TV Psychologist Gets It Right

There's been a story going around that I just heard about a couple of weeks ago. Abbie Dorn, a young mother of triplets who suffered severe brain damage due to complications during delivery, is in a legal battle to see her children. Her ex-husband, who divorced her just a year after the event, saying he needed to "move on", has prohibited their three (now four year old) children from visiting her, and even prohibits anyone mentioning her at all to them. Oh, and after she received a malpractice financial settlement, he's reportedly suing her for child support.

Good Morning America covered this story on April 14th of this year, and played up the "tragedy" of the whole situation. It wasn't terrible coverage, but it wasn't too great, either. It didn't really scratch the surface, so was more exploitative than anything else, as far as I was concerned.

On July 10th I happened to catch this story for the first time on CNN. The Dorn story starts about 3/4 of the way down the transcript that is linked here. After going over the basic facts, the CNN anchor went to Dr. Wendy Walsh, a clinical psychologist who specializes in relationships for commentary. I must admit that I am usually biased against talking head TV psychologists. They either seem to a) say something that is so "common sense" that you just go "Duhh", b) try to wedge whatever topic it is into pushing some agenda of their own, or c) come up with some off the wall thing that they couldn't possibly infer from never ever meeting or talking with the principle people involved.

Dr. Walsh's comments both surprised and pleased me. She was both thoughtful and insightful. After the story focused (much like GMA) on whether Abbie could actually communicate or not thru blinking, Walsh immediately cut thru that to comment

And, you know, the question is, who cares if she can communicate or not? There's a living, breathing mother there...Who deserves to see her children. And the children, you know, Don, kids - everything is new and normal in the world of small children. I don't think that they'll be overly traumatized. Would people prefer that they're given a cold teddy bear to comfort them?

Walsh quickly followed with

And, you know, the biggest question this raises for me, Don, is what's going on in our culture that we institutionalize people with disabilities to the point that now we think it's just so wrong to even look at them or be exposed to them? What does it say that we're sweeping away the ugliness and not allowing families to have an integrated experience with people with disabilities? I think it's making us lose our compassion for people with disabilities.

Walsh also blogged on the story on her own blog here, where she also wrote

I’m concerned that the more we insulate people, young and old, from seeing the full range of human possibilities the more we limit our capacity for compassion.

My hat's off to Dr. Walsh. Rather than settle for a superficial recounting of a "tragedy", she cared enough to dig a bit deeper, and provide some thoughtful analysis. Like a good documentary film maker, she challenges us to think deeper not just about this particular situation, but about ourselves and the wider world.

Maybe I should pay more attention to TV psychologists. Or at least this one.

U.S. Seclusion Bill Alert

photo credit-David Paul Ohmer
creative commons license

I subscribe to the Wrightslaw Special Ed Advocate Newsletter. The Wrightslaw.com website (run by two people named "Wright"-who would have figured), which is a great source for getting/keeping yourself informed with all things having to do with special education law. They also publish a few books, which I have found helpful.

The use of restraints and seclusion in U.S. schools has been a fairly hot topic over the last few years in the U.S. There are at least 3 different (general) views on this. One, that all people deserve basic human rights, and tying them down and putting them into locked closets at school are not the type of thing that should be done to anyone. A second view (we'll refer to it as "the ignorant view", for lack of a better term), thinks that special ed kids shouldn't be mainstreamed with the general population in schools. And if they are, then if they are at all "disruptive" then it is perfectly OK to do "whatever it takes" to preserve peace and quiet in the schools, including tying kids down, putting them in locked closets, or having them arrested. And wouldn't things just be much better if they all just went back to "some other place" to be educated warehoused. A third view is (roughly) that any proposed laws will never do what we think they will do. The bills will just be used to normalize abnormal treatment of the disabled, including instituting/requiring ABA treatment as the "gold standard" of education cruel and unusual punishment.

Federal laws (referred to as "bills" before they are passed) are passed in the U.S. by being voted on by two houses of Congress, the House of Representatives (or just "House") and the Senate. After being signed by the President (or in some cases, even after them not being signed) the bill becomes law.

The U.S. House passed H.R. 4247 (the House version of the bill), and passed it on to the Senate. The Senate version is referred to as S. 2860. Evidently the Senate version would change how student's Individual Education Plans, or IEP's, are administered.

