Court Opinion

ID: 9487831
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:27:35.683502+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:30.129726
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. In my view, substantial evidence on the record as a whole does not support the finding of the administrative law judge (ALJ) that Lavonzo Chamberlain can perform full-time, light work in our competitive economy.
As is frequently the case, much of the record cannot be deciphered.1 I have done my best to read it from beginning to end, a task that took much longer than it would have if the Secretary had fulfilled his responsibility to present a legible record to us. But the ALJ, the district court judge, and my colleagues have made the best of a bad situation, and I will too.
At the outset, it is significant that Chamberlain has worked diligently since he was 17 years old as a factory worker, a farm worker, a soldier, a construction worker, a truck driver, and a warehouseman. After working all of these years for others, he opened his own asphalt and construction business, which he operated for an additional four years. Chamberlain managed to work during all of this time even though he sustained at least three serious injuries, had only a limited education, and marginal intelligence — hardly the picture of the malingerer the ALJ goes to great length to paint in his decision. While I am not willing to accept Chamberlain’s claim that the ALJ is racially biased, I cannot read the AL J’s decision without questioning his impartiality.
In my view, one cannot read this record from beginning to end without concluding that Chamberlain cannot possibly perform light work in our competitive economy due to his physical and mental limitations. The vocational expert called by the ALJ was given the following hypothetical:
[Chamberlain is a 45-year-old] male, [with a] ninth grade special education. [He has the ability] to lift up to 25 pounds occasionally, 10 pounds frequently. Ability to sit from a half hour to an hour. Standing from a half hour to an horn* with ability to alternate those positions. Walking 4 to 5 miles. Only occasional kneeling or crawling. Jobs would need to be limited to simple routine tasks. The need to avoid *1497concentrated exposure to dust, fumes, odors, gases and poor ventilation. Would also need to avoid concentrated exposures to extremes of heat and cold and traveling would be limited to one hour with the need for a rest period after this hour.
Ree. at 85. Based on this hypothetical, the expert stated that Chamberlain would not be able to perform any of his past relevant work and that he did not have any transferable skills. The expert was then asked whether Chamberlain was capable of performing any jobs of an unskilled nature, to which the expert responded:
I’d say something along the lines of some kind of assembly, packaging work that could be done in a ... factory setting. There are jobs that don’t involve concentrated exposure to these environmental factors that would allow alternation of position between sitting and standing on a half hour to an hour basis surely and would be within the lifting limitation. Various types of assembly jobs would be under Code Number 706.687-010 in the Dictionary of Occupational Titles. At a light level I think you’re probably talking about 2500 jobs on a statewide basis; 125,000 jobs nationally; and the same numbers I think would hold true for work as a packager in various industries, Code Number 920.587-018. Additional work as ... a guard inside, various types of security guards working inside. The code is 372.667-034. That’s light work activity and we’re looking at 3000 jobs; 150,000 jobs nationally. Those would be representative of types of work that would be consistent, I think, with the limitations that you indicated.
Id. at 86. He was asked a second hypothetical not relevant to this dissent. A third hypothetical was then posed: “[A]dd ... [to what I have already stated] that there would need to be rest periods of up to two hours during an 8 hour work day. Would that change any of your answer?” The expert responded, “Yes, I think that would preclude regular full-time competitive employment.” Id. at 87 (emphasis added). Finally, the ALJ asked the expert to consider that Chamberlain
often has deficiencies of concentration, persistence, or pace resulting in [a] failure to complete tasks in a timely manner in a work setting or elsewhere and he’s limited in carrying out instructions, maintaining attention, concentration and pace, getting along with people, using his judgment, responding to changes in the workplace.
Id. at 88. The expert replied: “Okay. I would say that ... those factors would preclude competitive employment and the only one that really would be that significant I think would be [that he] often found difficulty with concentration and [failed] to complete tasks in a timely manner.” Id. (emphasis added).
On the basis of the expert’s testimony and the findings of Dr. Domingo, a psychiatrist called upon by the Secretary to examine Chamberlain, the ALJ had no alternative but to find that Chamberlain was disabled. Dr. Domingo found that Chamberlain was mildly depressed, had difficulty concentrating, was alcohol dependent, had a probable low I.Q., and had a history of back injury with chronic pain. He concluded as follows:
I don’t think he can concentrate too well in any kind of work because of his alcoholism, depression and chronic pain. Because of the above conditions, it would limit his activities in carrying out instructions, maintaining attention, concentration, pace, getting along with people, his judgment, responding to changes in the workplace and I don’t think his concentration is good enough to remember and understand instructions, procedures and locations from timé to time.
Id. at 250.
Ostensibly to avoid the impact of Dr. Domingo’s potent testimony, the ALJ concluded that the doctor’s testimony was based on misleading and incomplete information. I cannot agree with this finding, just as I cannot agree with a great deal of the ALJ’s reasoning and conclusions in this case.
First, Dr. Domingo was selected by the Secretary, not Chamberlain. Having selected Dr. Domingo, the Secretary (and the ALJ as well) must assume some responsibility for the doctor’s conclusions.
*1498Second, if the ALJ truly believed that Dr. Domingo had not been given accurate information or was incapable of separating true claims from spurious ones, the ALJ had the option of furnishing Chamberlain’s complete medical and work records to Dr. Domingo and asking him to reconsider his opinion. The ALJ failed to do so, opting instead to blind side not only the claimant but the doctor as well.
