EEOC Prevails With Jury In ADA Perceived Disability Case

 On Tuesday, the EEOC announced that it had obtained a jury verdict in an ADA perceived disability discrimination case where the Sixth Circuit last year reversed the employer's summary judgment (as reported here).    According to the EEOC, the jury awarded the employee $6,000 in compensatory damages and the parties stipulated to a similar amount for back pay.  (The legal fees would clearly have dwarfed the verdict).      The employee had requested intermittent FMLA leave to deal with anxiety and there had been factual disputes about the existence, content and legitimacy of supporting medical documentation (all of which created issues for the parties' credibility).  The employee was terminated despite having no disciplinary history during her eight months of employment.  The employer contended that it had not regarded her as disabled because she had admitted being able to immediately return to work, but the legal standard is merely whether it perceived her as having a mental impairment.