Let me first start off by saying that I am not a legal professional and I am not giving you any legal advice in this response. I have never been trained in the law, though I do find it very interesting and sometimes wish that I had.

I am very sorry to hear about your situation. It is never easy to lose a job, especially under that type of circumstance and in this type of economy. Things can be very hard after something like that.

As to whether or not you might have a case to take legal action against your employer I must admit that I am not qualified to answer that. My hunch is that you do not, but I would recommend that you talk to a legal professional about it since many of them offer free consultations for this type of case. The reason that my hunch tells me that you don’t is that they have a right to hire or fire someone for any reason that they deem appropriate that isn’t expressly forbidden by federal or state law.

It seems like they believe that because of your injury you are a risk to yourself and the company for future injury to yourself or to others. This may or may not be true, but they have a right to limit who they hire based upon these factors. It would be like an company requiring that a office administrator be able to lift 20 pounds over their head – if they can’t do it then they are not qualified for the job. It is an arbitrary qualification, but employers are allowed it according to the law.

That, anyway, is my common sense reading of what I understand the law to say. I am not a lawyer or an attorney. I am not a legal clerk or an assistant. I work in a totally unrelated to field to employment litigation. Contact a legal professional for the real scoop. I just thought I’d answer your question since you posed it here.