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Dismissed

The Veteran's February 2006 claim for an earlier effective date was dismissed as a matter of law because it is barred by the finality of previous Board decisions.

The deciding factor: The Board found that the July 2005 decision subsumed all prior rating decisions on the issue, and the Veteran's February 2006 claim did not meet the criteria for a freestanding earlier effective date claim.

Claimed conditions
schizophrenia, undifferentiated type
How they argued it
Direct service connection
Exposure basis
None
Rating assigned
None in this decision
Decision date
March 10, 2009
Citation
0908850

Veterans Law Judge

L. HOWELL

Decisions by this judge: 2,162 · Granted: 21% (granted or partly granted, in the vetted decisions on this site)

Judge attribution: 2025 complete; earlier years partial.

This is a plain-language summary generated by AI from a public Board of Veterans’ Appeals decision. It can contain errors — always verify against the original. Look up the original decision on VA.gov (opens in a new tab) using citation 0908850.

What this means for you

A dismissal means the Board did not decide the issue on its merits — usually because it was withdrawn or had become moot. It says more about procedure than about whether a claim like this can win.

What you can do next

Related decisions

Other Board decisions on a similar condition or argued the same way.

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