Wrightslaw sent out an e-mail alert today, stating:

The Senate would let school staff put restraint and seclusion in a child’s IEP or 504 plan. Call your Senators now and ask them to reject this proposal.

The Proposed Amendment to S. 2860 Will Take Away IDEA Rights. Unlike IDEA, 504, and ADA, the Restraint/Seclusion bill has been written to prevent parents from seeking to enforce it in with lawsuits.

The new law (S. 2860) would take precedence over the old law (IDEA).

The Wrightslaw alert also included these helpful instructions for taking action:

How to Call Your Senator

1. Always use the bill number, S. 2860, Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act. Please call; Senators pay more attention to calls. Email may get lost. Use Email only if you must.

2. Dial 202-224-3121 (TTY 202-225-1904) or go to www.senate.gov, click on Senators for contact information (including local numbers). You will have 2 Senators. When you call, ask for their Education or Disability Aide. Leave a detailed voicemail message if they are not available. Be sure to identify the bill by name, Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act and use the number, S. 2860.

3. Please call your Senators - but especially if you live in these states on the Senate HELP Committee: AK, AZ, CO, CT, GA, IA, KS , MD, MN, NC, NH, NM, OH, OK, OR, PA, RI, TN, UT, VT, WA, WY. If you are in these states, check the HELP Committee website so you call the Senator on the Committee, http://help.senate.gov/. If you have friends or family in the Committee states, please get them to call. And even if you are not in a Committee state, please call. Senators from all over the country are impacting this bill.

4. Call Senator Tom Harkin and ask for his disability counsel (phone 202-224-3254, fax 202-224-9369). Senator Harkin chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, http://help.senate.gov/ and has much power over this bill. He needs to hear from parents and advocates from around the country; he certainly is hearing from the other side.

Here is a link to http://www.senate.gov/, which has a nice little "drop down" box on the top right to find your own state's senators, and to the committee page for the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, http://help.senate.gov/.

Senator Tom Harkin, from Iowa, has always been a pretty good advocate for disability issues. He is also the Chair of this committee. Even if you don't live in his state, I urge you to contact him, and not let this portion of the bill be included.

For a brief overview of how U.S. laws are made, watch this:

Honesty, Justice, and Trust

photo credit-navets
creative commons license

I'm not the kind of person that immediately shouts for someone to lose their job when they do something wrong. We all make mistakes, and jobs are hard to come by nowadays.

But I'm also the kind of person that gets their dander up when organizations try to sweep problems under the rug, and whitewash a situation to cover their own backside.

I recently wrote about how two police officers in Tybee Island, Georgia tased a young autistic man who was sitting outside a restaurant waiting for his brother, who was inside. They not only tased him, but wrestled him to the ground, bruising him and breaking his tooth in the process. Originally, the police chief did what might be expected. He defended the actions of his men, and even went so far as to "blame the victim" and his family somewhat by saying that he was sorry that he had been left "unattended". That last statement, which implies that no one with any kind of disability that impairs communication should ever be left alone, even for a few minutes, got me (and a lot of other people, I'm sure) very upset. I don't realistically expect that the whole world will change overnight, and that the world and everyone in it will totally understand my autistic son as he grows up. I also don't think it unreasonable that he should not have to fear being beat up and tased for sitting on the curb outside a restaurant on a hot day.


Evidently there are some reasonable people living in Tybee, and some of them are actually in a position to do something. According to this article:

Tybee drops charges against autistic teen

WTOC11 reports that,

Tybee Island Mayor Jason Buelterman and Schleicher asked Police Chief Price James W. Price to have the GBI investigate the incident and make sure no laws were broken by police.

Many politicians, both local and national, would have followed on what the police chief originally said, and would have tried to cover up the situation and hope it would go away. I applaud the mayor and city manager, who asked a neutral party (the Georgia Bureau of Investigation-the state counterpart to the FBI) to look into the matter. As police officers themselves, the GBI would have an excellent understanding of what proper police procedure in such cases should be, as well as having practical experience in similar types of situations. Yet as a neutral party, they also understand that the public needs to have confidence in its law enforcement officers. Law abiding public citizens should not have to fear their own police force. When law enforcement officers "go too far", it impairs the ability of all other officers on the force in their ability to do their job. When you are in a job that serves the public, you need to be accountable to that public. You may not like it, but that's part of the job.

