On July 26th, 1990, one of the most transformative pieces of civil rights legislation was passed into law: the Americans with Disabilities Act, otherwise known as the ADA. The ADA was created to prohibit discrimination against individuals with disabilities in all areas of public life, including jobs, schools, transportation, and all other public and private areas opened to the public. Today many of us can see the effects of the ADA just by walking into a building or riding public transportation.
The ADA is divided into five sections to protect individuals with disabilities in different areas of life:
Title I: Employment
Title II: Public Services: State and Local Government
Title III: Public Accommodations and Services by Private Entities
Title IV: Telecommunications
Title V: Miscellaneous Provisions
The ADA does not provide an exhaustive list of conditions that are protected under the act. Some believe the ADA was designed to be incomplete so that it could be expanded and include new disabilities. For example, in July of 2021, President Joe Biden announced that individuals suffering from serious long-term COVID-19 could qualify as disabled under the ADA.
Employers’ Obligations under the ADA
Many ADA lawsuits filed against businesses are based on allegations of discrimination, which include allegations relating to Title I of the ADA. Therefore, it is crucial for employers to understand their rights and obligations under the ADA.
The Appellate Court of Illinois, First Judicial District recently found that the COVID-19 pandemic was a factor that weighed against forum transfer in Bearden v. Conagra Foods, Inc. In this case, 45 plaintiffs brought a total of 39 product liability actions in the circuit court of Cook County against Conagra Foods, Inc., Conagra Brands, Inc., DS Containers, Inc., and Full-Fill Industries, LLC. Conagra Foods and the other defendants involved filed a combined motion to dismiss for forum non conveniens as to the out-of-state plaintiffs and a motion to transfer out of Cook County for the in-state plaintiffs. The circuit court issued a ruling without hearing argument dismissing the defendants’ motions and issued its findings.
Interestingly, in addition to weighing the standard private and public interest legal factors, the court also weighed another factor that has had both private and public implications for all of us over the past two and a half years: COVID-19.
While wrangling up all the necessary witnesses that could testify in a case involving numerous out-of-state plaintiffs and corporations with offices and employees across the country might be a factor against a forum in certain cases, here, the circuit court found that because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was likely that most or all of the witnesses would testify by video and that remote depositions and testimony would likely be used. The court found that the arguments that court dockets would be backlogged and that jury trials might be postponed or delayed were not persuasive because COVID-19 had rendered that the case in every jurisdiction.
The circuit court did find, however, that jury visits to the sites weighed in favor of dismissal or transfer, not specifically because of COVID-19, but one could easily assume that if the court considered COVID-19 in other factors, perhaps having a jury travel to multiple states during a pandemic influenced its decision on that point as well.
COVID-19 as a Factor
On appeal, the defendants argued that the circuit court improperly found that COVID-19 weighed against dismissal or transfer. They argued that including COVID-19 as a factor was an abuse of the circuit court’s discretion. Upon review, the appellate court upheld the circuit court’s ruling in total, including its inclusion of COVID-19 in its list of factors.
The appellate court stated that “a circuit court’s decision is an abuse of discretion when it is arbitrary, fanciful, or unreasonable, or when no reasonable person would take the same view.” Bearden v. Conagra Foods, Inc., 2021 IL App (1st) 210234-U, ¶ 71 (quoting Palacios v. Mlot, 2013 IL App (1st) 121416, ¶ 18. The appellate court found that the circuit court’s consideration of such issues as testifying virtually or by video, packed dockets, and delayed jury trials, were not fanciful, arbitrary, or so unreasonable that no person would ever take the view of the circuit court. In affirming the circuit court’s decision, the appellate court has determined that COVID-19, and more specifically the impacts and related measures taken on and by the legal system can be a factor considered by Illinois circuit courts in deciding a forum non conveniens issue.
The New Normal During COVID-19
The factors considered by the circuit court in this case are familiar to anyone in the legal profession that has continued to work throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Zoom and telephonic depositions have become the norm, trial dates have been pushed back multiple times, and pajama pants have become standard dress code while in webcam meetings (well, the court didn’t explicitly consider that last one, but we all know how important that’s become).
