Gail Ann Cruz v. KILOLO KIJAKAZI, Acting Commissioner of Social Security

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
GAIL ANN CRUZ,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
KILOLO KIJAKAZI, Acting Commissioner
of Social Security,
Defendant-Appellee.
No. 20-16651
D.C. No. 2:19-cv-04460-JJT
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Arizona
John Joseph Tuchi, District Judge, Presiding
Submitted November 15, 2021**
Phoenix, Arizona
Before: CLIFTON, BRESS, and VANDYKE, Circuit Judges.
Gail Cruz appeals the district court’s order reversing the decision of the
Commissioner of the Social Security Administration and remanding for further
administrative proceedings before an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ). “We review
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
** The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
FILED
NOV 17 2021
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

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the district court’s decision to remand for further proceedings or to direct a payment
of benefits for an abuse of discretion.” Treichler v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec. Admin.,
775 F.3d 1090, 1098 (9th Cir. 2014). We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291
and affirm.
A district court “ordinarily must remand to the agency for further proceedings
before directing an award of benefits.” Leon v. Berryhill, 880 F.3d 1041, 1045 (9th
Cir. 2017). The “credit-as-true” rule, on which Cruz relies, is a “rare and
prophylactic exception to the ordinary remand rule.” Id. For the court to remand
for award of benefits, three conditions must be satisfied:
(1) the record has been fully developed and further administrative
proceedings would serve no useful purpose; (2) the ALJ has failed to
provide legally sufficient reasons for rejecting evidence, whether
claimant testimony or medical opinion; and (3) if the improperly
discredited evidence were credited as true, the ALJ would be required
to find the claimant disabled on remand.
Garrison v. Colvin, 759 F.3d 995, 1020 (9th Cir. 2014).
The district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that “further
proceedings would be useful given that none of the treating providers’ medical
opinions were meaningfully addressed,” and “there was no meaningful analysis of
their credibility.” Further proceedings may be useful when the medical evidence is
inconsistent. See Dominguez v. Colvin, 808 F.3d 403, 408–09 (9th Cir. 2015)
(holding that the district court did not abuse its discretion in declining to credit a
treating physician’s opinion as true when the physician’s opinion “conflict[ed] in

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some respects with his treatment notes” and was “inconsistent with the reports of
other physicians”). Here, Dr. Patel and Nurse Gray’s opinions that Cruz is unable
to perform light work conflict with the opinions of two state agency examiners.
Gray’s evaluation also appears to be internally inconsistent.
These various inconsistencies demonstrate that the record is not “free of
conflicts, ambiguities, or gaps,” and that further proceedings would be useful to
determine what portions of the opinions of the various medical professionals the ALJ
thought were entitled to weight. Leon, 880 F.3d at 1046–47. The ALJ’s discounting
of Cruz’s subjective testimony further militates against a direct award of benefits.
Dominguez, 808 F.3d at 409 (“The ALJ’s well-supported credibility concerns raise
additional factual issues that require resolution.”).
AFFIRMED.

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