Court Opinion

ID: 9839282
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-12 18:00:48.864683+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:12:54.944736
License: Public Domain

FILED
                           NOT FOR PUBLICATION
                                                                            SEP 12 2023
                    UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS                       MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
                                                                          U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

                            FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

LETICIA MONREAL,                                 No.   22-55713

              Plaintiff-Appellant,               D.C. No. 5:21-cv-00813-JDE

 v.
                                                 MEMORANDUM*
KILOLO KIJAKAZI, Acting
Commissioner of Social Security,

              Defendant-Appellee.

                    Appeal from the United States District Court
                        for the Central District of California
                     John D. Early, Magistrate Judge, Presiding

                           Submitted August 24, 2023**
                              Pasadena, California

Before: RAWLINSON and BRESS, Circuit Judges, and ZOUHARY,*** District
Judge.

      *
             This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
      **
             The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
      ***
            The Honorable Jack Zouhary, United States District Judge for the
Northern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.
      Leticia Monreal (Monreal) appeals the district court’s order affirming the

denial of Social Security benefits by the Commissioner of Social Security.

Monreal contends that the Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) failed to resolve an

apparent conflict between the testimony of a vocational expert (VE) and the

Dictionary of Occupational Titles (DOT) concerning the reasoning levels required

of the occupations the ALJ relied on in determining that Monreal was not disabled.

We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

      “We review [the district court’s] decision de novo and must determine

whether the ALJ’s ruling is free of legal error and its findings of fact are supported

by substantial evidence. . . .” Wischmann v. Kijakazi, 68 F.4th 498, 504 (9th Cir.

2023) (citation omitted).

       “[U]nder current rules, if there is a conflict between occupational evidence

provided by the VE and information in the DOT, the ALJ may not rely on the VE’s

evidence to support a determination or decision that the individual is or is not

disabled unless the ALJ explains how he or she resolved the conflict.” Id. at 505

(citations and internal quotation marks omitted).

      The DOT provides that Level 2 Reasoning encompasses the abilities to

“[a]pply commonsense understanding to carry out detailed but uninvolved written

or oral instructions,” and to “[d]eal with problems involving a few concrete

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variables in or from standardized situations.” DOT, App. C, 1991 WL 688702

(2016). With Level 3 Reasoning, an individual is capable of “[a]pply[ing]

commonsense understanding to carry out instructions furnished in written, oral, or

diagrammatic form,” and “[d]eal[ing] with problems involving several concrete

variables in or from standardized situations.” Id.

      The VE’s unchallenged testimony reflected no apparent conflict between his

opinion and the DOT concerning Monreal’s capability to perform occupations

requiring Level 3 Reasoning. In his RFC determination, the ALJ specified that

Monreal could “sustain concentration, persistence and pace for simple and some

occasional detailed tasks for a 40 hour workweek; detailed tasks require written

instructions.” In support of his RFC determination, the ALJ gave significant

weight to the opinions of a psychiatric consultative examiner that Monreal “had

moderate limitations in . . . her ability to follow detailed instructions, and her

ability to respond to work pressure in a usual work setting,” but “no more than

mild limitations in any other functional area.” Monreal’s capabilities exceed the

limitations imposed for occupations involving Level 2 Reasoning. See id.

Consequently, there was no “apparent conflict” between Monreal’s residual

functional capacity “and the demands of Level 3 Reasoning.” Zavalin v. Colvin,

778 F.3d 842, 847 (9th Cir. 2015). Zavalin does not control because there, the ALJ

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found that the claimant was limited to “simple, routine tasks,” which did create an

inherent conflict with Level 3 Reasoning occupations. Id. at 846.

      AFFIRMED.

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