United States Federal Circuit

The Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims committed legal error in requiring the veteran to "undebatably" establish that he filed an informal claim for secondary service connection prior to 1994. The proper inquiry is whether the Board of Veterans' Appeals sympathetically read the veteran's pre-1994 filings in determining his "date of claim."

Appellate Information

• Decided 03/10/2004
• Published 03/10/2004

Judges

• DYK, Circuit Judge., Before RADER, BRYSON and DYK, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Federal Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Francis M. Jackson,Jackson & MacNichol, of Portland, Maine, argued for claimant-appellant.


• For Appellees:
  
• Andrew P. Averbach, Trial Attorney, Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, United States Department of Justice, of Washington, DC, argued for respondent-appellee.   With him on the brief were Peter D. Keisler, Assistant Attorney General;  David M. Cohen, Director;  and Franklin E. White, Jr., Assistant Director.   Of counsel on the brief were Michael J. Timinski, Deputy Assistant General Counsel;  and Martie Adleman, Attorney, Department of Veterans Affairs, of Washington, DC. Of counsel were Timothy P. McIlmail and Harold D. Lester, Jr., Attorneys, United States Department of Justice, of Washington, DC.