We represent a 55 year old police officer from Spring Gardens with metastatic multiple myeloma. We immediately submitted proof that the claimant’s medical condition met the listed criteria of 13.07(A), and sought expedited review of the Social Security Disability (“SSD”) application. Nonetheless, the State agency doctors denied the application twice.
It took nearly two years before the claimant received a hearing. To matters even worse, Social Security transferred the hearing from Queens to Manhattan. As a result, the claimant was deprived of an in-person hearing because due to his medical condition he could not travel the distance.
At the hearing, the Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) threatened that if the claimant refused to accept an amended onset date (“AOD”), the ALJ would schedule another hearing with a medical expert (“ME”), and the ALJ said it was unlikely that the ME would find the claimant still met a listing. The ALJ then directed me to discuss the AOD with the claimant in private.
The claimant said he could not afford to wait for another hearing. When the ALJ returned, I pointed out how the evidence supported the AOD, such as his leg bone snapping in half from simply standing on it. Nonetheless, the ALJ gave the claimant a take it or leave it ultimatum, which I said the claimant had to accept.
When I proceeded to explain that the ALJ was doing the claimant a disservice, the ALJ insisted that he doubted there was any basis to support the claimant currently being disabled. The ALJ then proceeded to question the claimant, and was shocked to learn that the claimant’s cancer was not in remission, had metastasized, and had to leave his home in 10 minutes to get chemotherapy. The ALJ sheepishly expressed his sorrow.
The ALJ approved the claimant’s SSD benefits with the AOD today, close to two years after the application was filed. There was absolutely no justification for the delay, or the ALJ’s threat to further the delays by scheduling another hearing.Inexcusable SSD Delay
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