Paul Wright v. Douglas A. Collins, Secretary of Veterans Affairs

United States Court of Appeals
for the Federal Circuit
______________________
PAUL WRIGHT,
Claimant-Appellant
v.
DOUGLAS A. COLLINS, SECRETARY OF
VETERANS AFFAIRS,
Respondent-Appellee
______________________
2025-1502
______________________
Appeal from the United States Court of Appeals for
Veterans Claims in No. 25-96, Chief Judge Michael P. Al-
len.
______________________
Decided: October 28, 2025
______________________
P AUL T ROY WRIGHT , Marietta, SC, pro se.
STEPHANIE F LEMING, Commercial Litigation Branch,
Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, Wash-
ington, DC, for respondent-appellee. Also represented by
WILLIAM J AMES G RIMALDI, P ATRICIA M. MC CARTHY , BRETT
SHUMATE; RICHARD S TEPHEN HUBER, D EREK SCADDEN, Of-
fice of General Counsel, United States Department of Vet-
erans Affairs, Washington, DC.
______________________
Case: 25-1502 Document: 24 Page: 1 Filed: 10/28/2025

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WRIGHT v. COLLINS 2
Before M OORE, Chief Judge, D YK and CUNNINGHAM ,
Circuit Judges.
D YK, Circuit Judge.
Paul Troy Wright is another veteran frustrated by
lengthy delays in the resolution of his claims before the De-
partment of Veterans Affairs (“VA”). He appeals pro se a
decision of the Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims (“Vet-
erans Court”). That decision concerned Mr. Wright’s unad-
judicated claims pending at the VA. The Veterans Court
denied his request to issue an order granting him relief on
the merits of his claims and to issue contempt sanctions on
the Chair of the Board of Veterans’ Appeals (“Board”) for
failure to resolve his claims. We dismiss for lack of juris-
diction.
BACKGROUND
Mr. Wright served honorably in the Navy from 1974 to
1984. In 2015, Mr. Wright applied for benefits related to
two heart conditions, melanoma, obstructive sleep apnea,
and gastroesophageal reflux disease with Barrett’s esoph-
agus (“GERD”). Mr. Wright claims these conditions re-
sulted from injuries he sustained in the line of duty. On
July 24, 2017, the VA denied Mr. Wright entitlement to
benefits for each condition.
Following the VA’s denial, Mr. Wright appealed to the
Board. The Board affirmed the VA’s denial of Mr. Wright’s
melanoma claim, but remanded his obstructive sleep ap-
nea, GERD, and two heart condition claims back to the VA
Regional Office (“RO”) for further factual development.
Mr. Wright then appealed the denial of his melanoma
claim to the Veterans Court, which on July 30, 2021, re-
manded his melanoma claim to the Board to address all of
his arguments and weigh the evidence on the record in
light of his arguments. Wright v. McDonough, No. 20-
8732, 2021 WL 3233403, at *2 (Vet. App. July 30, 2021).
The Board again reviewed Mr. Wright’s melanoma claim
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WRIGHT v. COLLINS 3
and remanded his melanoma, obstructive sleep apnea,
GERD, and heart condition claims to the RO for factual
findings. On July 25, 2022, the RO denied Mr. Wright en-
titlement to benefits for each of his claims. In part, the RO
denied Mr. Wright’s claims because he did not report for a
scheduled examination in connection with his claims.
On July 31, 2022, Mr. Wright appealed the RO’s
July 25, 2022, decision to the Board. In a December 27,
2024, decision, the Board again remanded Mr. Wright’s
melanoma, obstructive sleep apnea, and GERD claims to
the RO, and deferred adjudication of Mr. Wright’s heart
condition claims pending development of his obstructive
sleep apnea claim. Specifically, the Board required the RO
to address factual issues related to secondary causation
factors and the reason why Mr. Wright did not appear for
examination.
Instead of further presenting his claim to the RO, on
January 15, 2025, Mr. Wright filed a petition for extraordi-
nary relief at the Veterans Court, asking the Veterans
Court to issue contempt sanctions against the Chair of the
Board for allegedly contravening the Veterans Court’s 2021
decision by failing to expeditiously “consider Wright’s con-
sistent attestations” related to his claimed injury.
S. App’x 22.1 Mr. Wright also asked the Veterans Court to
directly grant him entitlement to benefits for his mela-
noma, obstructive sleep apnea, and GERD claims since, in
his view, the facts are undisputed.
