Disability Law Commons^™

Use Of Facial Recognition Technology For Medical Purposes: Balancing Privacy With Innovation, Seema Mohapatra

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Vexatious Litigants And The Ada: Strategies To Fairly Address The Need To Improve Access For Individuals With Disabilities, Helia Garrido Hull

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Politically Correct Eugenics, Seema Mohapatra

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

The Accessibility For Manitobans Act: Ambitions And Achievements In Antidiscrimination And Citizen Participation, Laverne Jacobs, Britney De Costa, Victoria Cino

Law Publications

The Accessibility for Manitobans Act (AMA) was enacted in December, 2013. Manitoba is the second Canadian province to enact accessibility standards legislation. The first province was Ontario, which enacted the Ontarians with Disabilities Act in 2001, and, later, a more fortified and enforceable Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2005. The AMA presents a strong set of philosophical and social goals. Its philosophical goals mark accessibility as a human right, and aim to improve the health, independence and well-being of persons with disabilities. The AMA’s social goals have the potential to make a positive impact on the development of equality …

What Are Aging Parents Caring For Adult Children With Disabilities To Do? A Comprehensive Framework For A Healthy, Stable, Financially Sound Future, Jennifer M. Kirby-Mclemore

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Give Them A Reason They Can Understand: An Examination Of Rhode Island's Medicaid Ineligibility Notices To The State's Most Vulnerable Populations, Laura Pickering

Roger Williams University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Are Intellectually Disabled Individuals Still At Risk Of Capital Punishment After Hall V. Florida? The Need For A Totality-Of-The-Evidence Test To Protect Human Rights In Determining Intellectual Disability, Ruthie Stevens

Oklahoma Law Review

No abstract provided.

Considering The Best Interests Test In The Context Of Disabilities, Vincent Ooi, Jia Wei Loh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The United Kingdom is bound by several international obligations to eliminate discrimination against persons with disabilities, chief among these being the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (‘CRPD’), which was ratified on 8 June 2009.Compliance with these obligations is secured at the domestic level through provisions such as those in the Equality Act 2010 (‘EA 2010’). However, parents with disabilities remain exceptionally vulnerable to losing the care and custody of their children under care orders and child arrangements orders.Thus, in 2006 the Social Care Institute for Excellence conducted a knowledge review which found that social workers …

The Olmstead Imperative: The Right To Live In The Community And Beyond, Robert Dinerstein

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

Of the 20 Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) cases that the United States Supreme Court has decided in the 25 years of the statute’s existence, Olmstead v. L.C. by Zimring is without doubt the most significant for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Olmstead is the only Supreme Court ADA case that specifically addresses the rights of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, but its importance goes well beyond this specific fact. In this essay, I set out the holding of the Olmstead decision, its connection to, and extension of, prior case law, the extent of its subsequent enforcement, and …

High-Quality Community Life Engagement Supports: Four Guideposts For Success (Engage: A Brief Look At Community Engagement, Issue No. 3, 2016), Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Jennifer Sullivan Sulewski, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

Community Life Engagement refers to supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) to access and participate in their communities outside of employment as part of a meaningful day. States and providers report growing numbers of individuals with IDD in Community Life Engagement, yet the role of services related to engagement and participation in community life has to date been largely undefined.

Furthermore, the Department of Justice’s guidance around the provision of day and employment supports in integrated settings (U.S. Department of Justice, 2014; United States v. State of Rhode Island, 2014) has illustrated the need to define and provide …

Policy And State-Level Strategies To Promote Employment (Bringing Employment First To Scale, Issue No. 3), Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

At the national level, integrated employment has become an important policy priority. Greater expectations are being placed on those charged with delivering employment supports, and disability systems are responding. However, the promise of integrated employment has yet to be realized for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). The number of individuals supported in integrated employment by state IDD agencies has remained the same since 2000, participation in non-work services has grown rapidly, and promising practices for employment supports identified in the research are not widely implemented. What are the state-level strategies that can change this trajectory?

This brief: Describes …

Organizational Transformation: Guiding Principles For Community Providers (Bringing Employment First To Scale, Issue No. 6), Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, Amie Lulinski, Cindy Thomas, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

A key area of focus for our Rehabilitation Research and Training Center (RRTC) is organizational transformation, leading to improved employment outcomes for those served by community provider organizations. Community provider organizations and their staff are the primary source of day and employment supports for people with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDD). Among this large provider community, variation of services and employment philosophies exists. Many believe that facility-based programs are essential for individuals with disabilities who are having difficulty getting or maintaining competitive work in the labor force, and have limited plans to expand competitive integrated employment. Others believe that all …

Who Are Employment Consultants? Characteristics Of The Workforce That Connects Job Seekers With Intellectual And Developmental Disabilities To Employment (Bringing Employment First To Scale, Issue No. 7), Oliver Lyons, Alberto Migliore, Kelly Nye-Lengerman, Derek Nord, John Butterworth, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