Concerns for Defendants
Forum non conveniens motions are a viable tool for defendants seeking to have cases dismissed, avail themselves of friendlier state or local laws, or a more favorable jury pool. Some of the standard factors weighing in favor of a transfer have been effectively negated by the measures taken by the legal profession to address the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now that courts and law firms have knowledge of these measures, they are not likely to go away anytime soon and could be damaging to a defendant’s motion for forum non conveniens efforts.
With many state legal systems continuing to utilize these COVID-19 measures and now precedent on the books in one of the busiest legal arenas in the country, it is possible that other courts and other states could follow the Illinois circuit court’s lead and explicitly consider COVID-19 in their analysis of forum non conveniens motions. For defendants, this could prove to be a bigger headache than trying to get that one co-counsel to mute their phone during your cross-examination. But hey, at least you don’t have to show the plaintiff how to work the Zoom camera.
At the end of 2021, two outstanding Rasmussen Dickey Moore associates were named members of the firm. We’re proud to welcome Travis Pour and Brandon Powell as new partners in our St. Louis office!
“We’re excited that our firm is growing,” says Nate Lindsey, member attorney in the St. Louis office. “And that includes promoting new leaders and partners like Brandon and Travis.”
“I am very pleased to have Travis and Brandon joining the partnership at RDM,” says Bryan Skelton, another St. Louis-based member attorney. “I have worked with Travis since 2013 and with Brandon since 2017. They have been a very significant part of my team from the beginning. They are both excellent attorneys who will serve our clients well into the future. I am looking forward to working with them for many years to come.”
Travis Pour
Travis received a Bachelor of Science in Construction Engineering from Purdue University and attended law school at Southern Illinois University School of Law in Carbondale, obtaining his Juris Doctor in 2013. With a background in construction engineering, Travis focuses his practice in areas that he has hands-on experience with, defending corporate clients in the construction industry.
“I am honored to be named a partner and I am looking forward to being a part of Rasmussen Dickey Moore’s growth and success.”
Travis and his wife, Katie, find themselves chasing their 18-month-old son, Jude, in their free time. Away from the office and home, Travis helps out at his family’s winery, The Pour Vineyard, in Red Bud, Illinois.
Brandon Powell
Brandon is also a 2013 SIU School of Law alum, graduating summa cum laude, while also serving as editor-in-chief of his law journal and member of the school’s moot court board. Prior to law school, Brandon received his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Evansville in Indiana.
Following a term as a judicial extern for Illinois Supreme Court Justice Lloyd Karmeier in 2013, Brandon began his practice in Evansville, representing corporate clients in a variety of complex litigation matters. He has extensive trial and appellate experience, both in state and federal courts.
“My entire legal career has been focused on litigation, and I am extremely excited to continue to work with the group of tenacious, detail-oriented litigators at RDM.”
Brandon and his wife, Jennifer, are parents to three boys, including twins born in November of 2021. They reside in O’Fallon, IL
With hard work, a bit of luck, and the best staff in the business, and of course our happy clients, Rasmussen Dickey Moore has been able to sustain growth through turbulent times. We’ve established ourselves as a premier small firm in the fields we serve. We’ve expanded from a small office in Kansas City’s Westport District to three branches in Kansas City, St. Louis, and Los Angeles with nearly two dozen top-tier attorneys. We are truly thankful for the clients, attorneys, and staff who have brought us so far.
In 2021, RDM celebrated an exciting and impressive milestone—25 years in business! While the ongoing pandemic preempted a silver anniversary party, we still want to take some time to reflect on the past quarter century, from humble beginnings to where we are today.
Rasmussen & Barton
On November 1st, 1996, Kurt Rasmussen, George Barton, and a handful of other attorneys from the Watson & Marshall law firm (including Clayton Dickey and Steve Moore) opened Rasmussen & Barton. The newly established firm first hung their shingle at 21 West 43rd Street in the Westport District of Kansas City. Kurt’s now-retired secretary Anita Kuhn recalls that first office as “not too good.”
“Leaky roofs, crows in the parking lot, people sleeping in the dumpster, one nasty bathroom in the basement,” were some of the challenges Clay recollects from the first year on West 43rd Street. “Anita wore her rain gear and brought a fishing pole to work to mark the occasion of the leaks.”
