NAFCU is demanding that a California law firm stop sending letters to credit unions contending that they owe legal damages because their websites do not comply with the Americans With Disabilities Act.
In a letter to Scott Ferrell and Victoria Knowles of the Pacific Trial Attorneys, NAFCU President B. Dan Berger charges that the law firm is using questionable facts and assumptions of law in letters to credit unions.
“Your demand letters, which appear to be nearly identical and issued wholesale, contain a number of troubling characteristics,” Berger said, in the letter.
Dozens of credit unions have been sued based on allegations that their websites violate the ADA and even more have been sent demand letters.
The problem is exacerbated by the Justice Department’s decision not to issue rules governing website accessibility. The Obama Administration had announced its intention to issue such rules, but the Trump Administration has said it will not.
Berger said that while the letters claim to represent visually impaired people who have had trouble with credit union websites, none of the letters were sent by actual members of those credit unions.
In fact, the persons cited in the letter do not even fall with that credit union’s field of membership, he said.
The letters, Berger said, claim that credit unions fail to follow federal law even though the Justice Department has not issued regulations governing websites. And, he said, they make no effort to cite law in the jurisdiction of a targeted credit union.
“The letters by which your firm is demanding monetary payments are distorted and do not appear to reflect a sincere desire to aid the disabled members of credit unions,” he wrote.
And he said the claims that credit unions owe legal damages are untrue and violate ethical standards that prohibit attorneys from demanding damages based on law they know is untrue.
And Berger concludes the letter by demanding that the law firm retract the threats of legal action and stop making further demands.
As the number of lawsuits and demand letters to credit union have soared, CUNA and NAFCU have been attempting to provide tools with which to respond.
Attorneys from Pacific Trial Attorneys did not respond to requests for comment. The firm’s website states, “We have tried over a dozen cases to verdict under the Americans with Disabilities Act.”
