ADA Violation – Fitness for Duty Examination

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Todd Kurtzhals v. County of Dunn

Case No.: 19-3111

Officials: MANION, KANNE, and WOOD, Circuit Judges.

Focus: ADA Violation – Fitness for Duty Examination

Sergeant Todd Kurtzhals worked for the Sheriff’s Office of Dunn County, Wisconsin. After he threatened physical violence against one of his fellow officers, Deputy Dennis Rhead, the Office put him on temporary paid administrative leave and ordered him to undergo a fitness-for-duty evaluation. Kurtzhals was convinced that his supervisors took this course of action because they knew that Kurtzhals has a history of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), not because his conduct violated the County’s Workplace Violence Policy and implicated public safety.

Acting on that conviction, Kurtzhals sued Dunn County for employment discrimination in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. § 12112. The district court concluded that no reasonable jury could find that Kurtzhals’s PTSD was the “but for” cause of the County’s action or that it was plainly unreasonable for Kurtzhals’s superiors to believe that a fitness-for-duty examination was warranted, and so it granted summary judgment to the County. We agree with that assessment and affirm.

Affirmed

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Derek A Hawkins is trademark corporate counsel for Harley-Davidson. Hawkins oversees the prosecution and maintenance of the Harley-Davidson’s international trademark portfolio in emerging markets.