From WYMT:
Family members of two people who killed themselves after receiving letters from the Social Security Administration indicating their federal disability benefits were suspended are suing the agency. ...
The SSA in 2015 ordered nearly 1,800 people to attend hearings to determine whether they should continue receiving disability checks. ...
The people being forced to undergo hearings are former clients of Floyd County lawyer Eric C. Conn.
Congressional investigators suspect Conn used fraudulent information to secure the benefits.
Conn has not been charged and has denied any wrongdoing.
14 comments:
what lawyer in their right mind would bring these suits? This is ridiculous.
SSA did not afford due process to these folks, initially telling them they had 10 days to send in new medical evidence (extremely few doctors' offices would comply so quickly). Then SSA allowed 30 days, which is still not enough time to get evidence. SSA was going to cut off disability benefits before re-adjudicating the claims. All this, despite knowing these folks did nothing wrong themselves and are vulnerable (mostly poor, uneducated, no other source of income). SSA has blood on its hands.
Completely agree with 9:13. Yes, unfortunately all of Conn's cases are questionable now, but that is not an excuse to cut off the only means of support most of these people have.
If you purchase stolen goods, even though you didn't know they were stolen, you still have to forfeit the goods, it is unfortunate but reality.
Has anyone been criminally charged in this matter? I believe the ALJ gave up his law license but I'm not sure. As far as I know the attorney still has a law license. Have the doctors faced any consequences?
It seems that everyone in this matter gets a presumption of innocense except the claimants!
The fact that Eric Conn has not been disciplined by the Kentucky Supreme Court, or sanctioned by the agency, makes me think he has dirt on a lot of people within the agency and in Kentucky politics. Appalachian politics are some of the most corrupt in the nation.
Why should any of these claimants pay back anything or go through any process when it wasn't them that perpetrated the fraud? It doesn't mean they aren't deserving of the claims. If the fraudster ERIC CONN hasn't suffered any consequences, then why should innocent folks who had nothing to do with the fraud? This is typical Orwellian speak/action. The innocent suffer while the perpetrators are treated like the innocents and go free. Nothing about this case makes sense.
7:11, because they received the benefits that they were not entitled too?? It is their duty to prove they are disabled through Step 4. Since their benefits were based on fraud and I am not buying that they were innocent lambs that knew not. Why do you think so many went to Conn in the first place? They knew they could get paid even if not disabled. Quit assuming everyone but the Agency employees are little Angels and so innocent...
8:38, if you ever represented claimants, you would know their involvement in just about any aspect of developing the case is usually pretty minimal. They went to Conn because he had the dumbest ads, which appears to be effective n getting clients for some reasons (ever see a B&B ad?)
That said, tying this to the agency is probably a step too far. I do hope that SSA joins Conn and Daughtery as parties, as causation seems a step closed with these two and they might finally see some reprecussions form their fraudulent behavior.
Disability benefits however received are not the same as stolen goods. The individuals who committed suicide faced one of the largest bureaucracies in the world, one that was demanding evidence and action in an impossible manner. Their lives were endangered and the agency indeed has blood on its hands. It went after these folks for political cover, disregarded due process and continues to pursue an unfair and unworkable course. This is adversarial and the agency should have heads fall. There has been absolutely no leadership in this fiasco which is the most shameful chapter in agency history since Reagan purged the rolls.
Why didn't the agency penalize the SSA management employees involved in the Huntington scam? As an obvious example, the manager who colluded with Conn's firm to undermine a whistleblower - isn't that manager still working for SSA? What about the chief judge and deputy commissioner who gave monetary awards for high productivity to the Huntington office while it was paying Conn's cases? Where's the accountability THERE?
SSA management at every level is adept at shifting focus away from its own culpability by blaming the minions below them or blaming the claimants - picking the weakest targets on which to focus blame and shifting attention away from where it really belongs. Management will never honorably own up to its mistakes -- that's why the agency never gets better. There's an an institutional pathology that prevents innovation and is driven by dynamics of power and fear.
The decision to suspend benefits for these claimants was the worst management decision and misstep (quickly reversed) so far in this terrible saga. That decision was undoubtedly made at the highest level with the Acting Commissioner's approval. At the end of the day, some of the claimants will be found disabled and some not, but all of this could have been done right the first time, several years ago. What a waste.
At 1:11, management does not eat their own, never has and never will.
The question bears repeating again and again: why not more direct more investigation, publicity, and penalties against the SSA ALJ, HOD, and other management officials who colluded with Conn directly and indirectly (through the awards system)? Or does targeting poor "nobodies" living off disability checks in rural Kentucky make SSA management, Congressmen, and taxpayers sleep better at night?
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