Filed: Apr. 02, 2020
Latest Update: Apr. 02, 2020
Summary: NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT _ No. 19-3244 _ JEANANGELA MICHELE CURRIER, Appellant v. COMMISSIONER SOCIAL SECURITY _ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (D.C. Civil Action No. 2-17-cv-05158) District Judge: Honorable Timothy J. Savage _ Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a) March 20, 2020 Before: KRAUSE, MATEY, and COWEN, Circuit Judges (Opinion filed: April 2, 2020) _ OPINION* _ * This dispos
Summary: NOT PRECEDENTIAL UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT _ No. 19-3244 _ JEANANGELA MICHELE CURRIER, Appellant v. COMMISSIONER SOCIAL SECURITY _ On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (D.C. Civil Action No. 2-17-cv-05158) District Judge: Honorable Timothy J. Savage _ Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a) March 20, 2020 Before: KRAUSE, MATEY, and COWEN, Circuit Judges (Opinion filed: April 2, 2020) _ OPINION* _ * This disposi..
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NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
___________
No. 19-3244
__________
JEANANGELA MICHELE CURRIER,
Appellant
v.
COMMISSIONER SOCIAL SECURITY
____________________________________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. Civil Action No. 2-17-cv-05158)
District Judge: Honorable Timothy J. Savage
____________________________________
Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
March 20, 2020
Before: KRAUSE, MATEY, and COWEN, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed: April 2, 2020)
___________
OPINION*
___________
*
This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.
PER CURIAM
Jeanangela Currier appeals from an order of the United States District Court for
the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which denied her request for review of a decision of
the Social Security Administration. We will affirm the District Court’s judgment.
Currier applied for supplemental security income (“SSI”—disability benefits) in
2013, and for divorced widow’s benefits (“DWB”) in 2014. After a hearing before an
Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”), Currier’s case was assigned to another ALJ for
decision. Her claims were denied, as was her appeal to the Appeals Council.
Currier then filed a counseled request for review with the District Court. She
raised four issues: (1) the second ALJ erred in failing to hold a new hearing after the
matter was reassigned, as the first ALJ failed to hold a fair hearing; (2) the ALJ failed to
document the vocational expert’s (“VE”) qualifications before allowing the VE to testify;
(3) the ALJ failed to proffer and improperly relied on extra-record evidence; and (4) the
ALJ misinterpreted and mis-weighed the evidence. The Magistrate Judge rejected each
of Currier’s arguments, and the District Court adopted the Magistrate Judge’s
recommendation to deny Currier’s request for review of the agency decisions. Currier’s
attorney withdrew and Currier filed a timely, pro se notice of appeal. The parties inform
us that in the meantime, Currier was granted SSI benefits on a later application, with a
disability beginning on February 26, 2018.
We have jurisdiction to review the District Court’s decision under 28 U.S.C.
§ 1291, but we agree with the Government that Currier does not appear to be challenging
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that decision. Currier may have believed, based on a letter from her former attorney, that
she was required to file this appeal. She refers to the appeal as “superfluous” throughout
her brief.1 Currier does, however, appear to seek review of the agency’s denial of her
DWB claim. We could decline to reach the issue, as Currier did not raise a challenge to
that denial in the District Court. See Krysztoforski v. Chater,
55 F.3d 857, 860-61 (3d
Cir. 1995) (per curiam). But in any event, the challenge lacks merit. Currier’s DWB
claim required a showing that she was disabled on or before May 31, 2002, Dkt. #7-2 at
23 (R. 22), but the agency precluded her claim, as it had determined in a 2010 decision
that she was not disabled during that period,
id. at 22 (R. 21). Currier has not explained
why preclusion was not appropriate.
For all of these reasons, we will affirm the District Court’s judgment.
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In any event, we do not discern any error in the District Court’s decision. Although the
first ALJ may have displayed some intemperance in the hearing, we do not believe that
the ALJ’s behavior rose to the level of violating Currier’s due process rights to a full and
fair hearing. Cf. Ventura v. Shalala,
55 F.3d 900, 905 (3d Cir. 1995). As to the claims
that the first ALJ erred by failing to establish the VE’s credentials and the second ALJ
failed to provide a citation for her interpretation of a disability assessment score, we
agree with the District Court’s determination that Currier failed to establish that she was
prejudiced by any such failures. Report and Recommendation, Dkt. #15 at 22, 26-27.
Finally, we agree that the ALJ did not misinterpret or mis-weight the evidence, and that
her decision was supported by substantial evidence.
Id. at 27-38; see also Biestek v.
Berryhill,
139 S. Ct. 1148, 1153-54 (2019) (noting that court’s review of ALJ’s decision
is limited to whether it substantial evidence supports it and that “the threshold for such
evidentiary sufficiency is not high”).
3