Our firm’s first office at 21 West 43rd Street in Westport, Kansas City.
The staff initially consisted of four employees, including Anita and paralegal Charles Blaschke, who still works for the firm today. According to the first issue of the R&B newsletter in the winter of 1996, the firm started off with “Corel Word Perfect 7.0 and Microsoft Windows installed on three PCs and two laptops; two laser printers; Savin 9600 copy machine; postage meter; one facsimile machine; phone system with voicemail and cost accounting procedures; scanner with sheet feeder; and of course—the office pen.”
“That first year was scary,” Clay recalls. “We no longer had the safety nets associated with a large organization—health care, steady paycheck, rent, utilities, and overhead being paid for by someone else. We had to pay the rent, buy the office supplies, make payroll, and advance costs to clients.”
However, at the end of their first year in business, the attorneys and staff at the fledgling firm had faith in their future and each other. The firm moved to newer office space on Roanoke Road in Westport and renamed itself to Rasmussen Barton & Willis to recognize the achievements of Randy Willis in developing the firm.
When George Barton left the firm to pursue a solo practice, the name changed again, with a couple of attorneys who stuck it out from the beginning—Clay and Steve—adding their names to the sign, becoming Rasmussen Willis Dickey & Moore.
Kurt Rasmussen in the early years.
RWDM’s office at 9200 Ward Parkway.
Into the New Millennium
By 2001, the firm had outgrown its Roanoke Road office and relocated to 9200 Ward Parkway, securing two floors of space and some creature comforts for the growing roster of attorneys and staff. Rasmussen Willis Dickey & Moore would operate from this location for the next 15 years.
Rasmussen Dickey Moore
Clay Dickey and retired secretary Anita Kuhn.
2016 was a year of many milestones. The firm, stronger than ever, celebrated its 20th anniversary. The firm relocated its Kansas City headquarters to the present office in the Holmes Corporate Center at 1001 East 101st Terrace.
Also in 2016, longtime partner Randy Willis retired. With that, the firm again changed its name and became Rasmussen Dickey Moore, or RDM, as we’re known today.
How Did We Get Here?
“Luck,” says Kurt. While luck certainly plays a role in the success of any business, most anyone at RDM will say there’s more to it than that.
“Our mantra for the past 25 years has been, ‘There is no substitute for hard work,’” says Steve. “Hard work pulled the firm through tremendously challenging times—9/11, client bankruptcies, market crashes, and the current pandemic. There is no real mystery to creating a successful law firm. The harder you work, the more successful you will be.”
Steve Moore (left) and Clay Dickey (right).
Clay reiterates the value of hard work. “What sets us apart is dedication to representing our clients with zeal. We have an ethical duty to be zealous in our representation. We should never allow our adversaries (and our competition) to out-work us. Our clients pay us well to represent them and we owe them nothing short of our best foot forward in every case.”
“I’m confident our clients see that we care more than most about thinking outside the box and creatively thinking about how best to succeed in a case that is tailored to the peculiar facts of any given challenge. We come to work each day with enthusiasm and a willingness to do the best job you can for our clients. They deserve nothing less.”
Behind the luck and the hard work, of course, are people. Dozens of present and past attorneys and staff have dedicated their day-to-day lives to providing exemplary work and quality service to our clients for 25 years and counting.
Despite the constant work, Anita Kuhn recalls, “we always stopped for people. We take a moment to reflect, we celebrate each other, and we take time to help each other.”
The National Guard Team Medal presented to RDM by Col. Chuck Blaschke.
One notable example is when paralegal and National Guardsman Col. Chuck Blaschke was deployed to Iraq in the early 2000s. “The respect that Kurt and the firm had for me as a guardsman and soldier through two deployments was remarkable,” says Chuck. In return, Chuck presented the firm with the Army National Guard Team Medal as a thanks for the support shown while he was away serving the country.
Another paralegal, Teresa Tallman, has been with the firm for most of its existence, recently celebrating 22 years with RDM. She’s made her dedicated work with us a family affair, with her daughter Brittany Leonard also working at the firm as a paralegal.
“The people who deserve special recognition for the success of our law firm are our families,” adds Steve. “They were (and still are) the support system that have allowed us to make innumerable personal sacrifices that have resulted in a successful law firm. Our key to success has been and will always be a strong work ethic, and our families have made that possible.”
