Court Opinion

ID: 9373646
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-02-22 16:06:27.72308+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:16:42.810316
License: Public Domain

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
                        MERIT SYSTEMS PROTECTION BOARD

     CYNTHIA BROWN,                                  DOCKET NUMBER
                 Appellant,                          CH-844E-16-0273-I-1

                  v.

     OFFICE OF PERSONNEL                             DATE: June 13, 2022
       MANAGEMENT,
                   Agency.

                  THIS ORDER IS NONPRECEDENTIAL 1

           Cynthia Brown, Chicago, Illinois, pro se.

           Linnette L. Scott, Washington, D.C., for the agency.

                                           BEFORE

                               Cathy A. Harris, Vice Chairman
                                Raymond A. Limon, Member
                                 Tristan L. Leavitt, Member

                                     REMAND ORDER

¶1         The appellant has filed a petition for review of the initial decision, which
     affirmed a January 28, 2016 reconsideration decision issued by the Office of
     Personnel Management (OPM) denying as untimely filed her application for
     disability retirement benefits under the Federal Employees’ Retirement System

     1
        A nonprecedential order is one that the Board has determined does not add
     significantly to the body of MSPB case law. Parties may cite nonprecedential orders,
     but such orders have no precedential value; the Board and administrative judges are not
     required to follow or distinguish them in any future decisions. In contrast, a
     precedential decision issued as an Opinion and Order has been id entified by the Board
     as significantly contributing to the Board’s case law. See 5 C.F.R. § 1201.117(c).
                                                                                         2

     (FERS). For the reasons set forth herein, we GRANT the appellant’s petition for
     review, REVERSE the initial decision, and REMAND the matter to OPM for the
     issuance of a new reconsideration decision on the merits of the appellant’s
     disability retirement application.
                                      BACKGROUND
¶2         It is undisputed that, on November 9, 2011, the appellant resigned from her
     position with the Department of the Treasury. Initial Appeal File (IAF), Tab 1
     at 7-8, Tab 4 at 4, 115. According to the appellant, she signed, dated, and mailed
     a portion of her disability retirement application, i.e., the Standard Form 3112C
     (SF-3112C), via regular U.S. mail on October 18, 2012. IAF, Tab 1 at 4, 8, Tab 4
     at 57, Tab 21, Hearing Record (HR) (testimony of the appellant) . OPM claimed
     to have received the appellant’s partial application on December 18, 2012, and
     ultimately issued    a   reconsideration   decision   disallowing   the   appellant’s
     application on the basis that it was not timely filed within 1 year of her
     separation. IAF, Tab 4 at 4-5, Tab 14 at 4, Tab 19 at 5.
¶3         The appellant filed a Board appeal, claiming that she timely filed her
     application with OPM, and, in any case, that the filing deadline should be waived
     due to her mental incompetence. IAF, Tab 1 at 4, 8, Tab 7 at 1-2, Tab 13 at 2-3.
     After a telephonic evidentiary hearing, the administrative judge reasoned that,
     although the appellant had “confidently” testified that she had signed and mailed
     her SF-3112C on October 18, 2012, and presented the testimony of two “credible”
     corroborating witnesses, i.e., her sister and a friend, it was “dubious that either
     the appellant or her witnesses could truly recall such a seemingly unremarkable
     date or event nearly four years after the fact.” IAF, Tab 22, Initial Decision (ID)
     at 2, 6. Accordingly, he found that the appellant failed to show by preponderant
     evidence that she had timely filed her application for disability benefits. ID at 6.
     He also concluded that the appellant had failed to show that she was entitled to a
     waiver of the filing deadline on the basis of mental incompetence. ID at 7-8. The
                                                                                          3

     appellant has filed a petition for review, which OPM has opposed. Petition for
     Review File, Tabs 1, 3.

