FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 3, 2003
Contact: Max Lapertosa, 312-253-7000
Rev. Rus Cooper-Dowda, 727-527-9764

On Friday, April 4, disability advocates will be bearing silent witness in a Florida courtroom to hear arguments in a case that affects the rights of people with cognitive disabilities across Florida. Twelve disability rights groups, a university affilated policy center, a patients' rights group, and two individuals who have experienced severe brain injury filed an amicus brief supporting Terri Schiavo's right to food, water and rehabilitation:

Not Dead Yet, ADAPT, American Association of People with Disabilities, Center for Self-Determination, Center on Human Policy at Syracuse University, Rev. Rus Cooper-Dowda, Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, Half the Planet Foundation, Hospice Patients' Alliance, Dr. James Hall, National Council on Independent Living, National Spinal Cord Injury Association, Self-Advocates Becoming Empowered, TASH, World Association of Persons with Disabilities, and World Institute on Disability.

These groups are among the nation's leading organizations representing people with disabilities. Most are governed and staffed by a majority of people with disabilities of all types, including people with severe physical and cognitive disabilities. They join with the parents of Theresa Schiavo because the standards upon which Ms. Schiavo's life or death turn may, if defined broadly enough, also be applied to thousands of people with disabilities who, like Ms. Schiavo, cannot articulate their own views and must thus rely on third parties as substitute decision-makers.

Max Lapertosa, attorney for the 16 amici, says, "A judge's order to terminate the life of a woman with severe disabilities is not a private family matter. Terminating Ms. Schiavo's life support would not be possible without the authority of the courts. This case reflects whether our society and legal system values the lives of people with disabilities equally to those without disabilities."

Sara Lewis, whose daughter has autism, notes that many parents of brain-injured children are afraid that once they are gone, their offspring will be thrown to the wolves. "How will parents sleep when they become aware of a newly added 'best interest standard' which permits a guardian to remove any medical treatment, even alternative nutrition and hydration?" she asks.

Rev. Rus Cooper-Dowda, a minister, journalist, and free-lance writer in the St. Petersburg area, takes this case personally as well as politically.

"In 1985, my situation was much like Terri's. The hospital staff and my (ex) husband had written me off as being as good as dead, as someone who would never regain any kind of 'meaningful' function. Since then, I've earned a Master's degree and had a son. Having a son would have surprised them, too, since those same physicians had earlier pronounced me sterile."

Ms. Lewis, Rev. Cooper-Dowda, and other disability advocates will be attending this hearing to express their solidarity with Terri Schiavo and her parents.