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By Kristina Launey and Julia Sarnoff

Seyfarth Synopsis:  The Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Justice recently issued Guidance for telehealth accessibility with specific examples.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, many health care providers and patients turned to telehealth as a way to provide and receive health care services while in lockdown.  Telehealth allows providers to see…
Continue Reading Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Justice Issue Joint Guidance On Accessible Telehealth Services

By Minh N. Vu

Seyfarth Synopsis: The Biden DOJ Civil Rights Division has been much more active than its predecessor in enforcing Title III of the ADA and supporting plaintiffs in pending litigation.

As we predicted in January, the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice (DOJ) under the Biden Administration has been very busy.  In the nine months…
Continue Reading Biden Department of Justice Steps up ADA Title III Enforcement

By Minh Vu, Kristina Launey, Susan Ryan

Seyfarth Synopsis: ADA Title III lawsuit filings in federal courts on pace for a record year.

Regular readers will doubtless recall that 2020 was a down year (but just barely) for lawsuits filed in federal court alleging violations of Title III of the ADA.  Our mid-year total was 4,751, due to…
Continue Reading ADA Title III Federal Mid-Year Lawsuit Numbers at an All-Time High

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By Minh N. Vu

Seyfarth Synopsis: California federal trial court grants summary judgment for plaintiff, finding Domino’s violated the ADA by having a website that is inaccessible to the blind and orders Domino’s bring its website into compliance with the WCAG 2.0 guidelines.

Five years after the lawsuit was first filed, federal district court judge Jesus Bernal ruled on June…
Continue Reading Court finds Domino’s Pizza Violated the ADA by Having an Inaccessible Website and Orders WCAG Compliance

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By Eden Anderson

Seyfarth Synopsis: A federal judge precluded the plaintiff from multiplying his statutory damages under the Unruh Act by his alleged number of visits to the defendant’s business.

California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act (“Unruh Act”) provides for the recovery of the greater of actual damages or $4,000 in statutory damages for “each particular occasion” of access denial.  (Civil…
Continue Reading Federal Judge Rejects Plaintiff’s Attempt to Inflate Unruh Act Statutory Damages by Making Multiple Visits to Business

Seyfarth Synopsis: A recently-filed lawsuit contains a lengthy critical report by a digital accessibility consultant of accessibility issues created by an accessibility widget.

Amidst the thousands of lawsuits filed over the past few years alleging business’ websites and mobile apps are not accessible to blind individuals, businesses have scrambled to find ways to make their websites and apps accessible.  Often…
Continue Reading Criticisms of “Quick-Fix” Website Accessibility Products Highlighted in New Lawsuit

Seyfarth Synopsis:  The Ninth Circuit holds that the ADA does not require a 36 inch length of clear sales counter space when the entire counter provided for all customers is at an accessible height.

When a business provides only one sales counter for all customers to use and that entire counter is at an accessible height of 36 inches or…
Continue Reading Ninth Circuit Rejects Serial Plaintiffs’ Lawsuits About the ADA’s Accessible Sales Counter Requirements

By Kristina M. Launey and Minh N. Vu

Seyfarth Synopsis: Website accessibility lawsuit filings in federal court in 2019 are on track to exceed 2018.  Will we see an increase in filings as a result of the Supreme Court’s decision not to review the Ninth Circuit’s Order in Robles v. Domino’s?

As of June 30, 2019, we counted 1204 website…
Continue Reading Federal Website Access Lawsuit Numbers Increase 7 Percent in 2019, With Possible Bump from Supreme Court Denial of Cert in Domino’s

By Minh N. Vu

Seyfarth Synopsis:  Serious sanctions imposed on a serial ADA Title III plaintiff and his attorney should concern the plaintiffs’ bar.

People often ask us why plaintiffs are filing hundreds of ADA Title III lawsuits when the law only allows for injunctive relief and attorneys’ fees and costs.  In the case of prolific plaintiff Alexander Johnson,…
Continue Reading Florida Judge Sanctions Serial ADA Plaintiff Alexander Johnson and Attorney Scott Dinin

By Minh N. Vu and Kristina M. Launey

Domino’s filed its petition for writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court today, June 13, 2019, asking the Court to review and overturn the Ninth Circuit’s decision which allowed a website accessibility lawsuit to proceed against Domino’s.  Domino’s styled the question presented as “Whether Title III of the ADA requires a…
Continue Reading Domino’s Files Petition for US Supreme Court Review of Unfavorable Website Access Decision