In today’s climate of evolving—and increasingly complex—federal and state public accommodations laws and regulations, experienced counsel is essential. Hunton’s public accommodations practice lawyers spearhead novel and cutting-edge approaches to public accessibility issues and lead teams that represent a large and diverse base of national clients in matters that cover the entire spectrum of public accessibility law. We have extensive experience in defending public accommodations class actions, federal pattern and practice accessibility cases filed by the US Department of Justice (DOJ), and state pattern and practice accessibility cases filed by state attorney generals. We have defended lawsuits against many of the leading plaintiff-side public accommodations attorneys in the country and have briefed and argued public accommodations cases in federal and state appellate courts across the nation. We also work with a nationwide team of consultants to oversee dockets of public accessibility cases and advise clients on a wide range of public accommodations audits and consulting projects.

• Defending nationwide pattern or practice public accommodations cases filed by the DOJ presenting first-impression federal law accessibility challenges to architectural designs (in the Ninth Circuit and Central District of California, Sixth Circuit and Northern District of Ohio, Ninth Circuit and District of Oregon, Fifth Circuit and Western District of Texas, California, North Carolina, and Texas).
• Securing jury trial wins in multiple single- and multi-plaintiff public accommodations cases presenting first-impression state law accessibility and consumer protection claims by mobility-impaired patrons challenging new architectural designs (in California and Texas).
• Defending national class actions presenting first-impression claims that the alleged failure to guarantee accessible hotel rooms when making internet hotel reservations violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (in California, Hawaii, and Texas).
• Defending a national class action presenting first-impression claims challenging whether charging customers for plant-based milk substitutions violated the ADA by unlawfully discriminating against customers with lactose-intolerance or milk allergies (in California).
• Defending multiple national and statewide class actions, and state agency pattern and practice actions, presenting first-impression claims seeking to mandate emerging closed-captioning, descriptive narration, and assistive listening technologies (in Arizona, California, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, and Washington).
• Defending multiple state and federal lawsuits, including multi-plaintiff and class actions, presenting website and mobile application accessibility claims (in California, Florida, Illinois, Minnesota, New York, and Pennsylvania).
• Defending a Ninth Circuit en banc appeal presenting first-impression standing issues under the "deterrent effect doctrine" for mobility-impaired patrons (in the Ninth Circuit and Central District of California).
• Consulting on disability access programs for patrons with developmental disabilities with national entertainment and theme park clients (in California and Florida).
• Consulting on emerging legal issues concerning internet website and mobile application accessibility with national retail, entertainment, grocery, financial, casual dining, and convenience store clients.
• Consulting on audits of detectible warning devices and self-checkout point-of-sale machines for national retail clients (in California, Florida, and Pennsylvania).
• Managing national and regional dockets of public accessibility cases for national retailer, casual dining, movie exhibitor, grocery, financial services, and fitness services clients (in Arizona, California, Florida, New York, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Washington, DC).