For 30 years, NARPA has provided an educational conference with inspiring keynoters and outstanding workshops. We learn from each other and come together as a community committed to social justice for people with psychiatric labels & developmental disabilities.
Workshop RFP on our website – Submission deadline April 1!
Limited scholarships available – Application on website soon.
The National Association for Rights Protection and Advocacy (NARPA) is seeking proposals which address strategies, ideas, programs, and emerging practices that support and promote NARPA’s mission and commitment to individual rights, liberty, freedom and dignity.
NARPA‘s mission is to promote policies and pursue strategies that result in individuals with psychiatric diagnoses making their own choices regarding treatment. We educate and mentor those individuals to enable them to exercise their legal and human rights with a goal of abolition of all forced treatment.
NARPA is an independent organization, solely supported by its members. It is a unique mix of people who have experienced psychiatric intervention, advocates, civil rights activists, mental health workers, and lawyers — with many people whose roles overlap. NARPA exists to protect people’s right to choice and to be free from coercion, and to promote alternatives so that the right to choice can be meaningful. Read about NARPA’s history of human rights advocacy, check out the ADA Case of the Week archives, and more.
If you are a journalist seeking mental health professionals or legal experts for news commentators on issues related to human rights violations affecting individuals with psychiatric diagnoses, please contact ISEPP’s Executive Director Dr. Al Galves:
Boston, MA.: Investigative reporter Mike Beaudet from Boston’s FOX 25 resently presented a powerful undercover report on the Judge Rotenberg Center claiming a controversial video of a disabled teen tied down and given painful electric shocks for seven hours should be made public.
Cheryl McCollins gave a horrific account about the treatment of her disabled son, Andre stating: “It is horrific. And poor Andre, who had to suffer through this, and not know why.” FOX News reports the ordeal began after Andre hit a staff member and gave this account:
Inside a classroom, as a camera was recording, he was tied to a restraint board, face down, a helmet over his head. He stayed like that for seven hours without a break, no food, no water, or trips to the bathroom. Each time he screamed or tensed up, he was shocked, 31 times in all. His mother called the next day to check on him.
He stayed like that for seven hours without a break, no food, no water, or trips to the bathroom. Each time he screamed or tensed up, he was shocked, 31 times in all. His mother called the next day to check on him. “I said, ‘Andre.’ I said, ‘Hello.’ And so he said, ‘Help me,'” McCollins said.
After spending three days in a comatose state, not eating or drinking, Andre was taken to Children’s Hospital, where he was diagnosed with “acute stress response” caused by the shocks. “The doctors took all the shackles and all those things off of him. Andre’s not talking to me. I’m just holding him and telling him how much I love him, and asking him please to talk to me, just tell me what happened,” McCollins said.
What happened that morning in October 2002 became clear after the Rotenberg Center showed her the video of Andre’s ordeal, recorded by the classroom camera. “When I viewed the tape, I saw Andre walking into a room, someone asking him to take off his coat. Andre said no, they shocked him, he went underneath the table trying to get away from them. They pulled him out, tied him up and they continued to shock him,”
McCollins said. “When you look at that videotape, what was the purpose of all those shocks?” asked FOX Undercover reporter Mike Beaudet. “I have no idea,” McCollins replied. “Did you get an apology?” Beaudet asked. “No, they felt what they did was therapy,” McCollins replied. “Does that look like therapy to you?” Beaudet asked. “No, it was torture,” McCollins said.
For now, the public can’t see for themselves what Andre’s treatment looks like because the Rotenberg Center asked a Norfolk Superior Court judge to seal the video tape, saying it would be unsettling for viewers who didn’t understand the context.
The judge agreed, and the video remains under a protective order. “This is video they fought vehemently not to release, fought vehemently to keep quiet and I think now are very concerned that this tape is out there,” said attorney Andrew Meyer, who represents Andre McCollins in a lawsuit against the Rotenberg Center. “The Judge Rotenberg Center has consistently gotten away with being able to soft sell their treatment, to whitewash what they’ve done about it being therapeutic: ‘It’s not so bad, it helps these children.’
But the eyewitness accounts that we now have about what actually goes on at this center puts to lie everything they’ve been saying,” Meyer said. But not everyone agrees. When asked about the perception that electric shock therapy is torture, school attorney Michael Flammia said, “Absolutely wrong.” Flammia would not talk about Andre McCollins. “But I can tell you I’m familiar with every kid who has been at the school, who have been at the school over 20 years and I can promise you the treatment here is safe, it’s effective, it’s administered properly and every kid has benefited enormously from it,” Flammia said. “We talked with a parent who says, ‘Put that video out there, let the public see what happened to my son here.
Let them see what she calls torture,'” asked FOX Undercover’s Beaudet. “The matter is in the hands of the courts and we have complete confidence in the court system on that particular matter,” Flammia replied. “So you don’t want us to see that video?” Beaudet asked. “It’s in the hands of the court,” Flammia replied. But McCollins says the public needs to see the video of what happened to her son. “I hope this stops it. I hope this tape being exposed puts an end to this torture.
Click here to visit MyFOXBoston for the full story.
Click here to read: Shock treatment at Judge Rotenberg Center debated
Child advocates outraged at this and similar cases are asking that concerned citizens contact their Senators today to Co-Sponser S.2020 to outlaw the use of seclusion rooms and restraints on challenging kids, claiming schools need to use Collaborative Problem SolvingSkills a’ la Dr. Ross Greene and learn to implement Plan B.
PLEASE EMAIL YOUR SENATORS AND ASK THEM TO COSPONSOR THE KEEPING ALL STUDENTS SAFE ACT (S.2020). This bill will protect children nationwide from restraint and seclusion in schools. Click here for more information.
ethicaltreatment.wordpress.com 