Virginia Business Litigation Lawyer Blog

In a memorandum opinion dated April 27, 2011, United States District Judge T.S. Ellis, who sits in the Alexandria Division of the Eastern District of Virginia, taught plaintiff Stephanie Holmes that it was not a good idea to change her story multiple times during her deposition. Finding that she had "perpetrated a fraud on the court," Judge Ellis affirmed the magistrate judge's recommendation to strike Holmes's claim for compensatory damages for pain and suffering.

Holmes, who had worked as a stocker at a Wal-mart in Alexandria, Virginia, for four years, filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), alleging that Walmart had failed to make reasonable accommodations for her hearing impairment. She alleged that Walmart had refused to provide her with an interpreter and with comprehensive notes of meetings and instructions, all of which she needed to perform her job properly. She sought compensation for pecuniary losses, an injunction, punitive damages, and back pay.

The EEOC filed suit on Holmes's behalf. During Holmes's deposition in 2010, Walmart's attorneys asked her about whether she had received any treatment from a mental health provider for emotional distress caused by her employment at Walmart. First, she said, "I don't need therapy, and I don't see doctors." Then she said she saw a therapist just once in 2007. She later changed her story again and said she saw one doctor three times a week from March 2004 through February 2005. Finally, at the end of her deposition, she acknowledged that she had received therapy for anxiety and depression in a 13-year period from 1994 to 2007 and that some of the treatment related to her work at Walmart.

Walmart moved to dismiss Holmes's entire complaint on the grounds that she had lied in her deposition and had failed to provide relevant documents in discovery. Rather than dismiss the complaint in its entirety, however, Judge Ellis decided that the appropriate course was to affirm the recommendation of the magistrate judge to strike only Holmes's claim for pain and suffering damages.

Judge Ellis found that Holmes's untruths at her deposition "prevented Walmart from adequately preparing its defense, particularly its defense against her claim for compensatory damages for pain and suffering." Accordingly, the appropriate action was to strike that claim. Judge Ellis noted that although a federal judge has the inherent power to dismiss a case in its entirety, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit "has emphasized that courts must exercise this authority with restraint."

"The partial dismissal ordered here must stand as a beacon to warn and deter others from engaging in similar conduct," Judge Ellis wrote.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) claims a Kmart Super Center in Norfolk, Virginia, fired a store greeter because he used a cane, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). In a lawsuit filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, the EEOC alleges that the employee used a cane to walk and stand due to his spinal stenosis, a physical impairment of his back. His back problems did not prevent him from performing his duties as a greeter. Nevertheless, the suit claims, when he was observed using the cane, Kmart terminated his employment.

Prior to terminating the employee, Kmart allegedly refused to allow him to use the cane, even though his condition made it difficult to stand or walk without one, and his job required both. The EEOC filed the lawsuit only after Kmart refused to settle.

The EEOC is seeking most of the remedies permitted under the ADA, including reinstatement of the employee's job (or placement into a substantially equivalent position), back pay, compensatory damages, and punitive damages for intentional discrimination. The EEOC is also seeking an injunction (as it usually does in the ADA cases it brings) prohibiting discriminatory practices and compelling Kmart to adopt and execute a variety of policies, practices, and training programs to clarify to their employees and the general public that Kmart will takes steps to ensure it does not discriminate against persons with disabilities.

Title I of the ADA requires employers with 15 or more employees to provide qualified individuals with disabilities the same employment benefits and opportunities as everyone else, provided the employers can make any necessary accommodations without experiencing undue hardship. The employment privileges to which the ADA applies include recruitment, hiring, training, compensation, promotions, and even social activities. For more information, see Your Rights as a Disabled Employee.

Both the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Virginians with Disabilities Act (VDA) prohibit stage agencies and public entities from discriminating against people with disabilities, or denying to them the benefits of their services, programs, or activities. On June 4, 2009, Virginia's highest court held that the Virginia Lottery, a state agency established to generate revenue to be used for public purposes, must comply with these laws and ensure that disabled persons are not excluded from participation in the lottery.

At issue was whether the lottery operation constitutes a "program, service, or activity" within the meaning of the ADA and VDA.  A group of disabled plaintiffs, all of whom use wheelchairs, sued the Lottery in Richmond, claiming that several retail outlets lacked accessible parking spaces, ramps, and paths of travel for disabled persons.  The Lottery argued that it was exempt from the ADA and VDA because it did not offer a program, service, or activity within the meaning of those statutes.  While the Circuit Court agreed with that argument, the Supreme Court reversed, finding that the Virginia Lottery does operate a "program, service, or activity" and therefore must conduct its operations in compliance with the ADA and the VDA.

The tricky part is determining how, exactly, accessibility is to be achieved. The only party responsible for complying with the ADA with respect to a particular challenged government program is the party with control over that program. (See Bacon v. City of Richmond, 475 F.3d 633 (4th Cir. 2007)).

The Virginia Lottery is the entity that operates the lottery, but it is permitted to license authorized agents--independent retail stores--to sell lottery tickets. The court acknowledged that the Lottery doesn't have the authority or power to require private businesses to comply with the ADA or VDA. The Lottery cannot simply construct wheelchair ramps on the premises of the various lottery retailers. At the same time, however, the court found that the Lottery has a broader obligation to ensure its operations are conducted in compliance with the laws.

How then, is the Virginia Lottery to comply with its obligations to disabled persons when it lacks the power to force its retailers to do the same? That is a question for another day, to be determined by the trial court when the case is returned to it. The Supreme Court suggested the remedy might entail something short of ramp construction, in that "accessibility" might be achieved by means other than physical.

Qualified individuals with disabilities are entitled to an equal opportunity to benefit from the full range of employment-related opportunities available to others.  The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits discrimination in the workplace (as well as in government and other contexts) on the basis of disability.  It applies to employers with 15 or more employees and covers recruitment, hiring, promotions, training, pay, social activities, and other privileges of employment.  The ADA also restricts the questions that can be asked about an applicant's disability before a job offer is made, and it requires that employers make reasonable accommodations to the known physical or mental limitations of otherwise qualified individuals with disabilities, unless doing so would result in undue hardship.

To be protected by the ADA, one must qualify as having a "disability" (or as having a close relationship with a disabled person) as that term is defined in the Act.  Under the ADA, a disabled person is: (1) one having a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, (2) a person who has a history or record of such an impairment, or (3) a person who is perceived by others as having such an impairment. See 42 U.S.C. § 12102(2).  The ADA does not specifically list or identify all possible impairments that would be considered disabilities.

Continue reading "Your Rights as a Disabled Employee" »