072317U.pdf   08/12/2011  Catherine G. Ratliff  v.  Michael J. Astrue
   U.S. Court of Appeals Case No:  07-2317
   U.S. District Court for the District of South Dakota - Rapid City   
   [UNPUBLISHED] Per Curiam - Before Melloy, Gruender and
   Shepherd, Circuit Judges]
   Civil case - Equal Access to Justice Act. On remand from the Supreme
   Court - Astrue v. Ratliff, 130 S.Ct. 2521 (2010). The court's prior
   opinion in the case, Ratliff v. Astrue, 540 F.3d 800 (8th Cir. 2008), is
   vacated, and the district court's order on attorneys' fees is affirmed.
  
072317P.pdf   09/05/2008  Catherine G. Ratliff  v.  Michael J. Astrue
   U.S. Court of Appeals Case No:  07-2317
   U.S. District Court for the District of South Dakota   
   [PUBLISHED] [Melloy, Author, with Gruender, and Shepherd, Circuit Judges]
   Civil case - Social Security. Under controlling Eighth Circuit
   precedent, attorneys' fees awarded under the Equal Access to Justice Act
   are awarded to the prevailing parties' attorneys, rather than to the parties
   themselves, and therefore cannot be used to offset the parties' debts to the
   government; judgment allowing the government to offset the EAJA
   award against the debts the parties owed is reversed. Judge Gruender,
   concurring on the ground the result is compelled by this court's case law,
   but asserting the holding is in conflict with repeated statements by the
   Supreme Court, the EAJA's plain language and the decisions in several
   other circuits.