Third, not satisfied "with Dr. Domingo’s report, the ALJ sent Chamberlain’s so-called “file” to another psychiatrist, Dr. Morrison, along with three pages of interrogatories. The record does not reveal what was in the file. Thus neither the majority nor I know what Dr. Morrison received. All we know is that Dr. Morrison never saw the claimant and never visited with him. Moreover, the only question posed to Dr. Morrison to which a substantive response was given was inconclusive. The ALJ asked him: “Based on your review of the exhibits enclosed, does the claimant’s condition meet the medical criteria of any specific listed impairment set out in section 12.00, et seq., of the Listing of Impairments?” Dr. Morrison answered, “No,” and offered the following explanation:
Although [Chamberlain] is reported to have mild depression, this does not seem to be major. He has a history of alcohol abuse but is reported to be astaining [sic] from alcohol currently, & there is no evidence of organic brain syndrome [due] to alcohol abuse. The psychiatric examiner is concerned about his concentration, based on poor serial subtractions, but in view of his subnormal intelligence & limited education, this is not a reliable test of concentration.
Id. at 292. Dr. Morrison’s answers hardly helped resolve whether Chamberlain is able to perform the light work identified by the vocational expert. At most, they indicate that Chamberlain does not meet the conditions of a specific listed impairment. The answers in no way refute Dr. Domingo’s conclusions that Chamberlain’s multiple disabilities preclude his performing work in the local or national economies.
Fourth, Dr. Elmendorf, Chamberlain’s treating physician, reported that Chamberlain’s chronic back condition necessitated the use of anti-inflammatory agents that caused a peptic ulcer; that he has hypertension; and that he has decreased range of motion in the lumbar spine, which makes it impossible for him to perform jobs that require any degree of bending or stooping. Id. at 288. Dr. Elmendorf further reported that Chamberlain cannot tolerate sitting or standing for more than half an hour without pain and that there currently is no surgical treatment for his condition. In his opinion, Chamberlain was “totally disabled.” Id. The ALJ rejected the doctor’s conclusion because, according to him, the report was not fully documented. The simple remedy for this deficiency would have been to request whatever additional information the ALJ felt was appropriate.
Fifth, Dr. Lee, who examined Chamberlain at the request of the ALJ in June 1992, diagnosed his condition as “1. Residual Back Pain Secondary Due to Herniated Disc, Treated by Two Lumbar Laminectomiesf,] and 2. Arthralgia, Multiple Joints, Etiology Unknown.” Id. at 278. He found that Chamberlain also had a stomach ulcer and a history of asthma, alcohol abuse, and depression. Id. at 277-78. Dr. Lee drew no conclusion as to whether, in light of claimant’s multiple disabilities, he was disabled.
Sixth, Dr. Warner, a state agency psychologist who offered his opinion of Chamberlain in October 1991, found that Chamberlain was mildly depressed with alcohol dependency; had an adjustment disorder; and appeared to function in at least a normal to dull normal range. Consistent with Dr. Domingo’s findings, he additionally found that Chamberlain would have moderate limitations in his ability to remember, understand, perform detailed instructions, and maintain his attention and concentration — findings that appear to have been altogether ignored by the ALJ. Id. at 254-55.
Seventh, Dr. Mokhtar, who examined Chamberlain at the request of the State of Iowa, found that he had asthma, hypertension, ulcers, depression, and chronic cervical and lumbar strain. He recommended that Chamberlain avoid stooping, climbing, kneeling and crawling. Id. at 234. Again, no conclusion was made as to whether Chamberlain is capable of doing light work — work that requires some stooping — which the voca*1499tional expert testified he is capable of performing.
Eighth, the ALJ questioned Chamberlain’s credibility based on Chamberlain’s uncertainty about his birthdate. Chamberlain testified at the administrative hearing that he had been “lied to so many times” about his birth-date that he could not say for certain when he was born. Given claimants’ often disjointed family histories, I am less astonished than the ALJ that a claimant might be unable to articulate precisely what his birthdate is. In any event, I do not see how a claimant’s inability to articulate exactly when he was born is any reason to seriously question his credibility.
Last and perhaps most significantly, the ALJ questioned Chamberlain’s credibility based on an alleged telephone call made in March 1992 to a local social security office by one of Chamberlain’s “relatives,” without ever verifying the phone call. The relative stated that Chamberlain “was going around asking people to sign papers saying they go into his home to help him out with things ... he couldn’t do for himself,” in an apparent attempt to bolster his disability claim. Id. at 42. The caller reportedly was asked by Chamberlain to sign a statement acknowledging Chamberlain’s inability to do things for himself, but refused. In response to Chamberlain’s attorney’s bewilderment about the alleged hoax and Chamberlain’s failure to apprise him of it, the ALJ sardonically responded, “Why, indeed? This claimant, contrary to the curious assertion by his attorney, is not mentally deficient. He is well aware such statements might bolster his claim.” Id.
If Chamberlain, in fact, solicited false testimony of his relatives to bolster his claim, I would disallow his claim for that reason alone. The ALJ, however, took no steps to verify the accuracy of the report but chose instead to discredit Chamberlain through double, unverified hearsay.
Were it not for the allegation that Chamberlain solicited false testimony, I would promptly remand the case to the Secretary with directions to award benefits to Chamberlain. Dr. Domingo’s testimony is largely unrefuted and, along with the vocational expert’s testimony, clearly calls for an award of benefits to Chamberlain. The record, however, is clouded by the unverified and unproven allegation that Chamberlain bolstered his claim by soliciting false statements. In spite of my firm conviction that Chamberlain is not capable of performing any work in the local or national economies, until this allegation is properly investigated, it would be precipitous to award benefits. I therefore would remand to the Secretary with directions to reassign the ease to an ALJ other than Thomas A. Donahue with directions to rehear the case in its entirety and to make new findings. On remand the new ALJ would be required to determine the truth or falsity of the alleged telephone call by Chamberlain’s relative. In no other way can the integrity of the social security process be guaranteed and justice be realized for both the claimant and the government.

. See Record at 178, 196-98, 218, 220, 226-28.