8th Circuit: Arkansas employee can't blame comment on steroids
HR.BLR.com
The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals—which covers Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota—recently affirmed an Arkansas district court's decision to dismiss an employee's claims of reverse race and disability discrimination.
Appellate Face-Off on Denying Schizophrenic Blood Donor
Courthouse News Service
A plasma-donation company battled in the 10th Circuit on Wednesday over its decision to turn away a man diagnosed with schizophrenia.
Octapharma Plasma, a global plasma donation company that manufactures human proteins from donated blood, has claimed that it feared Brent Levorsen would have a schizophrenic episode during the blood-donation process.
If Levorsen ripped the needle out of his arm during such an episode, he could hurt himself or the attending staff, Octapharma claimed.
Though Levorsen supplied Octapharma with two recommendations from therapist that found him healthy enough to give plasma safely, Octapharma kept Levorsen on the "National Donor Deferral Registry" - banning him from donating plasma at all plasma-donation centers nationwide.
Levorsen's federal lawsuit in Utah hinged on "public accommodation" rules for businesses like Laundromats, restaurants, theaters and libraries, all of which must provide access and services to disabled people to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Dustin Pead ruled, however, that Octapharma did not exist under any of the 12 categories Congress listed as constituting "public accommodations." As such the company could continue deny Levorsen's plasma without legally discriminating against him, the court found.
A three-judge panel of the 10th Circuit met Wednesday to decide whether Octapharma belongs among the 12 categories Congress laid out as ADA-covered.
EEOC Sues Media Star Promotions For Disability Discrimination
Cosmic Concepts, Ltd., trading as Media Star Promotions, violated federal law when it refused to provide a reasonable accommodation to a field representative with a disability, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charged in a lawsuit announced today. EEOC also charged that the company unlawfully demanded that she waive her rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and then fired her based on her disability and refusal to sign the waiver.
Amanda Matherly began working as a field representative at Media Star's Baltimore headquarters. As a field representative, her duties included traveling to outdoor festivals to distribute free product samples and gather customer contact information. Matherly has several allergies, including a severe allergy to peanuts and tree nuts. If she is exposed to peanuts or tree nuts, she will go into anaphylactic shock, and must be immediately injected with medication and hospitalized to prevent death, according to the suit. EEOC says that Matherly requested that Media Star reasonably accommodate her disability by providing vinyl gloves for her to handle a small number of items at company headquarters that may have been exposed to peanuts and to alert hotels and airlines about her allergies when making her travel arrangements.
EEOC charged that Media Star refused to accommodate Matherly's disability and instead improperly asked her to sign a form purporting to waive her rights under the ADA. When she refused, the company terminated her because of her disability and in retaliation for, and in interference of, her exercise of her rights under the ADA, according to the lawsuit.
Such alleged conduct violates the ADA, which prohibits disability discrimination. The ADA requires employers to provide a reasonable accommodation unless it would cause a significant expense or difficulty to the employer. The ADA also protects individuals from coercion, intimidation, threat, harassment, or interference in their exercise of their own rights or their encouragement of someone else's exercise of rights granted by the ADA. EEOC filed suit (EEOC v. Cosmic Concepts, Ltd., t/a Media Star Promotions, Civil Action No.1:15-cv-02975-CCB) in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, Baltimore Division, after first attempting to reach a pre-litigation settlement through its conciliation process.
$900K compensatory damages verdict to fired needle-phobic pharmacist 'conscience shocking'
A pharmacist with needle-phobia who was fired by Rite Aid and who subsequently achieved a multi-million dollar jury verdict after suing his employer for violations of the ADA and the New York State Human Rights Law withstood most of the arguments made by his former employer in post-trial motions before a federal district court in New York. Although the court granted the employer's motion for judgment as a matter of law on the employee's reasonable accommodation claim and agreed that his $900,000 compensatory damages verdict was conscience-shocking for garden variety damages, it declined to grant the employer's motion with regard to the remainder of the employee's successful verdict. (Stevens v Rite Aid Corp dba Rite Aid Pharmacy, NDNY, September 23, 2015, McAvoy, T.)
Accessibility issues persist for disabled
The Boston Globe
Trash barrels blocking the sidewalk. Restaurants handicap-accessible in name only. Store doorways impossible to enter in a wheelchair.
These are the daily obstacles people with disabilities must negotiate, no matter now meticulously they plan. Twenty-five years after the Americans with Disabilities Act became law, navigating Boston can still be a challenge, marked by seemingly small barriers that can range from humiliating to insurmountable.
Judges select winners in ADA anniversary photo contest
nwitimes.com
A picture of keys hanging beside a blue placard to designate disabled parking eligibility nabbed first place in a photo contest marking the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
The contest coincided with an exhibit called "The ADA: 25 Years and Counting," which recently wrapped up at the Indiana Welcome Center, 7770 Corrine Drive. The exhibit featured displays, videos and photographs illustrating the history of the effort to establish the law, which took effect in 1990.
Everybody Counts, the Great Lakes ADA Center and the South Shore Convention and Visitors Authority sponsored the event.