Garcia v. Beck

Background

Orlando Garcia, an individual with physical disabilities who uses a wheelchair, sued Peter J. Beck, Regia Beck, and Lola’s Chicken Shack, LLC. He alleged that Lola’s Chicken Shack, a restaurant in Alameda, California, lacked wheelchair-accessible paths of travel and accessible outside dining surfaces during his May 2021 visit. Garcia alleged that he visited partly to determine whether the defendants complied with disability-access laws and that he would return once the restaurant and its facilities were represented to be accessible. He also alleged that existing barriers and uncertainty about other barriers deterred him from returning.

Garcia brought claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act. The defendants filed a motion asking the court to dismiss the ADA claim as moot, declare Garcia a vexatious litigant, impose sanctions on Garcia’s counsel, and decline supplemental jurisdiction over the Unruh Act claim. Supplemental jurisdiction is a federal court’s authority to hear related state-law claims alongside federal claims.

Mootness

The defendants argued that the ADA claim was moot because, after the lawsuit was filed, the restaurant hired a consultant and made changes. They cited an electric entrance door, an ADA-compliant outdoor table, a sign directing disabled customers to that table, an ADA policy manual, employee training, and an agreement for yearly compliance checks.

The court acknowledged that these actions were commendable but found that the relevant facts remained disputed. Garcia maintained that the restaurant still violated the ADA, while the defendants maintained that it did not. The court explained that whether the alleged barriers had been adequately corrected was intertwined with the merits of Garcia’s ADA claim. It therefore declined to dismiss the ADA claim as moot.

The court also declined to convert the motion into a motion for summary judgment. It noted that discovery was stayed under General Order 56 and that Garcia wanted an expert site inspection under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34 to assess the restaurant’s accessibility and recent changes.

Vexatious-Litigant Request

The defendants asserted that Garcia had brought 732 ADA cases since 2014, including 31 against Alameda businesses in May, and argued that many cases were factually and legally similar. They also disputed whether Garcia genuinely intended to use the businesses’ services. Garcia did not deny that he was an ADA tester—someone who visits businesses to check compliance with disability-access laws.

The court held that the defendants did not come close to showing that Garcia was a vexatious litigant. It stated that filing many complaints, standing alone, is not enough, and that the defendants had not shown that Garcia’s cases generally, or this case specifically, were meritless, harassing, or brought for an improper purpose. The court also noted that the defendants claimed to have taken corrective action as a direct result of this lawsuit. It therefore would not deem Garcia a vexatious litigant.

Sanctions

For the same reasons, the court declined to sanction Garcia’s counsel for allegedly filing multiple complaints for harassment or to obtain early settlements without intending to litigate the merits. The court stated that Garcia and his counsel were permitted to bring ADA cases and that Garcia was not responsible for the defendants’ claimed expense of $2,000 for the vexatious-litigant motion.

Supplemental Jurisdiction and Disposition

The defendants asked the court to decline supplemental jurisdiction over the Unruh Act claim if the ADA claim were dismissed as moot. Because the court was not dismissing the ADA claim, it found that federal-question jurisdiction remained under 28 U.S.C. § 1331.

The court denied the motion. The order therefore left the ADA and Unruh Act claims pending and rejected the requests to declare Garcia a vexatious litigant and impose sanctions.