According to another recent article in the Savannah Morning News, "Tybee Police Learn About Autism", the two police officers that arrested Clifford, as well as a jailer, have both resigned their posts. The police chief has been suspended, and officers are now being sent for training on dealing with people with autism.

My hat is off to the city of Tybee, for stepping up and doing the right thing. Nothing will undo the damage that has been done. Clifford will forever more be afraid of the police, and it will be that much harder for him to react calmly the next time he interacts with them. But it looks as if the city is stepping up, doing what it can to prevent future similar occurrences, and weeding out a few bad apples (while sending an important message to the rest of the department).

I don't know if the police chief will keep his job, or if he should. I am not in a position to know what he knew, when he knew it, and what he has done in the interim. But I trust now that the people of Tybee will do the right thing, because of what they've done thus far. And if he does keep his job, I sincerely hope that he issues a much more heartfelt and all encompassing apology to Clifford and his family, for them having to have endured this.

Geogia-Zero Tolerance for Differences

photo credit-centralasian
creative commons license


Evidently it's not safe to walk around (or sit) any place in Georgia while being autistic. At least not by yourself. Because if you do, you're fair game for being tased by the police. At least, that's what the police chief of Tybee Island, Georgia seems to think.

A little over a week ago, it was a 14 year old boy being arrested on felony terrorism charges for drawing threatening one inch stick figure drawings on his homework. Now it's an 18 year old autistic young man tasered after being confronted by police while he was sitting on the curb waiting for his brother and a friend to come out of a restaurant.

WMBF news reported yesterday on how 18 year old Clifford Grevemberg was waiting on the curb outside the Rock House Bar and Grill for his brother and a friend to come out, when he was approached by two policemen. According to the police report, Clifford was staggering while walking back and forth in front of the establishment, and when questioned, responded that he was waiting for his brother to come out with some food.

The police report said that one officer asked Clifford if he had been drinking, and he responded yes. Of course, they didn't ask him what he had been drinking. Unless he was asked if he had been drinking alcohol, my 10 year old son might have also responded in the affirmative, having drunken water, soda, or some other perfectly legal beverage. The officers then asked for identification (twice), and when Clifford turned and began to walk away, they grabbed his arm. Clifford, as might be expected, tried to retract his arm away from them, which gave these two police officers all the justification they thought they needed to taser him. Which they did while forcing Clifford to the ground, causing a bruised face and a broken tooth.

The Tybee police chief, in a statement given today, tried to explain away the incident by saying that Clifford gave the appearance of being intoxicated, and tasing him prevented further damage to both Clifford as well as the officers. He gave a backhanded apology, saying

"We are sincerely apologetic for the injuries suffered to Mr. Grevemberg. We are also sorry he was left unattended under the circumstances..."

In other words, if you are so brazen as to think that you have the right to walk or sit in a public place while being autistic (and you don't have an attendant immediately at your side), then you shouldn't complain when the police tase you and arrest you.

Kathleen Slapped-Blogs Slap Back

photo credit-azrainman
creative commons license

I had heard of SLAPP suits (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) before in the context of lawsuits against environmental groups, but had never really paid much attention to them. Evidently the whole purpose of them is to harass people who are speaking out by costing them great deals of money to defend themselves.

I'm sure that most everyone has heard about the ridiculous subpoena that Kathleen Seidel has been served with. While it appears that she has not been sued, this subpoena is pretty much an all encompassing fishing expedition meant to pursue one purpose, and one alone-silencing Kathleen Seidel.

No one could reasonably believe that there was some grand conspiracy that involved paying off Kathleen to write her blog on neurodiversity.com. I do not know Kathleen personally, but there is absolutely no indication that she is being put up to write the things she does. How do I know this? Because there is no way anyone could ever write so elegantly, so powerfully, and so honestly if they were being paid.

Paid product pushers and plants on blogs make themselves known over time. They can't help themselves. They post obviously false things that support certain products or positions, in contradiction to all the evidence that there is to be found.

