Katagiri v. Matson Terminals, Inc.
| Decision Date | 13 January 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 18-72398,18-72398 |
| Parties | ROBERT KATAGIRI, Petitioner, v. MATSON TERMINALS, INC.; SIGNAL MUTUAL INDEMNITY ASSOCIATION; DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WORKERS' COMPENSATION PROGRAMS, Respondents. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
MEMORANDUM*On Petition for Review of an Order of the Benefits Review Board
Submitted January 9, 2020** San Francisco, California
Before: WALLACE and FRIEDLAND, Circuit Judges, and LASNIK,*** District Judge.
Robert Katagiri petitions for review of a Benefits Review Board (Board)decision affirming an administrative law judge's (ALJ) denial of his request for a permanent disability award. We have jurisdiction under 33 U.S.C. § 921(c), and we deny the petition.
Robert Katagiri was working for Matson Terminals, Inc. (Matson) on April 16, 2012, when he injured the prosthesis in his right knee while exiting from a motor vehicle.1 As a result, Katagiri underwent knee surgery on April 20th and took leave from work until July 29, 2012.
Katagiri filed a benefits claim under the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act (Longshore Act), 33 U.S.C. §§ 901, et seq., against Matson and its group self-insurer, Signal Mutual Indemnity Association Ltd (Signal).2 On December 10, 2015, an administrative law judge (ALJ) determined that Katagiri's injury was work-related, awarded Katagiri temporary total disability benefits for the 102 days he was off from work, and ordered Matson to pay certain medical bills. The ALJ did not award any permanent disability benefits because Katagiri had "not shown he [was] entitled to permanent disability benefits, nor ha[d] he requested them." On December 22, 2015, Matson filed a Notice of Final Payment indicating compensation pursuant to the ALJ's order was complete the previous day. Thispayment did not include medical bills that Matson ultimately paid to a third-party insurance collector after receiving an August 28, 2017 medical invoice from Katagiri.
On February 8, 2017, Katagiri filed a request for permanent disability award (Request), in which he requested permanent partial disability benefits based on a 75-percent permanent impairment to his right lower extremity. Pursuant to Matson's motion for a summary decision, the ALJ denied the Request as an untimely attempt to modify the December 2015 award under 33 U.S.C § 922. Katagiri then filed a motion for reconsideration, which the ALJ denied. Finally, Katagiri appealed to the Board, which affirmed the ALJ's conclusion that Katagiri's Request was untimely.
The sole question before us is whether the Board incorrectly determined that Katagiri's Request was untimely as a matter of law.3 Reviewing the Board's legal conclusion de novo, Iopa v. Saltchuk-Young Bros., Ltd., 916 F.3d 1298, 1300 (9th Cir. 2019), we conclude that it did not.
Section 922 of the Longshore Act "provides the only way to modify an award once it has issued" and "provides for modification of awards 'on the ground of a change in conditions or because of a mistake in a determination of fact.'" Metro. Stevedore Co. v. Rambo, 515 U.S. 291, 294 (1995), quoting 33 U.S.C. § 922. Inrelevant part, Section 922 permits the deputy commissioner, upon an application by a party or sua sponte, at "any time prior to one year after the date of the last payment of compensation" to "terminate, continue, reinstate, increase, or decrease such compensation, or award compensation." 33 U.S.C § 922.
An examination of Katagiri's Request reveals that it reflects an attempt to modify the December 10, 2015 order so as to "increase" the award. The vast majority of the Request merely quotes the ALJ's December 10, 2015 order, in which the ALJ awarded Katagiri temporary total disability benefits, but declined to award permanent disability benefits because Katagiri had "not shown he [was] entitled to permanent disability benefits, nor ha[d] he requested them." The remainder of the Request attaches additional evidence of Katagiri's physical condition and asks for a rating necessary to increase his award to include a permanent partial disability benefit. Cf. 33 U.S.C. § 922 ().
Because Matson completed its last payment to Katagiri on December 21, 2015, and Katagiri's Request was filed in February 2017, the Request constitutes an attempt to modify filed more than "one year after the date of the last payment of compensation," 33 U.S.C. § 922, and is thus time-barred.
Katagiri attempts to avoid this outcome by arguing that his Request is instead a new claim based on the purported fact that "his continued employment hadaggravated his knee." Quite simply, this is untrue: neither the Request nor the attached medical report indicate his requested 75% permanent disability rating is the result of his continued employment.
Katagiri argues, in the alternative, that his Request was a timely modification application under 33 U.S.C. § 922 because it was "made within one year of the last payment of compensation." In order to arrive at this conclusion, Katagiri asserts that Matson's payment to a third-party insurance collector to settle medical bills reflected in an August 28, 2017 invoice is the "last payment of compensation." Even assuming a payment for Katagiri's medical bills following the Request could retroactively make the Request timely, Katagiri's argument fails because the phrase "payment of compensation" in the context of § 922 does not extend to the payment of medical bills to a third-party insurance collector.
In Marshall v. Pletz, the Supreme Court rejected a similar argument regarding this phrase in a similar section of the Longshore Act. 317 U.S. 383, 390 (1943). In Pletz, the Supreme Court held that "the 'payment of compensation' mentioned in" 33 U.S.C. § 913(a) did not include "medical aid" and instead referred only "to the periodic money payments to be made to the employe[e]." Id. at 390-91. Sections 913 and 922 not only use the same phrase in the context of similar language, but they also serve the same purpose of establishing statutes of limitation for pursuing compensation claims under the Act. See 33 U.S.C. § 913(a) (). Similar logic applies here: Matson's payments to the third-party insurance collector do not constitute "payment of compensation" under Section 922 and thus do not extend the limitations period.
Based on a review of other provisions of the Longshore Act, the Fourth Circuit has similarly concluded that "the term 'compensation' in 33 U.S.C. § 922 does not include voluntary payments by an employer for medical services provided to an employee" and thus "payments of such services do not extend the Section [9]22 limitations period." See Wheeler v. Newport News Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co., 637 F.3d 280, 291 (4th Cir. 2011). The Fourth Circuit reasoned that, although Pletz was not "controllin...
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