                                          ANALYSIS
¶4         An application for disability retirement under FERS must be filed with an
     employee’s employing agency before the employee separates from service or with
     the former employing agency or OPM within 1 year after the employee’s
     separation. 5 U.S.C. § 8453; 5 C.F.R. § 844.201(a)(1). For purposes of the filing
     deadline, OPM accepts applications that are “incompletely executed or submitted
     in a letter or other form not prescribed by OPM.” 2 5 C.F.R. § 844.201(a)(3). The
     deadline may be waived if the employee is mentally incompetent on the date of
     separation or within 1 year thereafter and the application is filed with OPM
     within 1 year from the date the employee is restored to competency or is
     appointed a fiduciary, whichever is earlier.          5 U.S.C. § 8453; 5 C.F.R.
     § 844.201(a)(4).    The appellant has the burden of proving, by preponderant
     evidence, 3 that she either timely filed or has a right to have the deadline waived.
     5 C.F.R. § 1201.56(b)(2)(ii).
¶5         Here, the only evidence in the record indicating that the appellant did not
     timely mail her application was a copy of the SF-3112C, which contained what
     appeared to be two stamps in the lower-right hand corner of the document
     indicating that OPM received the form on December 18, 2012. 4 IAF, Tab 4 at 57.
     Because the date stamp(s) were out-of-court statements used to prove the truth of
     the matter asserted, they constituted hearsay evidence. See United States ex rel.

     2
       Additionally, an application mailed to OPM with no legible postmark date is pr esumed
     to have been mailed 5 days before its receipt, excluding days on which OPM is closed
     for business. 5 C.F.R. § 844.201(a)(2).
     3
      A preponderance of the evidence is the degree of rel evant evidence that a reasonable
     person, considering the record as a whole, would accept as sufficient to find that a
     contested fact is more likely to be true than untrue. 5 C.F.R. § 1201.4(q).
     4
       OPM did not provide a copy of the envelope in which the form was mailed, which
     presumably would have contained a postmark.
                                                                                          4

     Davis v. District of Columbia, 34 F. Supp. 3d 30, 39 (D.D.C. 2014), rev’d on
     other grounds, 793 F.3d 120 (D.C. Cir. 2015).               Under Federal Rule of
     Evidence 803(6), a business record, such as the date stamp, is admissible hearsay
     when, among other things, a custodian or other qualified witness testifies as to the
     procedures by which the record is typically made. 5 Id. Here, however, OPM
     produced no such custodian to describe its procedure for date stamping
     applications received via U.S. mail.
¶6         The appellant, by contrast, “confidently” testified that she both signed and
     mailed her SF-3112C on October 18, 2012.            ID at 6; HR (testimony of the
     appellant). She also presented the testimony of two “credible” witnesses who
     both testified that the appellant informed them that she had mailed a retirement
     form on or about October 18, 2012. ID at 2, 6; HR (testimony of D.B. and O.D.).
     Moreover, the appellant testified that she believed that OPM could not have
     received her application in the mail on December 18, 2012, because she had
     undergone surgery on December 2, 2012, and “would not have been in a position
     to mail any forms or do any day-to-day business during that time.”                 HR
     (testimony of the appellant).       Medical documentation in the agency’s file

     5
       Although the Board uses the Federal Rules of Evidence as nonbinding guidance,
     Holton v. Department of the Navy, 123 M.S.P.R. 688, ¶ 13 n.4 (2016), aff’d, 884 F.3d
     1142 (Fed. Cir. 2018), hearsay is admissible in Board proceedings, Vaughn v. U.S.
     Postal Service, 109 M.S.P.R. 469, ¶ 8 (2008), aff’d, 315 F. App’x 305 (Fed. Cir. 2009).
     The determination of whether hearsay evidence is sufficient to prove the truth of a
     contention depends upon the evidence’s reliability and trustworthiness, which is
     evaluated pursuant to the factors set forth in Borninkhof v. Department of Justice,
     5 M.S.P.R. 77, 87 (1981). Vaughn, 109 M.S.P.R. 469, ¶ 9. Those factors are the
     following: (1) the availability of persons with firsthand knowledge to testify at the
     hearing; (2) whether the statements of the out-of-court declarants were signed or in
     affidavit form, and whether anyone witnessed the signing; (3) the agency’s ex planation
     for failing to obtain signed or sworn statements; (4) whether declarants were
     disinterested witnesses to the events, and whether the statements were routinely made;
     (5) consistency of declarants’ accounts with other information in the case, inter nal
     consistency, and their consistency with each other; (6) whether corroboration for the
     statements can otherwise be found in the agency record; (7) the absence of
     contradictory evidence; and (8) credibility of declarant when he made the statement
     attributed to him. Id. (citing Borninkhof, 5 M.S.P.R. at 87).
                                                                                          5