Kathleen is the polar opposite of someone who is paid to write from a certain perspective. When I found out that there was a name for why my son was having so much difficulty with peers and at home, and that that name was autism, I went searching for information on the web. I first found a local listserve where parents had an ongoing pity party, and most were in search of a holy grail cure. I continued to search, and rapidly came across three different sites on the web that greatly influenced me. These were Kristina Chew's AutismVox, The Autism Hub, and Neurodiversity.com. I loved these sites for different reasons. Kristina for her personal touch, The Hub for its diversity of opinions, and neurodiversity.com for its obviously well researched list of resources and readings on autism. I spent days delving through the articles and resources linked from the site. I felt like I had discovered a cave full of jewels, and I marveled how each one of them sparkled as it was held up to the light. Such sites are not put together by those who are paid to push a certain viewpoint (If she were being paid, there would be much less content, and a lot more "splash" to the site). The beauty of neurodiversity.com is in the layers upon layers of painstaking research that went into putting it all together.

Kathleen's blog has always been top notch. She doesn't push vague conspiracy theories with no facts behind them. Instead she publishes extremely well researched, well annotated (a rarity on the web), and well written treatises on subjects related to autism. A victim of her own success, the existence of this precedent setting subpoena speaks to how well Kathleen's voice is being heard. Evidently she must be silenced.

Many bloggers have stepped up to symbolically link arms with Kathleen. In whatever small way I can, I am proud to join them. Kathleen's voice is one that we cannot allow to be silenced.

Many (including probably myself) would have been intimidated by such harassment. To her credit, Kathleen didn't even flinch, and has fired back a motion to quash the subpoena. You go, girl. They've SLAPPED the wrong woman.

Don't Help Them-Arrest Them

photo credit-piccadillywilson
creative commons license

If there is anyone left that hasn't read Bev's excellent post "I Am Joe's Functioning Label", I highly encourage you to do so. I think that the phenomenon that she describes, whereby people slap certain labels on others, and then make all sorts of assumptions about them, applies to a story I read.

According to the online version of the Kansas City Star,

The sheriff is recommending charges in the case of a western Kansas woman who sat on her boyfriend’s toilet for so long that her body became stuck to the seat.

Ness County Sheriff Bryan Whipple said Thursday he asked the county attorney to file charges against Kory McFarren for mistreatment of a dependent adult. The county attorney will decide whether any charges are brought. ...

... McFarren, 36, told the sheriff at that time that Babcock had not left the bathroom in two years, although McFarren now contends he’s unsure how long she was in there. Whipple said Thursday that judging by the woman’s condition — she had open sores on which the toilet seat would stick — it appeared she likely sat on the toilet continually for at least a month.

Now I don't know all of the particulars surrounding the story, and I'm certainly in favor of punishing those who abuse the disabled. But some things in this story don't add up to the typical "caretaker abuses person in their care" scenario.

First of all, the person being charged is described as the woman's boyfriend, not her caretaker.

McFarren said she moved around in the bathroom during that time, bathed and changed into clothes he brought her. He brought food and water to her. They had conversations and an otherwise normal relationship — except it all happened in the bathroom.

But the sheriff disputed that account: “She hadn’t bathed for quite some time, I am safe in saying. She obviously was not keeping herself up.”

McFarren said he finally called police Feb. 27 after he became worried because Babcock was acting groggy, as if she didn’t know what was going on around her. ...

...McFarren, who works at an antique store, said he has been taking care of Babcock for the 16 years they have lived together.

So, they live together for 16 years. Since there's no mention in the story, I'm assuming that this is the first time that the authorities are being called to intervene in this couple's life.

Certainly the girlfriend has problems that need attention. But it sounds like the boyfriend and her had some semblance of a healthy relationship, though extremely odd by conventional standards. And it sounds like when the boyfriend perceived there was really trouble, he called for help.

To make matters worse, it sounds like the sheriff doesn't consider the boyfriend to possess full capacity

“The unfortunate thing is this truly is a case of two people, in my opinion, with diminished mental capacity,” Whipple said.

So why did the sheriff want to press charges?

He (McFarren) insisted that he tried to coax her out of the bathroom every day.

“And her reply would be, ‘Maybe tomorrow,’ ” Whipple said.

OK, so they live together for 16 years without having any obvious problems. Both parties have some issues, and boyfriend exercises some poor judgement in when to seek assistance for his girlfriend (though there is no contention that she wanted any outside help). Since McFarren (the boyfriend) holds down a job, he is assumed to be able to fully make all decisions that not only affect him, but also another adult.

And the sheriff comes in and sees something which he considers too weird, and wants to press charges.

Doesn't the county have any psychiatric social workers?