Treating Mr. Wright’s appeal as a request for relief un-
der the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651(a), the Veterans
Court denied Mr. Wright’s petition. The Veterans Court
found the Board followed the Veterans Court’s 2021
1 “S. App’x” refers to the Supplemental Appendix
filed by the government with its Informal Response Brief.
Dkt. No. 10.
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WRIGHT v. COLLINS 4
decision and did not do anything to warrant contempt sanc-
tions. In addition, the Veterans Court found it could not
reach the merits of Mr. Wright’s benefits claims because it
lacked the ability to render substantive relief on claims un-
der both its general jurisdiction and the All Writs Act. Fi-
nally, the Veterans Court found the VA did not
unreasonably delay its adjudication of Mr. Wright’s claims
(given the short period of time since the remand order), and
so relief could not be awarded on that basis.
Mr. Wright appealed.
D ISCUSSION
“[O]ur jurisdiction is limited in appeals from the Court
of Appeals for Veterans Claims . . . .” Szemraj v. Principi,
357 F.3d 1370, 1374 (Fed. Cir. 2004). “This court has juris-
diction to review the [Veterans Court’s] decision whether
to grant a mandamus petition that raises a non-frivolous
legal question . . . .” Beasley v. Shinseki, 709 F.3d 1154,
1158 (Fed. Cir. 2013).
We agree that the Veterans Court lacked jurisdiction
to hear an appeal of the December 27, 2024, Board deci-
sion, as a decision to remand that does not fully grant or
deny relief is not appealable to the Veterans Court. Kirk-
patrick v. Nicholson, 417 F.3d 1361, 1364–65 (Fed. Cir.
2005). Unless it determined it had jurisdiction to consider
a petition under the All Writs Act, the Veterans Court did
not have jurisdiction to review Mr. Wright’s petition. We
thus agree with the Veterans Court that Mr. Wright’s peti-
tion to the Veterans Court should be addressed as a peti-
tion for relief under the All Writs Act.
Mr. Wright contends the Veterans Court should have
granted his petition to order the VA to issue benefits for
each of his claims without remand to the RO. At the Vet-
erans Court, Mr. Wright’s petition arose out of the Board’s
“remand” of his claims to the VA, and he requested that the
Veterans Court vacate the Board’s remand order and order
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WRIGHT v. COLLINS 5
the VA to issue benefits for his claims without remand to
the RO. S. App’x 23, 34. The right to substantive relief
without remand is squarely foreclosed by our decision in
Ravin v. McDonough, 107 F.4th 1357 (Fed. Cir. 2024).
Ravin explained how our cases “rejected the contention
that there was a right to a determination of the Veterans
Court without remand.” Id. at 1362. As in prior cases “we
held there was no right to a decision without remand,” the
court in Ravin held “there can no longer be a colorable ar-
gument here” that a veteran is “entitled to a decision with-
out remand.” Id.
While Ravin is in the context of a remand from the Vet-
erans Court to the Board, as noted, we have previously held
that the Veterans Court does not have jurisdiction to re-
view a Board decision that remands a veteran’s claims to
the RO. Kirkpatrick, 417 F.3d at 1364–65.2 The Veterans
Court has since held in Gardner-Dickson v. Wilkie, 33 Vet.
App. 50 (2020), that this jurisdictional bar cannot be
avoided by resort to a mandamus petition. Gardner-Dick-
son, 33 Vet. App. at 55–58.3 We agree. Just as there is no
colorable claim to an appeal of a Board decision that re-
mands a veteran’s claims to the RO, there is no colorable
claim to a writ of mandamus in the same circumstance.
Mr. Wright does not raise arguments related to his re-
quest for sanctions, and his argument for sanctions was in
any event without colorable merit. He also does not appeal
the Veterans Court’s denial of a writ of mandamus to
2 Kirkpatrick held that the Williams exception to fi-
nality does not apply to Board remand orders. Id. at 1365
(citing Williams v. Principi, 275 F.3d 1361, 1364 (Fed. Cir.
2002).
3 That decision forecloses the argument that the Vet-
erans Court itself should have granted relief without re-
mand.
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WRIGHT v. COLLINS 6
compel the decision of the RO, a contention that is also
without colorable merit.
We understand Mr. Wright’s frustration with the slow
process of adjudication, but we lack jurisdiction to afford
him his requested relief.
CONCLUSION
We have considered Mr. Wright’s remaining argu-
ments and find them unpersuasive. For the foregoing rea-
sons, we dismiss Mr. Wright’s claims for lack of
jurisdiction.
DISMISSED
COSTS
No costs.
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