Background
Edward Hepler, an Army veteran who served in Vietnam and Kuwait, applied in December 2011 for disability benefits for hypertension. He asserted that the condition was directly related to the stress of his military duties and submitted supporting evidence. The VA regional office denied the claim, and Hepler appealed to the Board of Veterans’ Appeals.
While that appeal remained pending, Congress enacted the PACT Act, which established presumptive service connection for hypertension based on qualifying Agent Orange exposure but did not permit benefits under that presumption before August 10, 2022. The Board granted Hepler presumptive service connection under the Act without adjudicating his earlier direct-service theory. The Veterans Court dismissed his appeal as moot, reasoning that service connection had been granted and that the effective date was a separate downstream issue.
The Court’s Holding
The Federal Circuit held that the PACT Act grant did not moot Hepler’s pending claim for direct service connection. The direct and presumptive claims rested on different grounds, and success on the direct-service claim could potentially support benefits dating to Hepler’s 2011 application rather than only to the PACT Act’s effective date. The Veterans Court therefore could grant effectual relief by requiring adjudication of the unresolved claim.
The court also rejected the government’s contention that the Board had implicitly remanded the direct-service claim to the regional office. The Board’s suggestion that the regional office consider certain evidence when assigning an effective date was not a remand, and later regional-office decisions did not adjudicate the direct-service evidence. Because Hepler had presented the claim to the Board after the regional office denied it, the Board was required to grant or deny it or expressly remand it for further proceedings.
Key Takeaways
- A grant of presumptive service connection under the PACT Act does not extinguish a pending pre-PACT Act claim for direct service connection for the same condition.
- A direct-service claim remains live when prevailing could produce benefits for an earlier period unavailable under the statutory presumption.
- When a properly presented claim is left unaddressed, the Board must adjudicate it or issue a remand with specific instructions; a suggestion concerning the effective date is insufficient.
Why It Matters
The decision protects veterans from losing potentially substantial past-due benefits merely because a later statute supplies a prospective presumption for the same disability. It confirms that entitlement under preexisting direct-service law is an upstream issue that must be resolved before the VA can determine the corresponding effective date.
The Federal Circuit reversed and remanded, directing the Veterans Court to require the Board to grant or deny Hepler’s direct-service hypertension claim or remand it to the regional office with specific instructions. The Board must proceed expeditiously.