Teh One Who Knocks
11-12-2012, 11:49 AM
By KATE BRIQUELET - The NY Post
http://i.imgur.com/npJOT.jpg
She’s hell on wheels for Upper West Side merchants.
Wheelchair-riding Linda Slone, 64, is suing 39 shops in her neighborhood for not being handicapped-accessible.
The legal crusade is netting her thousands, but Slone, who cannot walk because of polio, insists she is simply championing the rights of the disabled.
“If you think this is a money-making scheme, you’re dead wrong,” said Slone, a speech pathologist. “I, along with anybody else with a disability, has the right to go wherever they choose to go and not have to be dissuaded or inconvenienced or even apologetic.”
Mom-and-pop shops live in mortal fear of her next visit.
“It’s a little too fishy to me,” said Andy Besch of West Side Wine, who settled with Slone this month.
“No one ever showed up at my store. No one was ever denied access. Yet I had to pay thousands and was given no opportunity to change anything.”
Barbara Gee Danskin, a shop selling dance gear, was also a target.
“It’s like getting hit up for money,” said owner Allan Greenberg. “It’s a shame. To fight it, you need deep pockets.”
Last month alone, Slone filed papers against eight shops on or near Columbus Avenue, aiming to force them to install ramps and other accessible features.
In each suit, all filed in Manhattan federal court, she demands $500 in damages, plus lawyers’ and experts’ fees, which could run up to $15,000.
She has settled half of her 39 suits since 2010. If she wins them all, she’ll reap at least $19,500 — and hundreds of thousands more for her Brooklyn attorney, Robert Mirel, who works for the Florida-based Weitz Law Firm.
Mirel declined to comment.
Weitz also represents Zoltan Hirsch, a Brooklyn double amputee who The Post revealed last year filed 147 suits citing the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Most small shops have no choice but to settle since the cost of going to court would put them out of business.
Nick Bazas, of Quality Florists, called the drive-by litigation “extortion.”
“You’re asking me for $500 without coming into my store,” he said. “I have a ramp, a sign and a handicapped bathroom. If you would have asked me to use it, I have it.”
Slone said she often warns shops when their steps prevent her motorized chair from entering but admitted it’s easier to call her lawyers.
“I’m not going to sit outside calling for somebody. I’m not going to humiliate myself,” Slone said. “No self-respecting person is.”
http://i.imgur.com/npJOT.jpg
She’s hell on wheels for Upper West Side merchants.
Wheelchair-riding Linda Slone, 64, is suing 39 shops in her neighborhood for not being handicapped-accessible.
The legal crusade is netting her thousands, but Slone, who cannot walk because of polio, insists she is simply championing the rights of the disabled.
“If you think this is a money-making scheme, you’re dead wrong,” said Slone, a speech pathologist. “I, along with anybody else with a disability, has the right to go wherever they choose to go and not have to be dissuaded or inconvenienced or even apologetic.”
Mom-and-pop shops live in mortal fear of her next visit.
“It’s a little too fishy to me,” said Andy Besch of West Side Wine, who settled with Slone this month.
“No one ever showed up at my store. No one was ever denied access. Yet I had to pay thousands and was given no opportunity to change anything.”
Barbara Gee Danskin, a shop selling dance gear, was also a target.
“It’s like getting hit up for money,” said owner Allan Greenberg. “It’s a shame. To fight it, you need deep pockets.”
Last month alone, Slone filed papers against eight shops on or near Columbus Avenue, aiming to force them to install ramps and other accessible features.
In each suit, all filed in Manhattan federal court, she demands $500 in damages, plus lawyers’ and experts’ fees, which could run up to $15,000.
She has settled half of her 39 suits since 2010. If she wins them all, she’ll reap at least $19,500 — and hundreds of thousands more for her Brooklyn attorney, Robert Mirel, who works for the Florida-based Weitz Law Firm.
Mirel declined to comment.
Weitz also represents Zoltan Hirsch, a Brooklyn double amputee who The Post revealed last year filed 147 suits citing the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Most small shops have no choice but to settle since the cost of going to court would put them out of business.
Nick Bazas, of Quality Florists, called the drive-by litigation “extortion.”
“You’re asking me for $500 without coming into my store,” he said. “I have a ramp, a sign and a handicapped bathroom. If you would have asked me to use it, I have it.”
Slone said she often warns shops when their steps prevent her motorized chair from entering but admitted it’s easier to call her lawyers.
“I’m not going to sit outside calling for somebody. I’m not going to humiliate myself,” Slone said. “No self-respecting person is.”