Court Opinion

ID: 9492052
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 14:30:58.877028+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:04.949187
License: Public Domain

KOZINSKI, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
The majority manufactures a new defense to the bar of judicial estoppel — having a really good excuse for taking inconsistent positions. In so doing it creates a conflict with Johnson v. Oregon, 141 F.3d 1361 (9th Cir.1998), and Rissetto v. Plumbers and Steamfitters Local 343, 94 F.3d 597 (9th Cir.1996). Johnson went to great lengths to explain how the plaintiffs previous representations could be squared with her position that she was in fact a qualified individual with a disability. For example, it explained that her representations to the Social Security Administration were not inconsistent because “[t]he SSA neither asks nor considers whether individuals can work with accommodation.” Johnson, 141 F.3d at 1370. What she represented to Standard Insurance was not inconsistent because she explained that “although she [was] permanently disabled, she [could] nevertheless work, but only with reasonable accommodations.” Id. Finally, in a letter to the IRS, she flatly represented that she was “totally disabled,” which the panel found “troubling.” Id. However, it found the inclusion of that representation in her handwritten letter to the IRS was not “an affront to the court sufficient to warrant judicial estoppel” because “[s]he was’ not seeking financial benefits from the agency, she was merely asking for leniency regarding her late tax return.” Id. at 1370-71. No such reconciliation can be made here, and the majority doesn’t even pretend it can.
The majority holds, correctly I believe, that Fredenburg has not proposed a reasonable accommodation. The only question left, then, is whether she can work without an accommodation. Fredenburg repeatedly represented to the state Employment Development Department (EDD) that she was incapable of performing her regular work.1 She is now claiming that she can perform her regular work, and in fact could do so all along. There is absolutely no way to reconcile the two positions. This is very different than Johnson, where the seemingly inconsistent representations could be reconciled by noting that the employee said nothing about her ability to work with a reasonable accommodation. And her representations here differ radically from the third representation made by Johnson because, unlike a letter to the IRS explaining why a tax return was late, one would expect an applicant to be precise about the nature of her ability to work when making representa*1185tions to an agency whose business it is to pay disability claims.
The simple explanation is that Freden-burg told one story in one proceeding, and then, when it didn’t get her what she wanted, she told a different and inconsistent story in another proceeding. The majority responds to Fredenburg’s obvious mendacity with a rhetorical question: “What else was she to do?” Maj. op. at 1180. What Fredenburg was to do was to tell the truth at all times; that’s the very essence of judicial estoppel. There is nothing wrong with expecting a plaintiff to respond truthfully to a simple question like whether she is able to perform her job. Although it may be asking too much to expect her to take into account the difference between being able to work with or without a reasonable accommodation, the majority’s analysis doesn’t pretend to be concerned with such niceties. Rather, Fredenburg is allowed to change her tune without penalty because she “had not played fast and loose with, or committed a fraud on, the court.” Maj. op. at 1180-81.2
I’m quite unsure what this standard means or is intended to mean. Does “committing a fraud on the court” mean that we failed to learn of the prior representation, and thus the party was able to sneak one by us? Certainly Fredenburg did nothing to bring her prior representations to the attention of the district court, and they probably would not have come to light had the county not learned of them.3 There is nothing Fredenburg could possibly have done to be any less forthright or more inconsistent than she was.. If this be not “fast and loose,” I’m not sure what is.
What I am sure of is that such a lax test for what constitutes “playing fast and loose” is contrary to binding precedent. In a very similar case, Rissetto, we noted “our concern that it might constitute ‘playing fast and loose with the courts’ for plaintiff to claim in 1990 that she was unable to perform her job in order to obtain workers’ compensation benefits and to claim now that she was performing her job adequately in order to win damages in this suit.” Rissetto, 94 F.3d at 601. Indeed, in that case we determined that the plaintiff was in fact trying to play fast and loose, and thus was judicially estopped from taking a new position in her FEHA suit. See id. at 606. Johnson did not, and could not, overrule Rissetto. The deception practiced by Fredenburg here is on all fours with that in Rissetto, and must lead to the same result.
The majority tries to rely on Nunes v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 164 F.3d 1243 (9th Cir.1999), see maj. op. at 1181, but the cases are so different the citation only undercuts the majority’s analysis. In Nunes, the plaintiff had suffered from syn-copal episodes that caused her to faint at work but, after taking a leave of absence, she was cured. See id. at 1245-46. There is no inconsistency in taking a leave of absence and collecting disability benefits while admittedly disabled, then returning to work after one’s health is restored. This does not in any way describe Freden-burg. Fredenburg nowhere alleges or suggests that she had a problem and needed time off to get well. Instead, she complains of her “pretext[ual]” termination at the hands of the county. See Complaint ¶ 11. Admittedly, she references a letter *1186from one of her physicians stating that she would be able to return to work after recovering from her “adjustment disorder” on January 16th; but she obviously didn’t believe that doctor’s opinion — she continued to accept disability benefits after January 16th, and then represented to the EDD in May, four months later, that she remained disabled and unable to perform the functions of her job. Nor does Fre-denburg’s brief suggest that she was once sick and then got better; rather, she objected to the district court’s taking judicial notice of the “unsubstantiated hearsay” contained in her EDD applications, Appellant’s Br. at 10, railed against the county’s “belie[f] that appellant was suffering from a personality disorder,” id. at 12, and then admitted that “out of financial desperation ... [she] applied for and received Social Security [sic, state] disability benefits,” id. at 13. Although her illness was “potentially” temporary, nowhere does she allege that she was disabled during the time that she was collecting benefits, and then later got better, as did Nunes. Nunes has no application here, and to suggest that it does belittles the claims of honest plaintiffs who admit to taking disability benefits during a leave of absence in which they seek to recover from a disability.
I also note that'we have given the district court no guidance as to what to do on remand — or perhaps too much guidance. The majority opinion doesn’t appear to leave any room for the district court to grant summary judgment on Fredenburg’s claims. Judge Weiner concurs in that opinion, yet strangely suggests that the district court could nevertheless grant summary judgment in favor of the county. See Weiner op. at 1184. I don’t get it. Given that we all agree that there was a genuine issue of fact as to whether Fre-denburg could do her job, and given that the majority disavows the use of judicial estoppel, I can’t see any way in which the district court could properly grant summary judgment. Because the district court cannot preclude Fredenburg’s claims based on her previous representations, it would have to weigh the evidence presented by Fredenburg and the county in order to grant summary judgment. What am I missing here?
In sum, the majority opinion guts the doctrine of judicial estoppel, which has previously been followed in this circuit. The majority forthrightly admits this when it allows that “Fredenburg’s earlier admissions, like those of any litigant, may be used in evidence against her.” Maj. op. at 1180 n. 6. Of course a party’s prior statements are always admissible at trial, so long as they meet the test of relevancy under FRE 401. But prior inconsistent representations made in a judicial proceeding are not merely admissible — they are preclusive. That is the heart and soul of judicial estoppel. By saying that prior judicial statements are to be treated just like prior statements made to a fish merchant or a fortune teller, the majority drives a stake through the heart of the doctrine of judicial estoppel.
I agree with the core holding of Johnson that representations made to disability agencies should be read narrowly so as not to automatically preclude ADA plaintiffs from pursuing the remedies that Congress has granted to them. However, I cannot agree with the majority here that sworn statements on applications for disability benefits — which result in the payment of cash benefits — should be granted no more weight than statements made in casual conversation. The majority’s approach allows people to slough off prior inconsistent representations when they become inconvenient, much like a snake sheds its skin. It is one thing to allow a plaintiff to explain how her previous representations were actually truthful and consistent with what she claims today, as did Johnson; it is a far different thing to look away from a plaintiffs previous representations with a wink and a nudge because she was “forced” to lie in order to fenagle benefits from the welfare state. Because the majority opinion is at loggerheads with dec*1187ades of precedent in our circuit and elsewhere, I dissent.