Addendum-I missed the fact that Casdok had already blogged about this. Please see here for her take on this story.
Joe

Playing Doctor

photo credit-Brendan Adkins
creative commons license

***Disclaimer-I am not a lawyer, so only a fool would take anything I say as legal advice ***

On a local autism list that I am on, someone wanted to go observe in one of the special ed classrooms, but was told that they couldn't, because it would be a HIPAA violation.

Huh???

It never ceases to amaze me what utter nonsense people will spew at times, especially if it serves to cover their own butt in some way.

HIPAA (for all of those outside the US, and anyone inside that US that has been asleep for the past several years, stands for Health Insurance Portability and Acountability Act. It is a law passed by congress in 1996 in the US that (amongst other things) is supposed to ensure that your private medical information stays private (except from government agencies, anyone doing research, and anyone your insurance company decides to share the info with-but that's a rant for another day).


The practical application of this law is that you have to sign a form at your doctor's office saying that you are aware of your HIPAA rights, you also sign a form for your insurance company waiving those rights (or they won't insure you), and there are extra people employed at all levels of healthcare spending time making sure that people's rights are not violated (proper forms must be filled out, and access to medical records is controlled-while any clerk at the insurance company can see your records, your doctor has to jump thru password protected hoops to prove he qualifies to see them).

The people that are affected by HIPAA are health care practitioners (like doctors, nurses, pharmacists, etc.), health care entities (like hospitals and nursing homes), insurance companies, and any business entity that contracts with either of these (like the cleaning service for a doctor's office). All of those people can get in big trouble if they start selling copies of Britney Spears' hospital records to the National Enquirer. But nowhere in any of the law is a school listed as being under the purview of this law, and I have heard no references in the media of schools and HIPAA violations.

The first question that needs to be answered, is if a school is even a "covered health care entity" under HIPAA. The short answer is probably not, unless the school is billing for the services of its school nurse or transmitting electronic medical records on patients. If the school is not a covered health care entity, then HIPAA only applies to the school nurse, and not to the school as a whole. Since the school nurse shouldn't be walking into classrooms and announcing who has what "disease" or is taking what meds, there should be no conflict from HIPAA in having student's parents coming in to observe in a classroom.

The suggestion that because other special ed students are present in a class, and that other parents might not want you to know their kids are in special ed is also very suspect. All of the kids in school know who is in special ed. Unless the school wishes to provide a separate classroom for every special ed student, it will not be a secret who is in special ed. So allowing parents to observe a class does not violate any confidentiality. Indeed, there is no expectation of total privacy in a public school. If there was, then parents could never go to any school function where they might see other students, such as athletic events, assemblies, or school outings.

There is a federal law that governs confidentiality of school records. It's a law that has been around since the 1970's, and is called the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (or FERPA-gotta love those governmental acronyms). According to Wrightslaw.com:

The purposes of FERPA are twofold: to ensure that parents have access to their children's educational records and to protect the privacy rights of parents and children by limiting access to these records without parental consent.

Some schools may fall back on FERPA as the reason that parents are not allowed to observe in class. But even that doesn't have a leg to stand on.

Again, Wrightslaw.com (one of my favorite sites for special education law) addresses this question well, when talking about parental involvement and what the No Child Left Behind act has to say.

Schools that receive Title I funds must meet with parents to develop a parental involvement policy and must distribute the policy to parents and the community. Parents of children who attend Title I schools shall have access to school staff, opportunities to participate in the child's class, and to observe classroom activities. (20 U.S.C. § 6318)

So, to get back to the original point. From what I know and have read regarding HIPAA and FERPA, neither law should preclude or prevent a parent from observing their child in a classroom, or observing a proposed classroom before a child is placed in it. Indeed, the NCLB act mandates parental involvement, and spells out a parent's right to observe classroom activities.

To deny such rights (IMO) means either that people in the school are supremely ignorant, arrogant, or just trying to hide something.

How much accommodation is enough?

That was the question I asked myself when I read the story of Sophie Currier, an MD/PhD graduate of Harvard University who is asking for additional break time during testing for her medical license because she is breastfeeding.

The test that Currier is taking is the USMLE Step 2, a nine hour test that is the second of three tests that are necessary to become a fully licensed physician. A physician must pass at least the first two steps prior to starting their residency training. This test is usually taken one year prior to completing one's medical school education. That way, if you are not successful the first time, you have another chance to take the exam the following year, prior to starting residency. Evidently Dr. Currier took the test when she was 8.5 months pregnant the first time, and failed by a few points. If she doesn't pass the test this time, she'll have to delay starting residency for at least another year, until she passes the test.

