Understaffing of Judges Hearing Longshore Cases

Understaffing of Judges Hearing Longshore Cases

For 10 or more years, the United States Office of Administrative Law Judges has been chronically understaffed causing serious backlogs in Longshore and similar cases. On the West Coast, it now typically takes two or more years for a decision to issue after a trial. This can result in serious adverse consequences to an injured worker, including a deterioration in physical condition, loss of a worker’s home, bankruptcy, and significant distress. Insurance companies know this to be the case and so engage in bad faith denial of claims. Longshore attorneys and claimants, and their trade groups such as the Workers Injury Law and Advocacy Group (“WILG”), have sought assistance from congressional representatives to correct this problem, but still have not received significant help. Injured workers should contact their congressional representative to make their voices heard on this point. “Justice delayed is justice denied,” and this is certainly true in the context of the understaffing of the Office of Administrative Law Judges and it effect on longshoremen and harbor workers