Social Media Causes Long-Term Disability Claimant To Lose Her Benefits

In a recent case out of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Davis v. Aetna Life Ins. Co., No. 16-10895, (5th Cir. 2017), the Court found that surveillance footage and social media were a contributing factor to the denial of the claimant’s long-term disability benefits.

The claimant who had been receiving both short-term and long-term disability benefits since 2010 was seen on several occasions out in public. Additionally, through the use of her Husband’s Facebook account, the claimant was found to have been out of the house quite a bit, even visiting several tourist locations around the San Antonio, Texas area.

Although these moments may have only “captured some of the claimant’s good days,” the Court determined that this evidence along with the IME report of an independent physician, an ALJ’s determination that she was ineligible to receive Social Security Disability benefits, and the conclusions of two peer reviewers, Aetna established more than enough evidence to properly deny the claim.

As a final point, the Court agreed that “while there is some evidence in the record to support [a] claim for disability, there is substantial evidence supporting Aetna’s decision to deny her LTD benefits.”