Hassan disputes the court’s determination,
 but he does so only by challenging the court’s findings of
 fact. He thus presents a claim beyond our jurisdiction.
     Indeed, we have consistently refused to exercise juris-
 diction in appeals of denials of a writ of mandamus by the
 Veterans Court when the appeals challenge only factual
 determinations or the application of law to fact. See Fer-
 min v. McDonough, No. 2023-1482, 2023 WL 6994232, at
 *2–3 (Fed. Cir. Oct. 24, 2023) (dismissing an appeal of the
 denial of a petition for writ of mandamus as it related to
 challenges to factual determinations or the law as applied
 to the facts); Hooper v. McDonough, No. 2022-1738, 2022
 WL 4091865, at *2–3 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 7, 2022) (dismissing
 an appeal for lack of jurisdiction, noting that the veteran’s
 arguments “merely raise issues about factual findings and
 the application of a settled (and un-challenged) legal stand-
 ard to the facts of this case”); McLean v. Wilkie, 780 F.
 App’x 892, 895 (Fed. Cir. 2019) (dismissing an appeal pre-
 senting only issues challenging factual determinations and
 the application of law to fact); Peet v. Shulkin, 686 F. App’x
 914, 916 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (“[E]ven if Mr. Peet addressed the
Case: 23-1832     Document: 18       Page: 5   Filed: 02/20/2024

 HASSAN v. MCDONOUGH                                          5

 Veterans Court’s findings, we could not review them. The
 findings in question involve both findings of fact . . . and an
 application of law to disputed facts.”); Spear v. McDonald,
 586 F. App’x 591, 592 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (“[W]hether Mr.
 Spear satisfied the requirements for a writ of mandamus is
 a challenge to the Veterans Court’s application of law to
 facts, over which we have no jurisdiction.”).
                         CONCLUSION
     For the foregoing reasons, we lack jurisdiction to adju-
 dicate Mr. Hassan’s appeal. The appeal is therefore dis-
 missed.
                         DISMISSED
                             COSTS
 No costs.