     substantiated that the appellant underwent surgery on December 2, 2012. E.g.,
     IAF, Tab 4 at 8. The record also contained an unsworn written statement from
     the appellant’s friend dated June 27, 2016, which similarly indicated that,
     following her December 2, 2012 surgery, the appellant was “in a recuperative
     period for several months and was totally immobile to have handled any business
     matters.” IAF, Tab 18 at 6 (grammar as in original).
¶7         Although both parties relied, at least in part, on hearsay evidence, we find
     the appellant’s evidence more probative regarding the timeliness issue .           See
     Borninkhof v. Department of Justice, 5 M.S.P.R. 77, 83-84 (1981) (stating that
     the probative value of hearsay evidence necessarily depends on the circumstances
     of each case).       To this end, the appellant consistently maintained that she
     submitted her application for disability retirement to OPM within 1 year of her
     November 9, 2011 separation from service; indeed, the record contained a
     November 12, 2013 letter written to an OPM employee wherein the appellant
     averred that her “request [for disability retirement] was submitted within a year of
     [her] separation.”     IAF, Tab 4 at 55.     The partial application the appellant
     testified she mailed reflects her signature and a date of October 18, 2012. Id.
     at 36. Moreover, the appellant presented corroborating evidence. To this end, the
     appellant’s friend specifically testified that she was able to recall that the
     appellant had informed her that she mailed a retirement form in October 2012 ,
     because she had lent the appellant money around this same time, which the
     appellant had presumably used to mail her application. 6 HR (testimony of O.D.).

     6
       Although the administrative judge’s found the appellant’s friend “credible,” he also
     found her testimony regarding specifically recalling the appellant telling her about
     mailing her application in October 2012, “dubious.” ID at 6. These two conclusions
     are difficult to reconcile. In any event, the Board may overturn demeanor-based
     credibility determinations when, as here, the administrative judge’s findings are
     incomplete, inconsistent with the weight of the evidence, and do not reflect the record
     as a whole. See Rapp v. Office of Personnel Management, 108 M.S.P.R. 674, ¶ 13
     (2008).
                                                                                          6

      Thus, we find that the weight of the evidence established that, more likely than
      not, the appellant mailed her application on October 18, 2012.
¶8          Accordingly, we find that the appellant showed by preponderant evidence
      that she timely submitted her application for disability retirement less than 1 year
      after her November 9, 2011 separation from service and, therefore, that her
      application was timely filed. 7 See 5 C.F.R. § 844.201(a)(3).

                                            ORDER
¶9          For the reasons discussed above, we remand this case to OPM. On remand,
      OPM shall issue a determination on the merits of the appellant’s FERS disability
      retirement application. OPM shall issue the new reconsideration decision within
      60 calendar days from the date of this Remand Order and shall advise the
      appellant of her right to file an appeal with the Board’s Central Regional Office if
      she disagrees with that new decision. See Litzenberger v. Office of Personnel
      Management, 88 M.S.P.R. 419, 424 (2001).
¶10         We also ORDER OPM to tell the appellant promptly in writing when it
      believes it has fully carried out the Board’s Order and of the actions it has taken
      to carry out the Board’s Order. We ORDER the appellant to provide all necessary
      information OPM requests to help it carry out the Board’s Order. The appellant,
      if not notified, should ask OPM about its progress. See 5 C.F.R. § 1201.181(b).
¶11         No later than 30 days after OPM tells the appellant it has fully carried out
      the Board’s Order, the appellant may file a petition for enforcement with the
      office that issued the initial decision on this appeal if the appellant believes that
      OPM did not fully carry out the Board’s Order.         The petition should contain
      specific reasons why the appellant believes OPM has not fully carri ed out the

      7
       Because we so find, the appellant’s mental competence is not material to the outcome
      of this appeal.
                                                                            7

Board’s Order, and should include the dates and results of any communications
with OPM. See 5 C.F.R. § 1201.182(a).

FOR THE BOARD:                                 /s/ for
                                        Jennifer Everling
                                        Acting Clerk of the Board
Washington, D.C.