In 1987, the Institute for Community Inclusion (ICI) at the University of Massachusetts Boston began a series of surveys aimed at providing a longitudinal description of the characteristics and service delivery provided by Community Rehabilitation Providers (CRPs)(Domin & Butterworth, 2012). Despite direct support staff comprising one of the nation’s largest labor market segments, there has been very little research into the wages and stability of that workforce (Bogenschutz, Hewitt, Nord, & Hepperlen, 2014). Additionally, most of the literature regarding employment consultants has focused on service outcomes of the individuals served. However, according to Luecking, Fabian, and Tilson (2004), “…Regardless of …

Achieving Best Practice In Employment Supports: Defining Measures Of Effectiveness (Bringing Employment First To Scale, Issue No. 4), Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

People with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) are among the most likely Americans to be unemployed, live in poverty, or rely on public programs. In 2013, only 23% of working-age people with cognitive disabilities—a broad demographic category that includes individuals with IDD—were employed, compared to 72% of people without disabilities. While over 30 states have adopted an Employment First policy (a declaration that employment is the priority outcome for people with disabilities), a key challenge is ensuring that supports meet the standards for best practice. Employment supports are delivered by what we refer to as “employment consultants.” We use this …

Knowledge Translation And Support For Individuals And Families (Bringing Employment First To Scale, Issue No. 5), Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

With the persistently low competitive employment rate for working-age people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), a main focus area for the field of disability research has been on the interaction between the individual and the service system. Yet we know much less about the interaction between systems and families around employment. Family engagement is key to successful employment and life planning, often leading individuals with disabilities on the path to employment when family members serve as role models for work ethic and behavior. Family members may also provide logistical support, including coaching and advice, help with planning and organizing …

Statedata: The National Report On Employment Services And Outcomes, 2016, Jean Winsor, Jaimie Ciulla Timmons, John Butterworth, John Shepard, Cady Landa, Frank A. Smith, Daria Domin, Alberto Migliore, Jennifer Bose, Lydia Landim, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

All Institute for Community Inclusion Publications

This report provides statistics over 25 years from several national datasets that address the status of employment and economic self-sufficiency for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The authors use abbreviations for both intellectual disability (ID) and intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) in this report. This is because data sources vary in the specific target groups that can be described. Please refer to each chapter for the disability definition used in that chapter. We provide a comprehensive overview that describes national trends in employment for people with IDD, and the appendices provide individual state profiles with data from several sources. …

Data Note: Comparing Vr Outcomes For Individuals With And Without Intellectual Disabilities Who Receive Postsecondary Education Services, John Shepard, Frank A. Smith, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

Data Note Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This Data Note explores the provision of postsecondary education services to vocational rehabilitation customers with and without intellectual disabilities who exited the VR system in FY2014.

Data Note: The Engagement Of Young Adults With Intellectual Disabilities In Vocational Rehabilitation: 2010–2014 State Trends, Alberto Migliore, Jean Winsor, Caro Narby, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

Data Note Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

In this Data Note, we look at the average number of young adults with intellectual disabilities (ID) who between 2010 and 2014 exited vocational rehabilitation (VR) programs in each of the 50 states and the District of Columbia.

Data Note: State Intellectual And Developmental Disability Agencies' Service Trends, Jean Winsor, Thinkwork! At The Institute For Community Inclusion At Umass Boston

Data Note Series, Institute for Community Inclusion

This Data Note summarizes findings from the FY 2014 National Survey of State Intellectual and Developmental Disability Agencies' (IDD Agencies) Day and Employment Services.

Hidden From View: Disability, Segregation And Work, Elizabeth Pendo

All Faculty Scholarship

The employment provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 were intended to bring working-age people with disabilities into the workplace by providing options for them to seek and gain meaningful, integrated employment. Although the ADA has made significant gains, the rate of progress in employment has been disappointing. While the lack of progress of people with disabilities in the traditional workplace has received attention, the work done by many, especially those with severe disabilities in segregated workplaces, remains hidden in sheltered workshops. This chapter explores the intersection of the concepts of disability, invisibility, and work and identifies the …

Dying Fast: Suicide In Individuals With Gambling Disorder, Stacey A. Tovino

Scholarly Works

These published remarks carefully document the history of health insurance coverage of gambling disorder. They begin by providing examples of gambling disorder insurance benefit disparities in the contexts of public health care programs and private health plans. They proceed by reviewing the effect of three pieces of legislation, including the Mental Health Parity Act of 1996, the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008, and the Affordable Care Act of 2010, on public and private insurance coverage of gambling disorder. They highlight the partial victory that will occur in some states beginning in …

Review Of Alaska Mental Health Statutes, Sara Gordon, Melissa Piasecki, Gil Kahn, Dawn Nielsen

Scholarly Works

This report identifies key statutory provisions that we recommend be amended, a description of our findings based on interviews with stakeholders, legislative history of the Alaska statutes, reviews of national best practices and, where applicable, information about emerging areas in national mental health law for Alaska to consider in creating new law. Our recommendations are based in large part on significant advances in law and medicine in the understanding and treatment of mental illness that have occurred in the years since Alaska last made significant and substantive reforms to its criminal and civil mental health statutes. It is important to …