I have a lot of sympathy for physician/mothers. Both jobs are very time consuming and tough, and juggling two full time jobs is next to impossible. One of my heroes during my internship year was a fellow intern who was a single mom to a 2 year old (her husband couldn't handle having a wife that was "smarter" than he was, so left her when she was in med school). We all tried to pitch in and help her out, but there was no doubt that that doctor mom fully pulled her share. She asked normal favors of us (as all friends would), but never asked for any special considerations because of her situation.

So my first inclination when reading the story was to think "Why couldn't the board give her some extra time to pump during the test? It's a 9 hour test, with only 45 minutes allocated to break time. Surely they could make some accommodation. I mean, this can't be a unique situation." But then I continued reading the article:

...Currier has already received special accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act for dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, including being granted permission to take the test over two days instead of one.

In the lawsuit, she was seeking an additional 60-minute break on each day. The board cited the need to be consistent in the amount of time given to doctoral candidates and said other nursing mothers who have taken the exam have found the 45 minutes of permitted break time sufficient. ...

I'm all in favor of her getting accommodations for her dyslexia and ADHD. But it appears that since she'll be taking the test over two days instead of one, then she'll have 4 hours of testing on one day, and 5 hours on another. She still has 45 minutes of break time that she can allocate over that time, to take when she wants. This may not be the extra hour of break time each day that she wants, but it appears on the surface to not interfere too badly with her breast feeding requirement of having to pump or feed every 3 hours. Also:

...The judge said the board offered Currier several special accommodations, including a separate testing room where she could express milk during the test or during break time, and the option to leave the test center to breast-feed during break times. ...

For its part, the USMLE (United States Medical Licensing Examination board) responded publicly on its website to the "Currier question" regarding breastfeeding during exams.

...How have you responded to Sophie Currier’s request for extra time to express milk?
As the papers filed in court show, NBME offered Ms. Currier a variety of comfort measures and personal item exceptions, such as permission to bring multiple, assembled pumps to eliminate the time involved in cleaning, assembling, and disassembling them; permission to pump milk while taking the test and on break time, with privacy within the constraints of exam security, in the individual testing room that she receives on account of her ADA disability. We also provided her with a sample schedule demonstrating how an examinee can flexibly manage the time to take a 20- to 30-minute break every three hours. ...

And I gotta tell ya, that's starting to sound pretty fair to me. But to give myself a little reality check before I ran my mouth off (since I am male, and therefore have never faced such a situation) I bounced this question off of a colleague of mine, herself an MD/PhD, who has small children and has breast fed. After thinking a bit, and without me even telling her the part about her getting to take the test over two days, she felt that the medical board had gone far enough. Indeed, she didn't even think they had to go that far. "Whisper Pump.", she said. To my blank look, she explained that the Whisper Pump is a wearable bra/pump contraption that you can wear while you work. It takes about 5 minutes to rig up, and pumps while you work. So it appears that Dr. Currier might not need any extra time at all in order to take the test and also pump.

I gotta tell ya, it feels a little uncomfortable arguing against someone getting an accommodation they say they need, especially when I have not walked in that person's shoes. But this one doesn't seem to pass the sniff test, and it would appear to me that Dr. Currier would spend her limited time better studying for her exam, rather than talking to her lawyer.

What a difference a day makes

What a difference a day makes.

It was only yesterday that I was flying high, rejoicing in the good news regarding an autistic young adult being accepted and honored in our department.

This morning, right before going to work, I log on and peruse a couple of blogs, and what do I see but this story, quoted by MommyGuilt .

...On Monday, February 26, a 6-year-old autistic boy was read his rights and charged with Assault II for jumping on his special education teacher. This arrest was made when he and his mother went to pick up some files at the Kailua-Kona, Hawaii Police Department ...

I think that the reason that this case struck me so hard was that many of the facts of this case seemed to parallel what had happened to our son a year and a half ago.

...Prior to jumping on his teacher, he was removed from his current classroom because the staff was worried he would hurt himself or others, and kept him in time- out from 10:55 a.m. until his mother picked him up at 2:00 p.m. ...

