Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing
January 20, 2025
In January 2025, following a sweeping undercover investigation by housing watchdog group Housing Rights Initiative (HRI), DRA filed the largest housing discrimination case in Illinois history against 165 real estate agents, brokerage firms, and landlords alleging they illegally discriminated against low-income families who sought to use Housing Choice Vouchers (“Section 8”). The 176 complaints against … Continue reading » “Housing Rights Initiative v. 160+ Housing Providers”
May 8, 2024
In May 2024, DRA filed a class action lawsuit along with The Legal Aid Society and Winston & Strawn LLP on behalf of incarcerated New Yorkers with disabilities against the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (“DOCCS”) and the New York State Office of Mental Health (“OMH”) for their ongoing violations of … Continue reading » “Anthony v. New York State Department of Corrections & Community Supervision (DOCCS)”
May 18, 2023
In May 2023, DRA and DREDF filed a group complaint with the United States Department of Justice on behalf of four law school graduates with disabilities against the State Bar of California for consistently violating the Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to provide accommodations on the California bar exam. Read the complaint. The State … Continue reading » “Complainants v. State Bar of California”
April 18, 2023
In 2022, DRA joined the plaintiffs’ counsel team in Disability Rights Tennessee’s lawsuit on behalf of several d/Deaf Tennesseans with intellectual and developmental disabilities and/or mental health disabilities and Disability Rights Tennessee to challenge the State of Tennessee’s failure to ensure that effective communication is provided to d/Deaf people who receive services from the Tennessee … Continue reading » “Battle v. Tennessee”
October 18, 2022
Since 2020, Disability Rights Advocates and the Law Offices of Wendy Musell have represented a group of Deaf civilian employees, applicants, and former employees in an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) case against the United States Air Force—which, despite its $190 billion annual budget, has consistently failed to provide Deaf employees and applicants with American … Continue reading » “Weimer v. U.S. Air Force”
September 19, 2022
This lawsuit filed in March 2020 on behalf of a group of people with hearing disabilities who are incarcerated in Tennessee Department of Correction (TDOC) facilities challenges TDOC’s failure to provide effective communication to people who are deaf and hard of hearing and enable them to access the same programs and services as non-disabled people. Plaintiffs … Continue reading » “Trivette v. Tennessee Department of Correction”
July 26, 2022
In July 2022, DRA filed a lawsuit in the Western District of Washington against Providence St. Joseph Health for the health care company’s failure to ensure effective communication for Deaf patients seeking medical care at Providence’s Seattle-area facilities. DRA’s clients, all of whom are Deaf and use ASL as their primary method of communication, had … Continue reading » “Spencer v. Providence St. Joseph Health”
December 13, 2021
In December 2021, Disability Rights Advocates and National Association of the Deaf filed a lawsuit against three major providers of podcasts, SiriusXM, Stitcher, and Pandora, to end their exclusion of deaf and hard of hearing Americans from each company’s extensive podcast streaming service. Read the complaint here. Because Defendants do not make transcripts available for … Continue reading » “National Association of the Deaf v. Sirius XM”
July 21, 2021
On July 20, 2021, DRA filed a class action lawsuit against the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) on behalf of Deaf human resource (HR) professionals who do not have equal access to SHRM’s services because SHRM fails to provide accommodations like sign language interpreters, captioning, and timely transcripts for SHRM’s continuing education programming. SHRM … Continue reading » “Ruffa v. The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM)”
April 21, 2021
On April 20, 2021, Disability Rights Advocates and Lynn S. Walsh filed a class action lawsuit against the State of Oregon and the Oregon Department of Corrections (ODOC) on behalf of current and former people with disabilities who are incarcerated and who have been charged for the costs of the prostheses and other equipment they … Continue reading » “Terrill v. State of Oregon”
