Fox & Robertson has achieved effective communication for Deaf, hard of hearing, and blind people in a variety of contexts using tools ranging from large-scale impact litigation to individual advocacy letters combined with gentle telephonic persuasion. We have challenged prison systems to provide effective communication for prisoners who are Deaf or blind and challenged the failure of law enforcement and local jails to provide sign language interpreters during non-emergent arrests, investigations, and detention. We have reached agreements – both through litigation and structured negotiations – with several large entertainment venues to provide open captioning of sporting events. And we have worked with the National Federation of the Blind to challenge inaccessible ATMs and inaccessible university web content.
Representative cases with links to key pleadings:
Rogers v. Colorado Department of Corrections and Disability Law Colorado v. Colorado Department of Corrections. In Rogers, we represented three Deaf people and one woman whose parents are Deaf in a lawsuit to force the CDOC to provide videophones. The court granted our motion for summary judgment, Rogers v. Colorado Dep’t of Corr., No. 16-CV-02733-STV, 2019 WL 4464036 (D. Colo. Sept. 18, 2019), and in 2020, we entered a settlement providing for videophones throughout the CDOC system. The following year, we teamed up with the student attorneys and their supervisors at the University of Denver Civil Rights Clinic, as well as co-counsel Disability Law Colorado, to challenge a wide range of issues affecting both Deaf and hard-of-hearing people in CDOC’s custody. When we filed, we issued a press release in ASL. The case settled in 2022. This year, following almost a year of negotiations concerning shortcomings in CDOC’s implementation, we reached an Amended Agreement that will put in place a Monitoring and Training Team to ensure compliance going forward.
Trivette v. Tennessee Department of Correction. We currently represent Disability Rights Tennessee and several current and former incarcerated people challenging the failure of the Tennessee Department of Correction to provide accommodations for Deaf prisoners. Despite years of advocacy by DRT, TDOC has denied Deaf prisoners consistent access to videophones and to qualified sign language interpreters during critical communications involving medical care, classification, religious services, and optional and mandatory educational classes.
In November 2020, the court denied TDOC’s motion to dismiss, holding that (among other things) that DRT had associational standing to sue TDOC on behalf of Deaf prisoners. Trivette v. Tennessee Dep’t of Correction, No. 3:20-CV-00276, 2020 WL 6685557 (M.D. Tenn. Nov. 12, 2020). In May, 2021, the court granted DRT’s motion for a preliminary injunction, ordering TDOC to provided access to videophones to the two then-incarcerated plaintiffs. Trivette v. Tennessee Dep’t of Correction, No. 3:20-CV-00276, 2021 WL 10366330 (M.D. Tenn. May 5, 2021). Finally, in July 2024, the court granted in part and denied in part the parties’ cross motions for summary judgment. Although our claims on behalf of hard of hearing prisoners were dismissed for failure to exhaust, the court granted summary judgment in favor of DRT concerning access to videophones and access to interpreters in specific high-stakes situations. Trivette v. Tennessee Dep’t of Correction, No. 3:20-CV-00276, — F. Supp. 3d —, 2024 WL 3366335 (M.D. Tenn. July 9, 2024). The case is scheduled to go to trial in January 2025. Co-counsel include DRT, Disability Rights Advocates, and Disability Law United.
Mackes v. Colorado Department of Corrections. In Mackes, we are co-counseling with Brown, Goldstein, Levy in representing two blind prisoners and the National Federation of the Blind of Colorado in a case against the CDOC. The two individual plaintiffs were being forced to rely on other prisoners to read and write their mail – including legal correspondence – draft required prison documents, and remain up to date on regulations and postings. We entered a settlement in 2022 in which CDOC promised to provide blind prisoners with laptops, scanners, and printers as well as other required accommodations. Because CDOC has consistently fallen short of promised measures, in November 2024, we filed a motion to enforce the settlement.
National Association of the Deaf v. Harvard University and National Association of the Deaf v. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In these companion cases, the National Association of the Deaf and several Deaf lifetime learners sued Harvard and MIT challenging the universities’ failure to caption their public-facing online content. The cases settled following five years of litigation and victories against a series of motions to dismiss, the last of which took our team of disability rights lawyers on a side quest into the Communications Decency Act. Nat’l Ass’n of the Deaf v. Harvard Univ., 377 F. Supp. 3d 49 (D. Mass. 2019). Both the Harvard case and the MIT case settled in 2020. In both cases, we co-counseled with the NAD, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund, the Disability Law Center, and Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll.