This Memorial Day we are once again firing up the grill with hundred dollar bills to celebrate how the ADA its current form encourages litigation that makes lawyers rich without any correspondening improvement in meaningful access for the disabled. The first case presents the unappetizing picture of a single claimed lack of access generating parallel state and federal proceedings as defendants and plaintiffs maneuver for a procedural advantage. The last explores the exploitation of California law by plaintiffs who can use internet accessibility claims to bring the whole world into their favorable local courts. In between we will see some courts pushing back, though only in the most egregious cases. More
An April 3, 2019 decision from Texas’ Third District Court of Appeals should give pause to many lawyers filing website accessibility lawsuits under the ADA. In Commission for Lawyer Discipline v. Rosales, Case No. 03-18-00147-CV (April 3, 2019)* the Court of Appeals wrote this about an ADA website demand letter:
A third of the reported ADA and FHA decisions in the last three weeks involved a single plaintiff, Scott Johnson. Mr. Johnson’s name is often found in this blog because he has been a fertile source of decisions on a wide range of ADA issues. As discussed below, outrage is one common response to his lawsuits.
I’m a day late with the St. Patrick’s Day Edition of Quick Hits but that’s no reason not to raise a toast to the saint who, as my great-grandfather William Mullin said, drove all the snakes out of Ireland except the politicians.
I’m just departing from the 2019 Assistive Technology Conference with a few prejudices confirmed but with some new ideas as well.