United States District Court, E.D. California
GEORGE P. CHILDS, Plaintiff,
v.
COMMISSIONER OF SOCIAL SECURITY, Defendant.
ORDER
KENDALL J. NEWMAN UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE.
Plaintiff
seeks judicial review of a final decision by the Commissioner
of Social Security (“Commissioner”) determining
that plaintiff did not continue to be disabled for purposes
of receiving Disability Insurance Benefits
(“DIB”) and Supplemental Security Income
(“SSI”) under Titles II and XVI, respectively, of
the Social Security Act (“Act”).[1] In his motion for
summary judgment, plaintiff principally contends that the
Commissioner erred by finding that plaintiff’s
disability ceased as of March 2012. (ECF No. 14.) The
Commissioner opposed plaintiff’s motion and filed a
cross-motion for summary judgment. (ECF No. 15.) No optional
reply brief was filed.
For the
reasons that follow, the court DENIES plaintiff’s
motion for summary judgment, GRANTS the Commissioner’s
cross-motion for summary judgment, and AFFIRMS the final
decision of the Commissioner.
I.
BACKGROUND
Plaintiff
was born on November 20, 1965, has completed at least two
years of college, can read and write in English, and
previously worked as a customer service representative and a
pressroom assistant. (Administrative Transcript
(“AT”) 50-54, 101, 256, 262.)[2] In a previous
decision dated March 22, 2007, plaintiff was found disabled
as of February 1, 2007. (AT 25.) However, in the course of a
subsequent continuing disability review, the Commissioner
determined that plaintiff was no longer disabled as of March
2012. (Id.) That determination was upheld upon
reconsideration after a hearing before a disability hearing
officer on November 5, 2012. (AT 120-49.) Thereafter,
plaintiff requested a hearing before an administrative law
judge (“ALJ”), which took place on March 11,
2013, and at which plaintiff, represented by an attorney,
testified. (AT 80-100.) A supplemental hearing was also held
on July 2, 2013, at which plaintiff was again represented by
counsel, and in the course of which the ALJ heard testimony
from a medical expert, a mental health expert, and a
vocational expert (“VE”). (AT 45-79.)
In a
decision dated August 12, 2013, the ALJ determined that
plaintiff’s disability had ceased as of March 2012. (AT
25-41.) The ALJ’s decision became the final decision of
the Commissioner when the Appeals Council denied
plaintiff’s request for review on January 12, 2015. (AT
1-6.) Plaintiff then filed this action in federal district
court on March 12, 2015, to obtain judicial review of the
Commissioner’s final decision. (ECF No. 1.)
II.
ISSUES PRESENTED
On
appeal, plaintiff raises the sole issue of whether the ALJ
improperly discounted plaintiff’s own testimony
concerning his symptoms and functional limitations
attributable to his impairments.
III.
LEGAL STANDARD
The
court reviews the Commissioner’s decision to determine
whether (1) it is based on proper legal standards pursuant to
42 U.S.C. § 405(g), and (2) substantial evidence in the
record as a whole supports it. Tackett v. Apfel, 180
F.3d 1094, 1097 (9th Cir. 1999). Substantial evidence is more
than a mere scintilla, but less than a preponderance.
Connett v. Barnhart, 340 F.3d 871, 873 (9th Cir.
2003) (citation omitted). It means “such relevant
evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to
support a conclusion.” Orn v. Astrue, 495 F.3d
625, 630 (9th Cir. 2007), quoting Burch v. Barnhart,
400 F.3d 676, 679 (9th Cir. 2005). “The ALJ is
responsible for determining credibility, resolving conflicts
in medical testimony, and resolving ambiguities.”
Edlund v. Massanari, 253 F.3d 1152, 1156 (9th Cir.
2001) (citation omitted). “The court will uphold the
ALJ’s conclusion when the evidence is susceptible to
more than one rational interpretation.” Tommasetti
v. Astrue, 533 F.3d 1035, 1038 (9th Cir. 2008).
IV.
DISCUSSION
“A
Social Security disability benefits claimant is no longer
entitled to benefits when substantial evidence demonstrates
(1) there has been any medical improvement in the
claimant’s impairment and (2) the claimant is now able
to engage in substantial gainful activity.” Attmore
v. Colvin, 2016 WL 3563596, at *1 (9th Cir. Jun. 30,
2016) (citation and punctuation marks omitted). As the Ninth
Circuit Court of Appeals explained:
Medical improvement is defined as any decrease in the medical
severity of a recipient’s impairment, and requires a
comparison of prior and current medical evidence which must
show that there have been changes (improvement) in the
symptoms, signs or laboratory findings associated with that
impairment(s). The Commissioner’s regulations prescribe
a specific baseline for this comparison: an ALJ must compare
the medical severity of the impairment(s) present at the time
of the most recent favorable medical decision-that is, when
the claimant was last found disabled or continued to be
disabled-to the medical severity of that impairment(s) at the
time of the comparison.
Making this comparison is straightforward in ordinary
termination cases where the ALJ finds a claimant is disabled
(or continues to be disabled) in one decision and, in a later
decision, finds the claimant has medically improved. In those
cases, the most recent favorable medical decision is an
earlier decision, and the severity of the claimant’s
...