Thursday, October 10, 2013

Disability Fraud Runs Deep and Wide
















SENATE

Widespread fraud reported in Social Security Administration's Disability Program

A two-year investigation by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations has found widespread fraud in the Social Security Administration's (SSA) Disability Program. It appears that disability payments have skyrocketed because the SSA's  attempt  to reduce the  back-log of disability cases has forced administrative law judges to hold hearings without reviewing the medical evidence in the case files, decide cases without holding hearings, and approve cases of claimants that are not disabled.

The fraud is so rampant, and disability cases have so proliferated in recent years, that the Social Security's Disability Trust Fund may run out of money in only 18 months, says Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., whose office undertook the investigation.
Coburn’s report on widespread fraud, released Monday, focuses in large part on a veritable "disability claim factory" allegedly  run by Attorney Eric C. Conn out of his small office in Stanville, Kentucky, a region of the country where 10 to 15 percent of the population  receives disability payments.
                                                          (Judge David Daugherty)

The report documents how Attorney Conn allegedly worked together with Social Security Administrative Law Judge David Daugherty (ALJ)  and a team of favored doctors with checkered pasts, including suspended licenses in other states, who rubber stamped approval of disability claims. In most cases, the claims had been prepared in advance with nearly identical language by staffers in Conn's law office.
The report found that over the past six years, Attorney Conn allegedly paid five doctors almost $2 million to provide favorable disability opinions for his claimants.
                                               (Attorney Eric. Conn)
In 2010, the last year for which records are available, Judge Daugherty approved 1375 disability cases prepared by Attorney Conn's office and denied only 4 of them - an approval  rate that other administrative law judges have described as nearly  impossible.
 The average disability-benefit approval rate among all administrative judges is about 60% of cases. But there are Daugherty equivalents dotted across the country. In the first half of fiscal 2011, 27 judges awarded benefits 95% of the time, not counting those who heard just a handful of cases. More than 100 awarded benefits to 90% or more of applicants, according to agency statistics.
Judge Daugherty, 75 years old, processed more cases than all but three judges in the U.S. He had a wry view of his less-generous peers. “Some of these judges act like it’s their own damn money we’re giving away,” Mr. Daugherty told a fellow Huntington judge, Algernon Tinsley, who worked in the same office until last year, Mr. Tinsley recalled.
Judge Daugherty was a standout in a judicial system that has lost its way, say numerous current and former judges. Judges say their jobs can be arduous, protecting the sometimes divergent interests of the applicant and the taxpayer.
 Some former judges and staff said one reason Judge Daugherty was allowed to continue processing so many cases was because he single-handedly helped the office hit its monthly goals. Staff members can win bonuses and promotions if these goals are surpassed as part of performance reviews.
Critics blame the Social Security Administration, which oversees the disability program, charging that it is more interested in clearing a giant backlog than ensuring deserving candidates get benefits. Under pressure to meet monthly goals, some judges decide cases without a hearing. Some rely on medical testimony provided by the claimant’s attorney.
The report found, "Judge Daugherty telephoned the Conn law firm each month and identified a list of Mr. Conn’s disability claimants to whom the judge planned to award benefits. Judge Daugherty also indicated, for each listed claimant, whether he needed a “physical” or “mental” opinion from a medical professional indicating the claimant was disabled."

Coburn's report found that, "over a four-year period from 2006 to 2010, the Social Security Administration paid Mr. Conn over $4.5 million in attorney fees." And that, "Mr. Conn was the third highest paid disability law firm in the country due to its receipt of over $3.9 million in attorney fees from the Social Security Administration."
The report says that when Senate staffers and the Social Security Administration’s Office of the Inspector General began an investigation based on tips from whistle blowers, Attorney Conn and Judge Daugherty began communicating with disposable, pre-paid cell phones. It also alleges they contracted with a local shredding company to destroy 13 tons of documents. Attorney Conn also allegedly destroyed all the computer hard drives in his office.
In 2011, the SSA placed Daugherty on administrative leave. He retired shortly after that.
Attorney Conn's legal fate is now in the hands of the Justice Department.
The alleged  fraud highlights an endemic problem in Social Security disability benefit awards. The Coburn report says a random examination of 300 case files by Congressional staff found more than a quarter of  the case files “failed to properly address insufficient, contradictory, or incomplete evidence,” suggesting a high rate of fraud or abuse.
Disability payments have skyrocketed across the U.S. in recent years. At the end of August 2013, more than 14 million Americans were receiving disability benefits The Social Security Administration has blamed aging baby boomers and the lingering effects of the recession as two causes, but another reason disability payments have skyrocketed appears to be  the SSA's  attempt  to reduce the  back-log of disability cases has forced judges to hold hearings without reviewing the medical evidence in the case file, decide cases without holding hearings, and approve cases of claimants that are not disabled.
That, in turn , has led to  less scrutiny of individual case files, which can be hundreds of pages long.
 Social Security Administration officials acknowledge they are trying to clear a backlog of 730,000 cases. But they say they remain focused on ensuring taxpayer money isn’t wasted. “We have an obligation to the people in need to provide them their benefits if they qualify, but we also have an obligation to the taxpayer not to give benefits to people who don’t qualify,” said the former SSA Commissioner Michael Astrue.

1 comment:

  1. Judge Daugherty paid 90+% of of his cases and processed 80 to 100 cases per month, mostly without holding hearings. When he held assembly-line hearings, they lasted no more than 15 minutes each. The Office numbers looked good to the Commissioner of Social Security. But the other ALJ who held 8 hearings a day of an hours duration each could only produce 20 decisions per month. He did not help to "pay down the backlog" and make the Office look good to the Commissioner; so, he was investigated and maybe brought up on charges for time and attendance violations. ALJ Daugherty was rewarded and the other ALJ was punished. That was what the Social Security System wanted and condoned and that is how the System worked until complaints from disgruntled staff members led to a Congressional Investigation. Judge Daugherty is not a 'Lone Ranger'. Other ALJs in other Hearing Offices are doing the same thing. They are paying down the backlog.

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