On February 1, 2013, a deaf jail inmate filed this lawsuit on behalf of himself in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The plaintiff claimed that the officials at DC’s Correctional Treatment Facility denied him (1) effective access to qualified interpreters (2) effective access to telecommunications, (3) access to jail alerts and announcements, and (4) adequate access to visitation. This effectively prevented the plaintiff from communicating with staff and inmates inside the jail, and family and friends during visitation hours. The plaintiff sued the District of Columbia under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. Represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the plaintiff sought damages and attorneys’ fees and costs.

The plaintiff claimed that officers at the D.C. Correctional Treatment Facility denied him adequate accommodations from the moment he arrived. The plaintiff’s native language was American Sign Language. He had relied on interpreters and auxiliary aids when communicating with people who did not know American Sign Language. Although he could communicate via notes in written English, it was his second language and no substitute for the accommodations guaranteed by the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act. Yet no interpreter was present for intake, orientation, or at any point during the plaintiff’s fifty-one day sentence. The lack of accommodation prevented the plaintiff from obtaining adequate health care, accessing the facility’s rehabilitative services, and communicating with visitors. During in person visits, the plaintiff wore handcuffs. The plaintiff analogized that this was equivalent to gagging a hearing prisoner.

On April 4, 2013 the case was reassigned to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. Over a year later on August 2, 2014, Judge Jackson referred the case to a magistrate judge for mediation. But by October, the parties had not reached a settlement. The case proceeded through discovery.

On November 14, 2014 the plaintiff moved for summary judgment with respect to claim (1) that he had been denied access to an interpreter, and claim (2) that he had been denied effective telecommunication technology. On September 2, 2015, the judge granted the plaintiff's motion for partial summary judgment with respect to his claims that the facility had denied him adequate access to interpreters and telecommunications technology. 128 F.Supp.3d 250 (D.D.C. 2015). On September 29, 2015 the defendant filed a motion to reconsider the summary judgment the court had filed against them. Judge Brown denied this motion on November 25, 2015. 146 F.Supp.3d 197 (D.D.C. 2015).

The case then went to trial with respect to the plaintiff’s remaining Rehabilitation Act claims, and on May 11, 2016 the jury returned a judgment for the plaintiff and awarded $70,000 in damages. The city appealed. The District of Columbia sought and obtained an order to withhold attorneys' fees from the judgment until the appeal had been resolved.

The Defendant appealed on the following issues: the calculation of the plaintiff's damages, whether there was a duty to conduct disability assessment before admitting the plaintiff, whether there was a genuine issue of fact that the jail afforded the plaintiff an interpreter and on the plaintiffs non-interpreter claims, and whether the court erred in allowing opinions from the plaintiff's experts. Before the appeal resolved though, the parties entered a settlement agreement on November 11, 2016. Information regarding this settlement is not available on the docket.

Subsequently, the D.C. appellate court entered a stipulated dismissal, requiring each party to pay their own attorneys' fees and costs. The case is now closed.

Keagan Potts - 01/30/2019


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