Rosario Rodriguez v. Foot Locker Corporate Services, Inc., 2:20-cv-08536

Plaintiff Rosario Rodriguez, a visually impaired person, sued Foot Locker in Los Angeles Superior Court alleging its website is inaccessible to screen-readers in violation of the Unruh Civil Rights Act and sought declaratory, injunctive, and monetary relief.
Complaint seeks a preliminary and permanent injunction requiring Foot Locker to make its website fully accessible and limits statutory damages to $34,999 and estimates $15,000 in costs for injunctive compliance.
Foot Locker removed the action to federal court under diversity jurisdiction, asserting the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000.
Foot Locker submitted Mehul Doshi’s declaration estimating substantial compliance costs (third-party accessibility audits, hiring at least one full-time developer/architect, and increased QA) and stated past consultant work exceeded $75,000.
Plaintiff argued the declarant failed to tie costs specifically to the barriers pleaded; the court rejected that challenge because the injunction sought is broad (all UCRA violations on the site), so full-site compliance costs are relevant.
The court concluded the cost of complying with the injunction likely exceeds $75,000 and that including future attorneys’ fees further supports federal diversity jurisdiction; the remand motion was denied.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether injunctive compliance costs satisfy the $75,000 amount-in-controversy	Doshi decl. lacks itemized, barrier-specific cost estimates; Ferries too speculative	Doshi shows realistic costs: third-party audit (> $75k historically), at least one dedicated developer (> $100k/yr), and increased QA costs	Court: compliance costs likely exceed $75,000; sufficient for amount-in-controversy because injunction covers whole site
Whether future attorneys' fees may be included in amount-in-controversy	Inclusion disputed but plaintiff emphasized limits on monetary damages	Defendant: statutory-fee exposure and recoverable future fees must be considered under Ninth Circuit law	Court: future attorneys' fees are includable and may push controversy over $75,000; counts toward jurisdiction

In re Ford Motor Co./Citibank (South Dakota), NA, 264 F.3d 952 (9th Cir. 2001) (amount-in-controversy includes potential cost of complying with an injunction)
Corral v. Select Portfolio Servicing, Inc., 878 F.3d 770 (9th Cir. 2017) (confirming injunction-compliance costs count in amount-in-controversy)
Arias v. Residence Inn by Marriott, 936 F.3d 920 (9th Cir. 2019) (future recoverable attorneys’ fees must be included in amount-in-controversy analysis)
Fritsch v. Swift Transp. Co. of Ariz. LLC, 899 F.3d 785 (9th Cir. 2018) (same principle on attorneys’ fees inclusion)
Engel v. Worthington, 60 Cal. App. 4th 628 (Cal. Ct. App. 1997) (Unruh Act cases can yield substantial attorneys’ fees awards)
Antoninetti v. Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc., 49 F. Supp. 3d 710 (S.D. Cal. 2014) (illustrating large attorneys’ fee awards in Unruh/ADA-related claims)