In the Ninth Circuit and in courts that follow its holdings ADA standing can be based on nothing more than a paranoid fantasy by the plaintiff or a presumption of guilt by the court. This conclusion follows logically from two decisions that themselves rest on neither logic nor the law.
The first case is Pickern v. Holiday Quality Food, Inc., 293 F.3d 1133 (9th Circ. 2002). In Pickern the Court held that a plaintiff who is “deterred from patronizing a public accomodation” by ADA violates has suffered an actual injury. The Court substituted deterrence for an actual encounter with an architectural barrier. According to Pickern simply by stating that he was “deterred” from trying to go into the store the plaintiff had “stated sufficient facts to show concrete, particularized injury.” Id. at 1137-1138. More