Michele Z. v. Kijakazi
- Katherine Menendez
- 0:21-cv-00661
- U.S. District Court · District of Minnesota
- 2
In Michele Z. v. Kijakazi, Judge Menendez partly granted both summary-judgment motions, vacated the step-four finding, and remanded for further proceedings.
Michele Z. and the Commissioner; the case returns to the Commissioner for further proceedings, and the administrative law judge’s step-four finding concerning past work as “cashier II” is vacated.
What happened
In Michele Z. v. Kijakazi, the court reviewed a magistrate judge’s recommendation because no party objected to it. Without objections, the court looked for clear error.
The court adopted the recommendation, partly granted and partly denied both Michele Z.’s and the Commissioner’s motions for summary judgment, and vacated the finding that Michele Z. could perform past work as a “cashier II.”
Judge Katherine M. Menendez remanded the case to the Commissioner under the sentence-four provision of the Social Security Act for further proceedings consistent with the recommendation’s findings and conclusions.
The detailed version
- Michele Z. v. Kijakazi · No. 0:21-cv-00661
- Katherine Menendez
- Sept. 26, 2022
Background
The court considered a Report and Recommendation from United States Magistrate Judge Tony N. Leung. No objections were filed. Because there were no objections, the court reviewed the recommendation for clear error rather than conducting a full review of disputed issues.
Rulings
The court determined that the magistrate judge had committed no error, clear or otherwise, and adopted the Report and Recommendation.
The court ruled on both pending summary-judgment motions as follows:
- Michele Z.’s motion for summary judgment was granted in part and denied in part. - The Commissioner’s motion for summary judgment was granted in part and denied in part.
The court vacated the administrative law judge’s determination that Michele Z. was capable of performing past relevant work as “cashier II,” specifically as to step four of the disability analysis.
Disposition
The court remanded the matter to the Commissioner under sentence four of 42 U.S.C. § 405(g), which permits a federal court to send a Social Security case back to the Commissioner for further proceedings after identifying error in the agency’s decision. The further proceedings must be consistent with the findings and conclusions in the Report and Recommendation. The order directed that judgment be entered accordingly.
Read the full 2-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.