Douglas v. Kriegsfeld Corp., 884 A.2d 1109 (2005)

Citation: Douglas v. Kriegsfeld Corp., 884 A.2d 1109 (2005)
Parent Document: Douglas v. Kriegsfeld Corp., 884 A.2d 1109 (2005)
Jurisdiction: DC (municipal)
Effective Date: 2005-10-13
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1472683/douglas-v-kriegsfeld-corp/ ↗

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[50] The trial court relied for its expert testimony analysis on our decision in American Univ. v. Comm'n on Human Rights, 598 A.2d 416 (D.C.1991), an employment discrimination case. In American University, we reversed a decision of the D.C. Commission on Human Rights, applying the Human Rights Act, in which the Commission had found discrimination in firing an employee without making a reasonable accommodation for her manic depression. We saw nothing in the record to show that the employee's job deficiencies were related to her handicap, or that a reasonable accommodation was possible. In the first place, no expert testimony was "offered to prove that complainant's disablement prevented her from performing the job," id. at 423, whereas in this case witnesses Sutton and Byrd testified that there was a causal relationship between the tenant's mental illness (exacerbated by alcohol abuse) and the deterioration of her apartment. Furthermore, in American University, the complainant acknowledged that medication "allowed her to behave in a `normal' way," id.; cf. Sutton v. United Air Lines, 527 U.S. 471, 482, 119 S.Ct. 2139, 144 L.Ed.2d 450 (1999) (holding that petitioner was not disabled under Americans with Disabilities Act when corrective measures, eye glasses, had completely corrected physical impairment). That acknowledgment effectively obviated any need for an accommodation by her employer, whereas in this case the tenant's apartment living could not be normal without intervention. Finally, in American University, the employee herself denied any relationship between her illness and her job performance, in contrast with the case proffered here on the tenant's behalf (despite her own reported denials). We need not decide whether these distinctions have relevance here, for as elaborated in the text below, American University is inapposite for a more fundamental reason: on this record, expert testimony is not essential to findings of the tenant's mental illness and its causal relationship to her filthy apartment.

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