United Food & Commercial Workers Union v. Clougherty Packing Co.

This is an appeal from an order confirming an arbitration award.

In March 1969, Gerardo Zazueta was employed as a butcher by appellant Clougherty Packing Company (the Company). Sometime thereafter, Zazueta contracted brucellosis, a disease transmitted to man from animals or their by-products. Zazueta last worked for the Company in December 1972. He applied for workers’ compensation benefits, and the WCAB ultimately found that he sustained a temporary total disability for the period June 15, 1972, to March 24, 1974, and a permanent disability of 17 percent. Zazueta was also placed on Social Security disability status.

Zazueta remained disabled for approximately eight and one-half years. In August 1981, he received a notice from the Social Security Administration which read in part:

“The evidence now in file indicates you are able to perform substantial gainful work and have been since July 81.

“Current evidence obtained by the Social Security Administration now discloses that you have sufficiently recovered from your impairments with no significantly [«'c] residuals. It would appear, therefore, that your impairments are no longer severe, and that you are no longer…