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Topical ADA Archive

Workers' Compensation/Social Security

• Blanton v. Inco Alloys Intl., (CA 6), 7 AD Cases 1475, 8/22/1997
  
  Summary: Receipt of disability benefits does not preclude subsequent ADA relief, but parties' prior sworn statements can be considered as a material factor.
  
  
• Cleveland v. Policy Management Systems, (CA 5), 7 AD Cases 1031, 8/14/1997
  
  Summary: Former employee continuously and unequivocally represented to the Social Security Administration that she was totally disabled and completely unable to work. Application for or receipt of Social Security disability benefits creates a rebuttable presumption that the claimant or recipient of such benefits is judicially estopped from asserting that he is "qualified individual with a disability'' under ADA. Therefore, because former employee did not rebut the presumption that she is estopped from asserting that she is "qualified individual with a disability,'' she cannot complain that she could perform the essential functions of her job during the time between her return to work and her termination.
  
  
• Cleveland v. Policy Management Systems Corp., (US Sup Ct) (BNA cite not yet available), 5/24/1999
  
  Summary: Despite the appearance of conflict between the SSDI program (which provides benefits to a person with a disability so severe that she is unable to do her previous work or any other kind of substantial gainful work) and the ADA (which prohibits covered employers from discriminating against a disabled person who can perform the essential functions of her job, including those who can do so only with reasonable accommodation), the two claims do not inherently conflict to the point where courts should apply a special negative presumption such as the one applied below. There are many situations in which an SSDI claim and an ADA claim can comfortably exist side by side. For example, since the Social Security Administration (SSA) does not take into account the possibility of "reasonable accommodation" in determining SSDI eligibility, an ADA plaintiff's claim that she can perform her job with reasonable accommodation may well prove consistent with an SSDI claim that she could not perform her own job (or other jobs) without it. An individual might qualify for SSDI under SSA's administrative rules and yet, due to special individual circumstances, be capable of performing the essential functions of her job. Or her condition might have changed over time, so that a statement about her disability made at the time of her application for SSDI benefits does not reflect her capacities at the time of the relevant employment decision. Thus, this Court would not apply a special legal presumption permitting someone who has applied for, or received, SSDI benefits to bring an ADA suit only in some limited and highly unusual set of circumstances.

  Nonetheless, in some cases an earlier SSDI claim may turn out genuinely to conflict with an ADA claim. An ADA plaintiff's sworn assertion in an application for disability benefits that she is unable to work appears to negate the essential element of her ADA claim that she can perform the essential functions of her job, and a court should require an explanation of this apparent inconsistency. To defeat summary judgment, that explanation must be sufficient to warrant a reasonable juror's concluding that, assuming the truth of, or the plaintiff's good faith belief in, the earlier statement, the plaintiff could nonetheless perform the essential functions of her job, with or without reasonable accommodation.
  
  Here, the parties should have the opportunity in the trial court to present, or to contest, Cleveland's explanations for the discrepancy between her SSDI statements and her ADA claim, which include that the SSDI statements that she was totally disabled were made in a forum that does not consider the effect that reasonable workplace accommodation would have on her ability to work and that those statements were reliable at the time they were made.

• Fredenburg v. Contra Costa DHS, (CA 9), 9 AD Cases 385, 4/19/1999
  
  Summary: Mental health treatment specialist who suffered from paranoia may assert that she is able to perform essential functions of job, despite her sworn statement to state employment agency that she was disabled, since it is possible to be disabled under ADA and eligible for state benefits at same time. Prior inconsistent statement can still be used to impeach credibility at trial. Because she had been placed on unpaid leave against her will it would be unfair to prohibit her from opportunity to support herself by collecting state benefits pending disability determination.
  

• Griffith v. Wal-Mart Stores, (CA 6), 7 AD Cases 1233, 1/29/1998
  
  Summary: Former employee's admissions regarding his disability that he made in his Social Security disability benefits application do not bar his ADA action, where he may not have fair opportunity to explain details of his medical condition and his ability or inability to work for ADA purposes. Statements made in application and forms are open to interpretation and context in which statements were made must be considered in determining precisely what he "admitted.'' Portions of application and other forms require merely that boxes be checked off without comment or that blanks be filled in with little room given for elaboration.
  
  
• Johnson v. State of Oregon, (CA 9), 8 AD Cases 283, 4/20/1998
  
  Summary: Neither application for nor receipt of disability benefits automatically bars claimant from establishing that she is a qualified person with disability under the ADA. An individual may be disabled and therefore entitled to disability benefits so long as she is not working--and still be qualified individual under ADA because she can work with reasonable accommodations, if her employer will provide them.
  
  
• Moore v. Payless Shoe, Inc., (CA 8), 7 AD Cases 1697, 3/30/1998
  
  Summary: ADA claimant may not cast aside factual import of prior sworn representations to Social Security Administration (SSA), even though judicial estoppel may not be invoked to bar ADA claims; claimant is estopped to deny truth of ongoing sworn statements made in SSA disability proceeding but may attempt to prove that he is nonetheless "qualified individual with a disability'' for ADA purposes.
  
  
• Pena v. Houston Lighting & Power Company, (CA 5) 8 AD Cases 961, 9/21/1998
  
  Summary: Employee who represented in his applications for long-term disability (LTD) benefits and mortgage disability benefits that he is "totally disabled'' has not overcome rebuttable presumption that he is not qualified individual with disability under ADA. LTD plan's definition of "totally disabled'' tracks ADA's "qualified individual with a disability'' language in that it states that claimant is totally disabled if "the Participant is wholly and continually disabled by sickness or accidental bodily injury which prevents him/her from performing, with or without reasonable accommodation, the essential functions of his/her normal occupation.'' This definition was included both in application that he filled out and in award letter that he received, and because he specifically represented that he could not perform his job with or without reasonable accommodation, he thus cannot show that he is "qualified individual'' under ADA.
  
  
• Rascon v. U. S. West Communications, (CA 10), 8 AD Cases 541, 5/6/1998
  
  Summary: Statement that former employee made in connection with his application for Social Security disability benefits that he did not plan ever to return to work does not preclude finding that he was a qualified individual with disability under ADA. There is no evidence that former employee indicated that he could not perform the essential functions of his job with reasonable accommodation. There is evidence that he wanted and expected to return to his job after completing a treatment program, and his doctor testified that he would have been able to return to his job had the employer not terminated him.
  
  
• Talavera v. School Bd. Of Palm Beach Cty., (CA 11), 7 AD Cases 1025, 11/24/1997
  
  Summary: Certification of total disability on Social Security disability benefits application is not inherently inconsistent with being "qualified individual with a disability'' under ADA. The certification means that the applicant cannot perform the essential functions of the job without reasonable accommodation but does not necessarily mean that he cannot perform essential functions with reasonable accommodation.