Wickman v. Commissioner of Social Security

Opinion

1 2

3 4 5 6 7 8 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT WESTERN DISTRICT OF WASHINGTON 9 TACOMA DIVISION

10 MARY A. WICKMAN, Civil No. 3:19-cv-05921-RSM 11 Plaintiff,

12 vs. ORDER 13 COMMISSIONER OF SOCIAL SECURITY,

14 Defendant.

15 For the reasons set forth in the parties’ stipulated motion for attorney fees under the 16 Equal Access to Justice Act (EAJA), 28 U.S.C. § 2412, et seq., and good cause shown, IT IS 17 HEREBY ORDERED AS FOLLOWS: 18 Plaintiff is here by awarded $8,931.92 in fees and $102.75 in expenses under the EAJA. 19 Under Astrue v. Ratliff, 130 S. Ct. 2521, 2528-29 (2010), EAJA fees awarded by this Court 20 belong to the Plaintiff and are subject to offset under the Treasury Offset Program (31 U.S.C. 21 § 3716(c)(3)(B) (2006)). Any EAJA fees should therefore be awarded to Plaintiff and not to 22 Plaintiff’s attorney. If, after receiving the Court’s EAJA fee order, the Commissioner (1) 23 determines that Plaintiff has assigned her right to EAJA fees to her attorney; (2) determines that 24 Plaintiff does not owe a debt that is subject to offset under the Treasury Offset Program; and (3) 1 agrees to waive the requirements of the Anti-Assignment Act, then the EAJA fees will be made 2 payable to Plaintiff’s attorney. However, if there is a debt owed under the Treasury Offset 3 Program, the Commissioner cannot agree to waive the requirements of the Anti-Assignment Act, 4 and the remaining EAJA fees after offset will be paid by a check made out to Plaintiff but 5 delivered to Plaintiff’ s attorney. 6

7 DATED this 29th day of October, 2021. 8

9 A 10 11 RICARDO S. MARTINEZ CHIEF UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE 12

15 Presented by:

16 s/ Sarah Moum SARAH MOUM 17 Special Assistant United States Attorney Office of the General Counsel 18 Social Security Administration 701 Fifth Avenue, Suite 2900 M/S 221A 19 Seattle, WA 98104-7075 Telephone: (206) 615-2936 20 Fax: (206) 615-2531 sarah.moum@ssa.gov 21 22 23 24