In May 2011, plaintiff Laura Torres, an office assistant for the Employment Development Department, attempted to return to work after having undergone surgery on her back and recovering from related nerve damage. Her surgeon recommended that she use an ergonomic chair, so Torres submitted the request and attached the letter from her surgeon. Since being hired in January 2010, Torres worked at the switchboard. When she returned to work, she found that it had a negative impact on her back. As a result, Torres asked for other positions. Ultimately, on Sept. 13, 2016, the Employment Development Department notified Torres that it would no longer transfer her to a position that did not involve switchboard duties and that, instead, it would only accommodate her by assigning her to work the switchboard in 30 minutes shifts, up to two hours a day. Torres was on medical leave as a result of being issued a fitness-for-duty examination notice when she was notified that the Employment Development Department would not take her off switchboard duty. She also claimed that, at that time, she learned that the Employment Development Department refused to extend her medical leave beyond Nov. 1, 2016. As a result, Torres did not return to work and lost her position. Torres sued the Employment Development Department and her supervisor, Pia Bennett. Torres alleged that the defendants’ actions constituted disability discrimination, a failure to accommodate, retaliation and a failure to prevent retaliation. Although Torres claimed that she was constructively discharged, Judge Andrew Cheng ruled that the claim would not be in the jury instructions or on the verdict form because Torres was terminated by statute. In addition, Cheng found that there was not enough evidence of harassment from Bennett, so the claim against Bennett was dismissed on motion for summary judgment. The matter continued with the remaining claims against the Employment Development Department. Torres claimed that when she was requested the ergonomic chair, she and the reasonable-accommodation program’s coordinator considered different chairs and that the coordinator eventually got her a different chair than the one she found comfortable. She claimed that, as a result, she filed an equal-employment-opportunity charge in June 2011, after her doctor noticed that her back had deteriorated without the requested ergonomic chair, placed her on medical leave and put her back into physical therapy. Torres claimed that when she returned to work in September 2011, she received the original chair that she found comfortable. However, she claimed that after two EEOC investigators arrived at the office and interviewed Bennett, Bennett’s supervisor and the office manager in December 2012, Bennett put her back to work on the switchboard. Torres claimed that she complained that the switchboard was bad for her back and that she was afraid of not being able to make it to the bathroom in time, noting that one of her doctors’ notes said that she had to be close to the restroom. In response, the Employment Development Department moved Torres to a workstation the same distance to the restroom as her previous workstation and got her a headset so that she could still work the switchboard. However, Torres claimed that the Employment Development Department ignored all the evidence of the significant adverse impact of the switchboard on her back and, instead, focused only on the issue of incontinence. Torres claimed that she suffered from ongoing retaliation from January 2013 through 2016, when the Employment Development Department required her to take a fitness-for-duty examination. She claimed that, at that time, her union representative got involved and asked to take her off the switchboard, but that instead, the Employment Development Department increased the time reflected on her position statement allocated to the switchboard, increasing the time from 14 percent to 30 percent, and it wanted her to sign a form saying so, which Torres refused. Torres claimed that even after her back went out at work, causing her supervisor and the office manager to call 9-1-1 and send her to the emergency room, the Employment Development Department continued to assign her to the switchboard. Torres’ expert neurosurgeon, who performed Torres’ surgery, opined that it is common for his patients to exacerbate their back doing one activity and to later trigger back spasms when engaging in activity that is ordinarily innocuous. Plaintiff’s counsel contended that despite the lack of any medical training by Torres’ supervisors, and despite no one from the Employment Development Department asking Torres’ doctor if Torres’ back going out at work was related to the switchboard, the office manager and the Employment Development Department found it significant that Torres’s back did not go out at the switchboard, but at a copy machine. Defense counsel contended that the Employment Development Department gave Torres all the accommodations that she requested, but that because the switchboard was an essential function of the position, it was not required to remove Torres from it., Torres claimed she suffered emotionally from the events, as well as from her deteriorating back pain and episodes of incontinence at work. She alleged that, at times, she had to take medical leave because of her adjustment disorder (anxiety and depression) due to her fear of being placed back on the switchboard and ongoing retaliation. Torres claimed that she has been in therapy since 2016 to deal with the events and that she is still currently in therapy. Torres sought recovery of past lost earnings for 4.5 months of missed work and recovery of future lost earnings. She also sought recovery of noneconomic damages for her past and future emotional distress.