Disability Discrimination Attorneys New York City

Family Medical Leave Act Lawyers

Pursuant to the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), qualified individuals with short-term illnesses/disabilities or family members with certain medical conditions are entitled to take time off of work to tend to those disabilities. Pursuant to the FMLA, an employee is allowed to take up to twelve (12) weeks during the calendar year to tend to a disability while their employer must keep their position open when they return from FMLA leave. In addition, employers may not retaliate against employees who exercise their FMLA rights. For example, an employer cannot demote or terminate a pregnant employee for exercising her right to take time off to have her baby. This is also true for employees suffering from mental impairments. Unfortunately, this type of discrimination is much more common than it should be, and often times we see employers creating pretexts to justify retaliatory acts against those who exercise their rights. It is important to have an attorney who can evaluate your entire working record, and build evidence to show that the pretextual reasons for the retaliatory actions happened only after the employer learned of the employee's disability. This, of course, is a major violation and prevents an employee from exercising their FMLA rights.

Reasonable Accommodation Lawyers

Employers are required to provide reasonable accommodation for disabled employees so that they can continue working and performing the essential functions of their job. These accommodations must be provided to disabled employees unless it would cause the employer undue hardship. An employer must engage in an interactive process with an employee to find accommodation and discuss what accommodation is needed and how it can work within the business. The failure of an employer to engage in such an interactive process can be strong evidence that reasonable accommodation was denied. We find that employers often refuse to engage in any process and provide little – if any – accommodations for their disabled employees, effectively resulting in their constructive termination. Employees faced with these dilemmas can choose to fight back and recover back pay, front pay, and emotional distress damages for such behaviors.