To the Future
RDM has come a long way over 25 years, expanding to three offices in Kansas City, St. Louis, and Los Angeles. However, our commitment to our core values—dedication, flexibility, and value—have always stayed the same. And while we’ve grown, we still acknowledge the importance of maintaining a lean, efficient organization to be able to provide top-tier service to our clients nationwide at an extraordinary value.
Recently, RDM was recognized in U.S. News & World Report’s 2022 Best Law Firmsfor our work in products liability defense, mass torts defense, and franchise law. Kurt Rasmussen, Clay Dickey, and Joseph Dioszeghy have been once again named to the Best Lawyers list. And Kurt Rasmussen and Steve Moore were listed as 2022 Super Lawyers in products liability defense.
We’re immensely grateful for the opportunity to serve our clients, whether it be from day one of a case or down to the wire before trial. Our attorneys and staff are eager to demonstrate our dedication and attention to detail that have set us apart over the last 25 years.
For my very first job as an attorney, I got to work with veterans as an Equal Justice Works fellow starting Legal Services of Eastern Missouri’s Veterans Project. It was the most rewarding way to begin my legal career that I could ever imagine. I had the honor of representing veterans and their family members in the St. Louis region over the course of two years. These cases arose from a variety of significant civil legal needs that are common among veterans and their families including housing, public benefits, family law, domestic violence, and consumer issues.
I am not being hyperbolic when I write that there was a massive number of cases that flooded into our office. While we were successful in helping numerous veterans who contacted us, there were still many we could not represent due to the limits of our own resources. For every veteran we could help, there were more who were unable to access the legal assistance they needed. According to the Legal Services Corporation, in 2017, “71% of households with veterans or other military personnel reported experiencing a civil legal problem in the past year.” Furthermore, veterans and military personnel reported receiving “inadequate or no professional legal help for 88% of their civil legal problems in 2017.” These issues persist to this day and have also been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
So, how can the legal community help tackle these overwhelming needs?
Attorneys Volunteering to Help Veterans
In addition to the clients we were able to represent, the project also worked with even more veterans to provide brief legal consultations and give them referrals to other organizations, including networks of private attorneys who could accept their cases pro bono.
I cannot express how impactful volunteer attorneys were in these roles, helping to fill the gaps as much as they could. Those who chose to utilize their law license to help a veteran keep a roof over their head, stop a predatory lender from financially exploiting them, or get out of an abusive relationship reported a sense of personal fulfillment in serving those who served our country.
This Veterans Day, I wholeheartedly encourage every member of the legal profession to assist our nation’s veterans and their families in addressing these outstanding legal needs. There are excellent organizations out there that you can contact and connect with abundant opportunities to serve our nation’s veterans.
Volunteer Opportunities
The need for legal assistance among veterans and their families is vast. There is no shortage of volunteer opportunities for attorneys seeking to serve veterans through pro bono work. Below are just a few of the organizations addressing the legal needs of veterans in our local communities.
St. Louis Area Legal Resources for Veterans
The Kaufman Fund serves veterans and their families in the St. Louis, providing a number of services for low-income veterans. Their Veterans Legal Referral Program offers assistance with both civil and criminal legal matters. Attorneys interested in volunteering with The Kaufman Fund can apply here.
In the Metro East, Land of Lincoln Legal Aid serves veterans in the state of Illinois who need civil legal assistance. Attorneys can learn more about volunteering with Land of Lincoln Legal Aid here.
Kansas City Area Legal Resources for Veterans
Legal Aid of Western Missouri supports veterans needing civil legal assistance in Kansas City area and other portions of western Missouri. Their Veterans Relief Project helps veterans navigate legal issues including bankruptcies, foreclosures, student loans, and acquiring VA benefits. Western Missouri attorneys interested in volunteering can find out more about the Volunteer Attorney Project here.
Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles’ Veterans Justice Center assists low-income veterans with a variety of legal issues. Attorneys interested in volunteering with LAFLA can find more information here.
Nationwide Legal Resources for Veterans
The U.S Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) hosts events and law clinics across the country. You can find upcoming events and points of contact at the Veterans Justice Outreach Program website.
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