Gaynell Boyd v. Trustees of the United Mine Workers Health & Retirement Funds

PHILLIPS, Circuit Judge:

Gaynell Boyd appeals from the district court’s affirmance of a decision by the Trustees of the United Mine Workers Health and Retirement Funds (Trustees) denying her eligibility for disability pension benefits under the Mine Workers’ Pension Plan. We find that the Trustees’ decision was an abuse of discretion and reverse.

I

Boyd is a former coal miner who worked in the industry from 1979 to September 1983. On July 30, 1982, she suffered a cervical spine sprain when a timber fell on her shoulder. The injury was sufficiently severe that she did not go back to work until…