Kansas Court Denies Employment Discrimination Claims under ADA, FMLA, and PDA

Extract

The United States District Court of Kansas, in Gudenkauf v. Stauffer, Znc.(922 F. Supp. 465 (D. Kan. 1996), granted the defendants motion for summary judgment for the plaintiff's claims of pregnancy-related discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA), but the court denied a similar motion for the plaintiff's claim under the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA). The court found summary judgment to be appropriate for the ADA claim based on its finding that the plaintiff's pregnancy did not constitute an impairment as required by the statute; as for the FMLA claim, it determined that the defendants failure to grant the plaintiff's leave request did not violate the statute. However, the court determined that summary judgment was inappropriate for the PDA claim because of material questions of fact about whether the defendant had acted with discriminatory intent.

In considering the motions for summary judgment, the court accepted the following facts as incontrovertible. Plaintiff Michaela Gudenkauf worked for the defendant Stauffer, Inc.