ADA Rights Defense Attorney

Fighting for Businesses in Palm Beach, Broward & Miami-Dade Counties

At the Law Offices of Nolan Klein, our Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) litigation attorneys have litigated more than 500 federal ADA lawsuits. We have the knowledge, experience, strength and skill to defend and represent your interests in any Americans with Disabilities Act lawsuit that has been filed against you.

Watch our managing partner, Nolan Klein, discuss ADA lawsuits with Anderson Cooper on 60 Minutes:

Schedule your free consultation today by calling (877) 745-0090 or contacting our firm online.

Examples of Our Success

We are not “all talk.” We have repeatedly been successful in representing our clients in these cases.

Real-world examples of our successes include:

• Representing shopping mall sued multiple times for violating ADA regulations and had taken remedial steps to comply with the law. We took the case to trial, resulting in a complete verdict for our client.

• Representing a national car wash chain to defend against ADA claims. After pressing the plaintiff to prove the existence of his disability, the plaintiff agreed to dismiss all claims and pay all attorney’s fees incurred by our client.

• Representing a major fast food chain to defend against ADA claims at one of its restaurants. We established conclusively that no ADA violations were present and obtained dismissal with prejudice.

Employment Law & ADA Rights

Equal rights for individuals with disabilities have come a long way in recent decades, which means employers should be vigilant about ensuring they comply with laws and regulations. Employers are expected to provide reasonable accommodations to allow employees with disabilities to do their jobs. For example, a person in a wheelchair should be able to easily get to their desk and do their job, meaning there must be wheelchair ramps, elevators, and other accommodations as necessary. As another example, if a job that usually requires standing can just as easily be done from a seated position, that must be allowed for an employee who cannot stand due to a disability.

Mandatory Premises Accommodations

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) requires that “places of public accommodation” make reasonable accommodations for individuals with disabilities, including compliance with very specific architectural requirements. The most common accommodations include installation of disabled parking spaces, restaurant seating, accessible bathrooms, ramps, and other such features needed to integrate the disabled.

The term “place of public accommodation” applies to a very wide variety of businesses, including:

• Inns, hotels, motels, and other places of lodging
• Restaurants, bars, and other food/drink establishments
• Auditoriums, convention centers, lecture halls, and other places of public gathering
• Gymnasiums, spas, bowling alleys, golf courses, and other place of exercise or recreation
• Theaters, concert halls, stadiums, and other place of exhibition or entertainment
• Bakeries, grocery stores, clothing stores, shopping centers, and other sales establishments

The law also applies equally to landlords and tenants, making each jointly liable for ADA violations that are present on the property. Tenants may be sued even though alleged violations are on property controlled by the landlord (for example, a parking lot), and landlords may be sued for alleged violations in a tenant space (for example, inaccessible restaurant seating). As a result, the business owner, and its landlord (the property owner) are almost always sued together in these cases.

ADA Website Lawsuits

The ADA states that “no individual shall be discriminated against on the basis of disability in the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations of any place of public accommodation . . .” This includes websites.

In recent years, a wave of ADA lawsuits have been filed against businesses that conduct commerce online where their website is not accessible to the visually impaired. Blind and visually impaired internet users who are disabled under the ADA have a number of options for “reading” their computer screens and using online commerce features.

The most widely accepted website technical standards for compatibility with screen reading software is Version 2.0 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, commonly known as WCAG 2.0. When implemented on a website, these guidelines make the website usable by individuals with visual impairments, and the guidelines have been adopted on the websites of many (if not most) major online retailers.

Hotel Reservation Websites

Hotels must ensure that individuals with disabilities can make reservations for accessible guest rooms during the same hours and in the same manner as people who do not need accessible rooms. These regulations require that any means by which hotels take reservations must “[i]dentify and describe accessible features in the hotels and guest rooms [. . .] in enough detail to reasonably permit individuals with disabilities to assess independently whether a given hotel or guest room meets his or her accessibility needs.”

What to Do Next

If you're a business owner who's being challenged with an ADA lawsuit against you, don't hesitate. Call the Florida ADA rights defense lawyers at the Law Offices of Nolan Klein for a free legal consultation to discuss your case and the next steps to move forward.

Schedule your free consultation today by calling (877) 745-0090.