. In order to qualify for state disability benefits, a claimant must be "unable to perform his or her regular or customary work” as a result of “his or her physical or mental condition.” Cal. Unemp. Ins. Code § 2626 (West 1986). Although this doesn’t mention the possibility of reasonable accommodation, the majority opinion doesn't rely on that distinction. Given the similarity of this language to that of the ADA, see 42 U.S.C. § 12111(8) (defining a "qualified individual” as a person who "can perform the essential functions of the employment position that such individual holds”), I am puzzled by Judge Weiner’s suggestion that this case turns on "different definitions of disability,” see Weiner op. at 1183. Judge Weiner does not explain — nor do I believe he can — how the "different definitions of disability” make any difference in answering the question put to us.

. The majority also excuses Fredenburg's conduct because "her employer and the state, considered together, were not treating her consistently either.” Maj. op. at 1180. But Fredenburg’s employer and the disability office were different parties who had no obligation to take consistent positions. Even if inconsistency by a single party opponent were a defense to judicial estoppel, I don’t see how one could meld the conduct of two unrelated parties for that purpose.

. Not only did Fredenburg fail to forthrightly admit to her prior representations, in this court she argued that the district court's decision to take notice of her application for benefits was an abuse of discretion. See Appellant’s Br. at 10-11. That pretty much refutes the majority's contention that ”[s]he has not denied any of the representations she made.” Maj. op. at 1180.