When Buddy Boy was in Kindergarten (last school year, as a 5 year old) he, like many kids on the autism spectrum, had issues with self control. Some of it was reacting to things in the environment, some of it may have been from delayed maturation, and I believe the majority of it probably stemmed from the system expecting a 5 year old with autism to be compliant at all times. All of their “interventions” were directed at getting him to be compliant. They didn’t care whether he learned anything at all. Indeed, any subject matter they presented was way below the types of worksheets that his mom, Liz, had him doing at home. And when they did do things in class, they insisted on repetition to the nth degree. This, of course, resulted in boredom and frustration on Buddy Boy’s part. Despite having all these things pointed out to them, his “teachers” persisted.

Due mostly to an idiotic curriculum not suited to him, and probably partially to lack of self control (in the face of being taught by idiots) Buddy Boy trashed the classroom one day. He first threatened to trash the classroom (“I’m going to throw things”) to which they responded with their direction of “Sit down, Buddy Boy” three times, dutifully recorded on their chart that he had refused to sit down, then stood back when he started pulling things off the shelf. No one acknowledged that he was angry and/or frustrated. No one tried to find out why he was upset. Just a command to sit down repeated three times. Mom was called to come and get him and take him home.

Buddy Boy was suspended for three days for that, and moved to a “resource room” where he was the only student. We were warned at that time that if he continued to be violent and a threat to others and himself that the police would be involved. Despite our convening another IEP (which they kept delaying) and attempting to get a much better behavioral intervention plan in place, the staff continued to do things to set him off (deliberately, I suspect, but have no way of knowing other than their e-mails obtained later which intimated that they had a plan for a solution in place, while during this time they were telling us that everything was fine). They had him “taught” by as many as 7-8 different “teachers” per day, on no consistent schedule. They would print up a schedule and show him on the clock when he would have a break, then another teacher would come in and cut the break short. Still, all they were teaching was compliance with rules, and repetition of busywork. He lashed out a couple of times at them (slapping and kicking), and each time he got “written up” without suspension. The disciplinary write ups had these check off boxes on the form for reasons they thought the behavior occurred. Almost all of the boxes had to do with the student (acting out, seeking attention, secondary gain, etc.). There maybe was one for the environment, and none at all for “provoked by idiot staff”, which was what I would have checked off.

Buddy Boy acted out again (in this stellar teaching environment) and threw a stapler across the room. This earned him another 4 days suspension. At this point he was one suspension away from a mandatory placement in another setting. We had already surmised that they were trying to build a case against Buddy Boy as an out of control kid that was a menace to himself and others, and had to be removed. The placement that they had in mind was in a separate school in a class of emotionally disturbed kids.

Meanwhile, just so one can understand how Buddy Boy was doing in general, this is what was happening outside of school. He had a weekly gymnastics class (that he grudgingly went to, didn’t look forward to) where he functioned within a group setting with individual assistance by a high school student with no special ed training. He also attended swimming class every Saturday morning (another non-preferred activity-he likes free swimming, but not swimming class). He also functioned just fine in this class being taught by high school kids for the most part. He attended church services without acting up, and though he argued with us a lot at home, we had gotten to the point where he was not aggressive with us.

...The school has been asked repeatedly to at the very least provide a one-on-one aide that is trained in the art of dealing with autistic children, or move him to a school for autistic children. ...

In our case we had asked several times (since before he was even admitted to Kindergarten) for a 1:1 aide. Each time we were refused.

By this time we had progressed from just having an advocate with us to having a lawyer involved. We short circuited their attempt to have him expelled by withdrawing him for a medical leave, and Liz home schooled him for six months (to complete the school year). He had someone from the school provide some instruction in the home, but again they were somewhat clueless (instruction below level, repetition, repetition, show me you are compliant).

Meanwhile we continued to convene an IEP for the following year (this year) with multiple meetings with staff and lawyers. I think one of their strategies was to try and bankrupt us by having more and more meetings. I think they also thought that if they had enough meetings then only my wife would show up, and not me. They thought wrong.

Our compromise that we agreed to was half time in their emotionally disturbed classroom (though we had it in writing that they did not have permission to use their preferred methods of discipline-physically removing kids into a padded room or a wooden box). The other half time was to be spent in a special ed class located in a regular school (NOT the school he was in before). For agreeing to this we got them to agree to an outside evaluation of Buddy Boy’s behavior. We had to wait a few months into the school year to get the evaluation, but the outside group said Buddy Boy was doing fine, and indeed should be in the least restrictive environment, and that there was no reason to bus him back and forth between two schools every day.

