Court Opinion

ID: 9464634
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 23:38:34.288972+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:38:44.098837
License: Public Domain

WINTER, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
For the following reasons, I agree with Judge Bryan that the order of the Benefits Review Board should be affirmed:
Lewis indisputably sustained an industrial injury in 1963. He was found then to be permanently partially disabled and awarded benefits. The question which this case presents is whether the Board’s later finding that Lewis subsequently became permanently totally disabled is supported by substantial evidence. An aspect of this ultimate question is the effect of the fact that at the time that the Board found him permanently totally disabled, he was working for an exterminating company. Another is the burden, if any, on his former employer to offer proof that he was capable of engaging in other substantial employment in order to defeat his claim when in fact he was actually employed as an exterminator.
I have no doubt that the proof is ample to support the finding that between 1963, when Lewis sustained the injury for which the first award of compensation was made, and 1974, when Lewis asserted that he was permanently totally disabled, Lewis had become permanently totally disabled. His original injury was a double hernia. This *450was surgically repaired. Although he was not injured again, single and double hernias requiring additional surgical repairs recurred in 1964, 1965,1966 and 1973. Lewis’ work history throughout this period shows that he was not physically able to continue his occupation as an elevator constructor and mechanic, or, stated more precisely, his employer was unwilling to retain him since he could not do, and refused to do, the heavy lifting that his occupation required. Both treating and examining physicians are agreed that Lewis cannot work as an elevator constructor or elevator maintenance man, although they are of the view that Lewis can perform light work not including lifting of heavy objects, prolonged walking, climbing or standing.
Following his discharge as an elevator constructor by Haughton, the employer in this case, Lewis did obtain short-term employment with two other elevator companies, light work with computers for an electronics company, work at an amusement center, and a job with an electronics firm doing light bench work on radar equipment. In each instance, Lewis’ physical condition and his recurrent hernias caused a cessation of his employment. His testimony that other potential employers refused to hire him because of his physical condition is undisputed.
This brings me to a consideration of whether the fact of Lewis’ present employment defeats his claim of permanent total disability. At the outset, I am mindful that the Act1 under which benefits are claimed is to be liberally construed in favor of injured workers, Voris v. Eikel, 346 U.S. 328, 74 S.Ct. 88, 98 L.Ed. 5 (1953). More importantly, the concept of “disability” under the Act is an economic and not a medical one. One does not have to be bedridden to be totally disabled. Watson v. Gulf Stevedore Corp., 400 F.2d 649, 654 (5 Cir. 1968). It has long been recognized that an employee who is only partially disabled in the medical sense may be totally disabled in the economic sense when his age, education, work experience and the availability of suitable employment are considered. American Stevedores, Inc. v. Salzano, 538 F.2d 933, 935-36 (2 Cir. 1976); Cunnyngham v. Donovan, 328 F.2d 694, 697 (5 Cir. 1964); Eastern S. S. Lines, Inc. v. Monahan, 110 F.2d 840, 842 (1 Cir. 1940); Norfolk, Baltimore and Carolina Line, Inc. v. Bergenon, 351 F.Supp. 348, 350 (D.S.C.1972).
The administrative law judge, impliedly, and the Board, explicitly, found that Lewis’ present employment as an exterminator was not “suitable” and, therefore, did not preclude a finding that Lewis was, in economic terms, permanently totally disabled. There is substantial support for this finding in Lewis’ undisputed testimony concerning the nature of his present work and the way in which he must perform it.2
As a serviceman for an exterminator, Lewis’ duties involve driving a pickup truck, carrying a one-gallon can of insecticide weighing 15-20 pounds, spraying, walking, bending and stooping. He testified that he can perform these duties, but they cause him to have extreme pain and soreness. His testimony was that he continues in this employment only because he has no other means of livelihood to support himself and his family. He works at his own pace through a full workday to complete his assignments despite pain and swelling, but he stressed that he cannot engage in these activities without enduring excruciating pain.3 When he returns to his *451home at the conclusion of a day’s work, he goes directly to bed where he lies flat on his back. Only over weekends when he has no duties as an exterminator does he experience a measure of relief.4
Both the administrative law judge and the Benefits Review Board were of the opinion that “if [Lewis] were not working at all, he would probably be found to be permanently totally disabled.” I agree with the Board that “it would be unfair to penalize [Lewis] by denying him compensation for permanent total disability because he made an extraordinary effort to keep working” and that a man “having a severe physical disability as a result of an employment-related injury should not be required to continue enduring excruciating pain and subjecting himself to the possibility of further injury by performing work which is more strenuous than that type of ‘light’ work he is advised to do.”5
Lewis is 52 years old. He has a seventh grade education and was employed as an elevator constructor and mechanic for approximately sixteen and one-half years. As I have shown, the Board’s determination that his present employment as an exterminator is not suitable is supported by the record. It is by now well-established that, in order to defeat a claim for benefits as a result of an alleged permanent total disability, the burden is on the employer to prove the existence of a suitable job presently available to the claimant in the community in which he lives. American Stevedores, Inc. v. Salzano, 538 F.2d 933 (2 Cir. 1976); Perini Corp. v. Heyde, 306 F.Supp. 1321 (D.R.I.1969). In the instant case, Lewis’ former employer, Haughton, attempted to meet its burden merely by demonstrating the fact of Lewis’ present employment. It presented no evidence to show the availability of any other job which Lewis could hold, consistent with his physical limitations, his education and his work skills, in the community in which he presently lives.6 Manifestly, when Lewis’ present employment was found unsuitable, Haughton’s burden was left unsatisfied. It was, therefore, entirely proper for the Benefits Review Board to sustain an award of benefits to Lewis for permanent total disability.

. Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act, 39 U.S.C. §§ 901 et seq., as extended by the District of Columbia Workmen’s Compensation Act, 36 D.C.Code §§ 501 et seq.

. Both the administrative law judge and the Board found Lewis to be a credible witness and their determination in this regard is binding on us.

. My dissenting brother suggests that the pain that Lewis was enduring in 1974 was no different from the pain that he endured at the time that he was found to be only partially disabled. The record, however, does not support this assertion. Before the administrative law judge, Lewis was questioned and responded as follows:
Q. One other question: We’ve continuously been speaking of this pain. This pain that *451you’re presently experiencing, how could you compare it to this pain, say two years ago or three years ago, four years ago?
A. Well, I tell you, it’s getting worse and worse all the time when I do anything. Any stooping or bending, I just — it swells and if I do much walking the pain, I have pain and swelling all the time. I don’t rest good at night. About the only time I ever get any relief is when I lay flat of [sic] my back.

. Even so; as Orkin’s employee, Lewis’ earnings in 1975 were only two-thirds of his earnings at the time of his injury in 1963, without adjustment for the substantial inflation which occurred between those two dates.

. My dissenting brother also asserts that the Board dismissed the fact of Lewis’ present employment with the observation that there was no assurance that he “would be able to continue [working as an exterminator] indefinitely.” The Board’s statement was merely a description of the conclusions of the administrative law judge. 1 cannot read the Board’s opinion as relying upon that observation of the administrative law judge as a ground for affirming him. To me, the Board’s opinion says that it affirmed the administrative law judge because the record established that Lewis was disabled, his present job was not suitable, and his former employer had not shown any other type of work in which Lewis could profitably engage within the limitations of his physical condition, his age and his employment skills, with the result that Lewis was permanently totally disabled within the meaning of 33 U.S.C. § 902(10). In any event, I am constrained to add that, in the context of this case, I do not find the observation of the administrative law judge unreasonable. Lewis’ present employment could well be deemed merely a stopgap measure to continue only as long as his sorely-taxed physical endurance held out.

. Lewis now lives in Clearwater, Florida. He moved there in January 1960 because there was no work available for him in the Washington area, where he resided at the time of his original injury, and because his son had asthma