Iannuzzelli v. Ribicoff, Civ. A. No. 28497.
| Decision Date | 27 September 1961 |
| Docket Number | Civ. A. No. 28497. |
| Citation | 197 F. Supp. 506 |
| Parties | William IANNUZZELLI v. Abraham A. RIBICOFF, Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania |
DeMarco & Battaglini, by James J. DeMarco, Philadelphia, Pa., for plaintiff.
Joseph S. Lord, III, U. S. Atty., by Sullivan Cistone, Asst. U. S. Atty., Philadelphia, Pa., for defendant.
This is another case in which the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare determined that the plaintiff had failed to prove that he was unable to engage in any substantial gainful activity, within the meaning of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C.A. § 301 et seq. Our duty is to review the evidence before the administrator and determine whether this conclusion is supported by substantial evidence.
At a hearing conducted before an examiner, the plaintiff and one of his friends testified as to the plaintiff's physical condition and as to the plaintiff's difficulty in finding employment. This testimony, together with the medical exhibits, presented the following undisputed facts.
The plaintiff is now 67 years old. He reached only the 6th grade in school. At the pertinent times involved herein, he had (and still has) these physical infirmities: an artificial eye; a useless finger on his right hand; and a painful leg, which requires him to walk with a cane. These are his overt disabilities. In addition, the medical evidence shows that he has Paget's disease, a slowly-progressing disintegration of the hip bones; a malformed vertebra; a renal calculus (kidney stone);1 and "sciatica."
The plaintiff told how much his leg pained him, and how he had to use a cane. He also described how he had tried to obtain employment doing anything at all, but was rejected because of the cane. He had been hospitalized and put in traction for this condition, and it was diagnosed at that time as "sciatica." The Appeals Council's evaluation of this evidence consisted of an observation that there was no evidence that the use of a cane had been medically prescribed. The Council further stated that although it recognized plaintiff's difficulty in securing employment because of his age and lack of education and skill, nevertheless the Social Security Act precluded the consideration by the Council of this situation in their determination of whether plaintiff had proved himself unable to engage in any substantial gainful activity.
It is noteworthy that the hearing examiner and the ...
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Zierler v. Ribicoff
...evidence before the administrator and determine whether this conclusion is supported by substantial evidence," Iannuzzelli v. Ribicoff, D.C.E.D.Pa.1961, 197 F.Supp. 506, 42 U.S.C.A. § While there is no dispute over the fact that plaintiff was injured in November of 1955 and that he was rece......