U.S. Attorney’s Office Reaches Agreement with Hackensack Meridian Health to Ensure it Permits Service Animals at Medical Appointments

NEWARK, N.J. - The U.S. Attorney's Office has reached an agreement with Hackensack Meridian Health (HMH) to resolve allegations that HMH violated the Americans with Disability Act (ADA) by prohibiting individuals with disabilities from bringing service animals to medical appointments, U.S. Attorney Philip R. Sellinger announced.

During its investigation, the U.S. Attorney's Office determined that HMH violated the ADA by refusing to allow a service animal into a medical office. The matter stems from a complaint alleging that Dr. Abigail Whetstone's office, part of HMH, did not permit an individual with a disability using a service animal to bring the service animal into the office for an appointment.

Under the ADA, places of public accommodation must make reasonable modifications to policies and practices to permit persons with disabilities who require service animals to use service animals while participating in its services. Places of public accommodation also cannot require individuals using service animals to produce documents or tags verifying that the animal is a service animal.

HMH has agreed to make reasonable modifications to its policies, practices, and procedures to permit the use of service animals by persons with disabilities, to ensure that all employees working at Whetstone's office have a hard copy of HMH's service animal policy, and to ensure that all employees working at Whetstone's office receive training on Title III's service animal compliance. HMH will also pay damages to the complainant.

Individuals who believe they may have been victims of discrimination may call the U.S. Attorney's Office Civil Rights Hotline at (855) 281-3339 and/or file a complaint with the U.S Attorney's Office at http://www.justice.gov/usao-nj/civil-rights-enforcement/complaint. Additional information about the ADA can be found at www.ada.gov, or by calling the Department of Justice's toll-free information line at (800) 514-0301 and (800) 514-0383 (TDD).

The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Kelly Horan Florio, Senior Civil Rights Counsel in the U.S. Attorney's Office's Civil Rights Division.