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Kaufman Dorowicz fired a colleague after she refused a request for disability accommodations, the lawsuit alleges.
June 13, 2024, 2:53 PM CST
A fired associate at the Philadelphia law firm Kaufman Dorowicz has sued the firm for alleged disability discrimination (Image credit: Shutterstock)
A fired employee at the Philadelphia law firm Kaufman Dolowich has sued the firm for alleged disability discrimination.
The colleague has sensorineural hearing loss and an auditory processing disorder, and his problems began after he disclosed his hearing loss in July 2022 and explained that he needed more time to process and decipher written words, according to the lawsuit, filed June 11 in federal court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
Law360 has the story.
The co-worker was using the pseudonym “John Doe” in the lawsuit, which he was allowed to do so by a June 12 order from U.S. District Judge Chad F. Kenney of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
The employee stated that he completed an accommodation request with Human Resources in August 2022. He asked for an increase in billable hours to complete assignments, weekly mentoring sessions to discuss invoice entries, and the ability to work remotely more frequently to increase his total hours worked.
His request for accommodation was denied, the lawsuit says, and the supervising attorney then stopped giving him work. He also faced “significantly increased criticism regarding his billing practices and performance.”
In a November 2022 performance review, an associate attorney called on Kaufman Dolowitch to do more to help attorneys with disabilities feel included, and the attorney wrote that she was working with the ABA Disability Rights Committee to promote accommodations regarding billable hours and realization rates.
The colleague was fired the following month.
He alleges disability discrimination, failure to provide a reasonable accommodation, and retaliation in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act, as well as violations of the Pennsylvania Human Rights Act.
Representatives for the company did not immediately respond to an ABA Journal email seeking comment.