Gambling Disorder, Vulnerability, And The Law: Mapping The Field, Stacey A. Tovino

Scholarly Works

This Article seeks to descriptively map the sub-field of gambling disorder and the law and ask whether individuals with gambling disorder are vulnerable under the law. Like other scholarship that descriptively maps ethical, legal, and social implications of lesser known conditions and developments, this Article seeks to describe the treatment of individuals with gambling disorder in a variety of illustrative, but not exhaustive, legal contexts, to identify the limited scholarship assessing the application of the law to individuals with gambling disorder, and to invite members of the health law academy to bring their significant expertise to bear on these issues …

Current Issues In Therapeutic Jurisprudence, David Wexler

Articles & Chapters

No abstract provided.

Sexuality, Disability, And The Law: Beyond The Last Frontier? (2016), Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Books

Sexuality, Disability, and the Law approaches issues of sexual autonomy and disability from multiple perspectives, including constitutional law, international human rights, therapeutic jurisprudence, history, cognitive psychology, dignity studies, and theories and findings on gender constructs and societal norms. Perlin and Lynch determine that if our society continues to assert that persons with mental disabilities possess a primitive morality, we allow ourselves to censor their feelings and their actions. By denying their ability and desires to show love and affection, we justify this disparate treatment. Our reliance on stereotypes has warped our attitudes and our policies, and has allowed us to …

The Role Of Support In Sexual Decision-Making For People With Intellectual And Developmental Disabilities, Jasmine E. Harris

All Faculty Scholarship

In response to Alexander Boni-Saenz, Sexuality and Incapacity, 76 Ohio St. L.J. 1201 (2015).

This Response analyzes three aspects of Boni-Saenz’s cognition-plus test. First, I position his normative and prescriptive proposals within an existing, robust conversation regarding legal capacity, SDM, and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). Scholars of international human rights law offer valuable insights on challenges of redefining legal capacity and implementing SDM. Advocates continue to debate and contest SDM as a practical, administrable, and measurable alternative. Second, I identify potential normative implications of incorporating SDM into domestic law, specifically for …

Merchants And Thieves, Hungry For Power: Prosecutorial Misconduct And Passive Judicial Complicity In Death Penalty Trials Of Defendants With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In spite of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Ford v. Wainwright (1986), Atkins v. Virginia (2002), and Hall v. Florida (2014), persons with severe psychosocial and intellectual disabilities continue to be given death sentences, in some cases leading to actual execution. Although the courts have been aware of this for decades -- dating back at least to the infamous Ricky Rector case in Arkansas -- these base miscarriages of justice continue and show no sign of abating. Scholars have written clearly and pointedly on this issue (certainly, more frequently since the Atkins decision in 2002), but little has changed.

I …

In The Wasteland Of Your Mind: Criminology, Scientific Discovieries And The Criminal Process, Michael L. Perlin, Alison Lynch

Articles & Chapters

This paper addresses a remarkably-underconsidered topic: the potential impact of scientific discoveries and an increased understanding of the biology of human behavior on sentencing decisions in the criminal justice system, specifically, the way that sentencing has the capacity to rely on scientific evidence (such as brain imaging) as a mitigating factor (or perhaps, in the mind of some, as an aggravating factor) in determining punishment.

Such a new method of evaluating criminality, we argue, can be beneficial not only for the defendant, but also for the attorneys and judge involved in the case. If used properly, it may help to …

Your Corrupt Ways Had Finally Made You Blind: Prosecutorial Misconduct And The Use Of Ethnic Adjustments In Death Penalty Cases Of Defendants With Intellectual Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

In a recent masterful article, Professor Robert Sanger revealed that, since the Supreme Court's decision in Atkins v. Virginia, some prosecution experts have begun using so-called "ethnic adjustments" to artificially raise minority defendants' IQ scores, making such defendants-who would otherwise have been protected by Atkins and, later, by Hall v. Florida-eligible for the death penalty. Sanger accurately concluded that ethnic adjustments are not logically or clinically appropriate when computing a person's IQ score for Atkins purposes. He relied further on epigenetics to demonstrate that environmental factors-such as childhood abuse, poverty, stress, and trauma-can cause decreases in actual IQ scores, and …

Infinity Goes On Trial: Sanism, Pretextuality, And The Representation Of Defendants With Mental Disabilities, Michael L. Perlin

Articles & Chapters

This paper, presented to the mid-winter meeting of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (Austin, TX, 2/18/16), explains why it is essential for lawyers representing criminal defendants with mental disabilities to understand the meanings and contexts of sanism - a largely invisible and largely socially acceptable irrational prejudice of the same quality and character of other irrational prejudices that cause (and are reflected in) prevailing social attitudes of racism, sexism, homophobia, and ethnic bigotry - and pretextuality - the means by which courts regularly accept (either implicitly or explicitly) testimonial dishonesty, countenance liberty deprivations in disingenuous ways that bear …