A disability discrimination suit against Baltimore County claiming that it violated the Americans With Disabilities Act by subjecting police and fire department employees to unnecessary medical exams, required disclosure of overly broad medical histories and rejected two fire department applicants because they had diabetes has settled. The ten persons involve will divide $500,000 in varying amounts.
The settlement also included two interesting and important points: (1) the county may no longer use one particular doctor to conduct medical exams of its employees and/or applicants; and, (2) if it requires an employee to undergo a medical exam, it must show that the employee's ability to perform his or her job is impaired in some way.
Source: Baltimore Sun
Police and firefighters are at the center of many violations of the Americans With Disabilities Act, often because their public employer goes off on a mistaken notion that some medical condition they have means that they can't do their job properly or safely. The ADA is directed at curing precisely this type of prejudice and discrimination. Here's some recent posts that show the point: Police Officer Prevails In Disability Suit; Epileptic Police Officer Awarded $225,000 for Disability Discrimination; Firefighter Captain Settles Disability Discrimination Suit.
Another frequent violation of the ADA directed at public safety workers are 100% healed rules which Robert Abell discussed at his Kentucky Employment Law Blog: Do An Employer's "100% Healed" or "No Restrictions" Policies Violate the ADA?
Lexington, Kentucky disability discrimination lawyer Robert Abell represents individuals and employees in cases under the ADA; contact him at 859-254-7076.
