NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS SEP 18 2017
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
TIMOTHY LEE HENRICUS, No. 16-15347
Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No. 2:14-cv-02699-KJN
v.
MEMORANDUM*
NANCY A. BERRYHILL, Acting
Commissioner Social Security,
Defendant-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of California
Kendall J. Newman, Magistrate Judge, Presiding
Submitted September 13, 2017**
San Francisco, California
Before: KOZINSKI and FRIEDLAND, Circuit Judges, and ARTERTON,***
District Judge.
Timothy Henricus seeks social security disability benefits for a period
*
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).
***
The Honorable Janet Bond Arterton, United States District Judge for
the District of Connecticut, sitting by designation.
beyond what the administrative law judge (“ALJ”) awarded. We reverse and
remand for further proceedings.
When faced with contradictory opinions, the ALJ must give specific and
legitimate reasons supported by substantial evidence in the record to reject a
treating physician’s opinion. See Batson v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec. Admin., 359 F.3d
1190, 1195 (9th Cir. 2004). An ALJ must give a germane reason for rejecting the
opinion of a physician’s assistant, who is considered an “other source” under the
Social Security regulations. See Molina v. Astrue, 674 F.3d 1104, 1111 (9th Cir.
2012). Here, the ALJ rejected the functional capacity opinion of Henricus’s
treating physician Dr. Hembd and his assistant, Ms. Zichella, without giving any
reasons for doing so or even mentioning it. This was error. See Garrison v.
Colvin, 759 F.3d 995, 1012-13 (9th Cir. 2014) (“[A]n ALJ errs when [s]he rejects a
medical opinion . . . while doing nothing more than ignoring it.”); Molina, 674
F.3d at 1111. The error was not harmless, because the vocational expert testified
that, if their opinion was credited fully, Henricus would be precluded from all
work. See Molina, 674 F.3d at 1115.
Henricus argues that the ALJ also erred by rejecting parts of Dr. Monks’s
functional capacity opinion. We disagree. The ALJ limited Henricus to simple,
repetitive tasks based on Dr. Monks’s opinion. This limitation shows that the ALJ
intended to adopt Dr. Monks’s opinion. See Orteza v. Shalala, 50 F.3d 748, 750
2
(9th Cir. 1995) (distinguishing between discrediting and interpreting a medical
opinion); see also Stubbs-Danielson v. Astrue, 539 F.3d 1169, 1173-74 (9th Cir.
2008) (reasoning that the ALJ is responsible for translating functional limitations
into a residual functional capacity). As a result, we must uphold the ALJ’s
interpretation of Dr. Monks’s opinion so long as it was rational. See Burch v.
Barnhart, 400 F.3d 676, 679 (9th Cir. 2005).
The ALJ’s limitation to simple, routine work reflects a rational interpretation
of Dr. Monks’s opinion, and rationally reconciles portions of that opinion that
might otherwise appear to be in conflict. As a result, the ALJ did not err in her
treatment of Dr. Monks’s opinion.
Finally, we remand for further proceedings rather than for an award of
benefits to allow the Commissioner to properly evaluate Dr. Hembd and Ms.
Zichella’s opinion in the first instance. See Dominguez v. Colvin, 808 F.3d 403,
407 (9th Cir. 2015).
REVERSED and REMANDED.
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