Smith v. Clark County School District, No. 11-17398 (9th Cir. 2013)
Annotate this CasePlaintiff filed suit against the district alleging claims for disability discrimination and failure to accommodate under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), 42 U.S.C. 12101-12213. On appeal, plaintiff challenged the district court's grant of summary judgment in favor of the district. The court concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion by reconsidering its prior order denying summary judgment where the district court found that it had committed clear error by not considering whether plaintiff gave a sufficient explanation for the conflict between her ADA claim and her Nevada Public Employees' Retirement Systems (PERS) application under the Supreme Court's decision in Cleveland v. Policy Mgmt. Sys. Corp. Under the standard set forth in Cleveland, the court concluded that plaintiff gave sufficient explanations for the inconsistencies between her ADA claim and her PERS and Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), 29 U.S.C. 2601, applications to survive summary judgment. Accordingly, the court affirmed in part and reversed in part, remanding for further proceedings.
Court Description: Employment Discrimination. The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court’s judgment in favor of an employer on claims of disability discrimination and failure to accommodate under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The panel held that the district court did not abuse its discretion by granting the employer’s motion for reconsideration of an order denying summary judgment because in that order the court committed a clear error of law by not applying controlling Supreme Court precedent. The panel held that, in deciding whether the plaintiff was a “qualified individual” under the ADA, the district court did not properly apply the framework set forth in Cleveland v. Policy Mgmt. Sys. Corp., 526 U.S. 795 (1999), for analyzing the effect of inconsistent statements on applications for disability benefits. The panel concluded that claims for disability retirement, disability leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, and private insurance disability benefits do not inherently conflict with an ADA claim because they do not account for an applicant’s ability to work with a reasonable accommodation. In addition, the panel held that, viewing the facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, she had offered sufficient explanations for her inconsistent statements in her prior benefit applications so that her case could proceed past summary judgment. Therefore, the panel held that the district court erred in granting summary judgment for the employer, and reversed and remanded for further proceedings.
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