METRO VANCOUVER -- A Coquitlam restaurant that denied serving a man who suffers from an “invisible disability” will be the subject of a human rights hearing.

The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal denied an attempt by Nagano Japanese Restaurant to have the complaint by Kevin Berry dismissed. Berry claims that the restaurant discriminated against him because of his disability when it refused to allow him to bring his licensed service dog inside.

Berry, an armed services veteran who served in Afghanistan, suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. He declined to comment on the case.

According to the documents, Berry arrived at the restaurant on June 14, 2013 with his dog Tommy and a friend to join seven others.

“Among the matters that Tommy helps (Berry) with is enjoying social outings with friends without experiencing some of the effects of PTSD,” the tribunal said Tuesday in its written decision.

PTSD is a mental illness caused by exposure to a trauma that can include death or the threat of death, severe injury or sexual violence, according to the Canadian Mental Health Association. Symptoms can include extreme nervousness, edginess, claustrophobia, a feeling that something terrible is about to happen and emotional numbness.

According to the tribunal’s decision, Berry said the server yelled “across the restaurant” that he couldn’t bring the dog inside.

Berry showed the restaurant owner, Hyoung Tae Pae, a certificate indicating Tommy was an assistance dog.

He said he was twice asked who was disabled. When Berry said he was the disabled person, Pae gave him a “skeptical and judgmental scoff.” Pae said having a dog in the store would make other customers “nervous and uncomfortable.”

Berry was told his group would be moved to a larger booth where he could “see Tommy through the window.”

Berry said he felt “embarrassed and humiliated” and he and his friends left the restaurant. Berry ended up crying in his truck.

In the restaurant’s version, a server said she approached Berry, who was a “seemingly sighted and able-bodied man with a big dog.”

Restaurant owner Pae said Berry showed him a certificate he hadn’t seen before. He described Berry as a “very muscular individual.” He approached Berry and “politely asked, ‘Do you mind if I ask who is the disabled person?’ He says he did so because it was not apparent that Mr. Berry was disabled and Mr. Pae thought that he was assisting someone else,” according to the tribunal.

Noting that there are “two diametrically different versions of what happened,” tribunal member Walter Rilkoff said in his decision that Berry may also be suggesting that it was somehow discriminatory for the restaurant to “question he was disabled and to ask to see and to examine the guide dog certificate.

“Particularly, where an individual like Mr. Berry has what he described as an ‘invisible’ disability, in my view, it cannot be improper or discriminatory for the establishment to satisfy itself that the individual is entitled to the accommodation being requested, in this case, having a guide dog with him,” Rilkoff said.

Brian Archer, president of Citadel Canine Society, which trains dogs for people with PTSD, said Berry received one of its first group of trained dogs last year.

“It’s an emerging therapeutic area for post-traumatic stress,” Archer said.

What’s lacking right now, he said, are recognized national standards of training of dogs for PTSD.

“Dogs have an incredible impact on people with PTSD in the right conditions,” he said.

These dogs become attuned to a person’s emotional state. If someone is asleep and about to have a nightmare, for example, the dog can sense that and wake a person up.

Assistance or service dogs can also be used to help people with other invisible disabilities. They include alerting a diabetic when a person’s sugar levels go awry or warning a person with epilepsy who is about to have a seizure.

kevingriffin@vancouversun.com