So now Buddy Boy is in the special ed classroom in the regular school, and just this week he had his first inclusion in a “regular” class for art, which went just fine.

I thought I was getting past my anger at how my son was railroaded last year, and of how idiotic many of the “experts” at his previous school acted. And how malignant they were in plotting behind the scenes to get him thrown out, even if it meant having a police record. My reaction to this article today tells me I have a ways to go.

The mother in Hawaii further relates:
Many people have told me that I need take this to the media to finally get the help we need, and that is what I hope to do. I have done everything the school has asked and tried to work with them, to no avail. Now, here I am with a disabled 6-year-old with Assault II charges against him.

Getting the media involved might just work. It is my impression that Americans in general have become much more hardnosed and unforgiving of the acts of adolescents, and this has also led to prosecutors trying to prosecute younger children (some as young as 10 years old) as adults in violent crimes. But I still think that 6 year olds get somewhat of a pass in society, and media attention might help. Of course, being disabled lowers the age of what is considered acceptable to prosecute, as does being poor or a member of a minority.

Finally, the mom writes:
We are filing for a Fair Hearing. But I understand this will take months and my child is not being educated nor is the school providing any help with his education, even though they know neither he nor I are able to go on school grounds because of the temporary restraining order."

Finally, something they definitely can’t do. As I hope the mother is aware, she needs a lawyer. Maybe two. Definitely one for the educational case, and possibly a second one for the criminal case. If she's lucky the special ed/disability rights lawyer can do both for her.

IDEA 2004 spells out specifically how they can kick your kid out of school (suspensions, expulsions), and how they can place him in an alternative setting. It also spells out what they have to do in terms of providing education. They end up not having to do much, but they have to do something.

The mother needs to inform herself what IDEA 2004 actually says, and the first place to start is at the Wrightslaw website. If you scroll down the left hand side there is a section called "Law Library". In there you can see a button to click on for IDEA 2004. If click thru to the IDEA 2004 Statute and Regulation page, there is a link to download the whole law with commentary from the Federal Register.

Basically the law says that the school can suspend a child for up to 10 days without providing any instruction. After that the IEP must meet to decide what is appropriate to be provided (this, of course, is the same IEP team that got you into this mess to begin with). The school also must provide a functional behavioral assessment and behavioral intervention services and modifications, that are designed to address the behavioral violation so that it does not recur.

Once a change in placement is determined (and they can't kick you out without a change in placement), within 10 school days an IEP team meeting must take place to determine whether the behavior was a result of the child's disability or not (of course, I've never heard of a school in this situation admit that the behavior was a result of the disability, or a failure to follow the IEP).

Finally, they can remove a child to an "interim alternative educational setting" for not more than 45 days, even if the violation was secondary to the child's disability if one of the following special circumstances occurs: 1) carries or possesses a weapon at school, 2) uses or possesses illegal drugs at school, or 3) has inflicted serious bodily injury to another person while at school or a school function. Of note, "serious bodily injury" is defined in the US Code as follows:

Title 18 USC Sec. 1365
(3) the term "serious bodily injury" means bodily injury which
involves -
(A) a substantial risk of death;
(B) extreme physical pain;
(C) protracted and obvious disfigurement; or
(D) protracted loss or impairment of the function of a bodily
member, organ, or mental faculty; and

(4) the term "bodily injury" means -
(A) a cut, abrasion, bruise, burn, or disfigurement;
(B) physical pain;
(C) illness;
(D) impairment of the function of a bodily member, organ, or
mental faculty; or

(E) any other injury to the body, no matter how temporary.


My guess (and I am NOT a lawyer, and none of this is to be construed as legal advice)is that they would have a hard time proving "serious bodily injury". But unfortunately, this person needs a lawyer badly, to try and stop the steamroller that this school district has set in motion.

I really wanted to bask in the good feeling I had yesterday for a while. I'm a realist, and I know that not everyday is good. And part of me wishes I didn't see that blog posting this morning.

But part of me knows that being vigilant, and keeping our legal ducks in a row is an important part of advocating for Buddy Boy. Because one of my worst fears is that something like this will happen to us.

Joe is 209