Painful Failure of the Special Education System

The following is a speech given to a local autism support group. The speech is from the parents of a young adult who was diagnosed as being on the autistic spectrum in his late 20s, after his time in school had passed, and as discussed below well too late to prevent tragic consequences. I publish this with the permission of the parents of this young adult with the hope that their pain may spare others the same tragedy. There are many lessons to be learned from this story: keep a close eye on your student's use of the internet, social development is often more important than academic, transition planning for self-sufficient and safe outcome can not be emphasized enough, and sex education that is meaningful for students with special needs is even more important than for other students.

Northwest Suburban Autism Society  - April 1, 2008
    First of all we want to thank Kym for all the support she has been to us since we shared with her our situation. 

    Our son, A, is 30 years old.  Our other children are neurotypical.  A was diagnosed in 2006 and 2007 by top Autism specialist doctors in our area. His diagnosis is High Functioning Autism.  The wrist band I wear asks ‘Autism – would you know if you saw it?’  No medical professional saw it in A until 2006.  We wish they had.

    Our son, A, is going to a federal prison in May.  The sentence is 37 months for possession of child pornography - pictures from the internet.  A is labeled a sexual predator – the only label for a sex offender in our state.  He has to register as a sex offender for the rest of his life and follow all the restrictions on where he can live and work.  His offense is public record on the sex offender website on the internet.  Child pornography is a horrendous, embarrassing and shameful subject.  37 countries in the world have no laws against child pornography.  It is very easily obtainable on the internet.

    It was 6 am on that Thursday morning in 2005 when our doorbell started ringing furiously and we heard frantic knocking on our front door.  I ran downstairs thinking something happened with our elderly next door neighbor.  I opened the door to see 12 officers rushing into the house and up the stairs to the bedrooms with their guns drawn.  It was a team of FBI agents, state police, county sheriff’s police and our local police.  They shoved a search warrant in my face – like I’m supposed to be able to read with what I just witnessed.
They separated us and questioned us.  They interrogated A with 2 or 3 officers on him yelling  “You’re not answering fast enough.  You must be hiding something”.  A was shaking like he had Parkinson’s.  They had him sign his Miranda rights.  They asked him leading questions.  They told him to write a statement which they started writing for him and told him what to write.  None of this is illegal.  He was not under arrest and since he was in his own house there are no laws to protect him.  We could not think to say we wanted to call a lawyer.  They thought he was some criminal mastermind that was taking these pictures and they took pictures of every wall in our house to match against the backgrounds of the pictures that had from A’s computer. After 3 hours they left.

    A year and 1/2 later A was charged with 3 counts of possession and one count of distribution.   The prosecution acknowledged the doctor’s diagnosis and even said himself that after spending 10 minutes with A you could tell he had a problem.  There were several avenues we could have pursued but not with a good outcome. If we had pursued A being declared incompetent the court could have kept him locked up in an institution until he was declared competent.  97% of federal cases reach a conviction.

    The prosecution eventually offered a plea bargain of at least 60 months of prison time in exchange for their dropping the distribution charge.  It was the most painful decision of our lives, but we chose to accept.  If we went to trial A would have been evaluated by the government’s psychiatrist who did not have to know anything about Autism and would perform tests on A that would not be normed for Autism.  They wanted him to be available for 3 days of testing. 

    At the sentencing hearing the judge decided not to accept the plea bargain which in his opinion was too harsh in this case.  We then pled guilty to the possession charges which is a general intent crime.   The prosecution pushed for a jury trial on the distribution count, but the judge urged the prosecution to drop the charge as he said no educated jury would convict A beyond a reasonable doubt due to it being a specific intent crime.  A did not have the wherewithal to commit a specific intent crime.  The prosecution finally dropped the distribution count.  Each count of possession has a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a maximum $250,000 retribution fine.  Although the plea agreement was for at least 60 months of prison time the prosecution was pushing for 97 to 121 months in prison.

    At the sentencing hearing the judge repeated what the doctor said in his report that the real tragedy is that A was not diagnosed much earlier.  If he was diagnosed sooner he could have received the education and training to have made better decisions.  We would have been aware of his vulnerabilities and could have taken precautions we did not know we needed to do.  Since your child is diagnosed with ASD the courts may not be as lenient as they were with A.

    A was diagnosed with speech delay when he was 4 and learning disabilities when he was 5.  He was evaluated by a clinical psychologist when he was 7 and then by school psychologists during grade school and high school.  He had an IEP every year.  The school system never took a fresh look at A’s problems.  Maybe they were not educated on High Functioning Autism which was added to the DSM in 1994 when A was in high school.  A had seen a psychologist for many years during grade school and high school, who did not keep up with new developments and told us recently that he did not know about High Functioning Autism or Aspergers until after A’s therapy stopped.  The possibility of A being on the Autism Spectrum was brought to our attention when we were trying to understand why our son could have been involved in this. 
A had the same small set of friends from kindergarten through high school.  After high school most of these neurotypical friends went away to college or just stopped interacting with him.   He was often on the computer and late at night when his ‘old’ real friends had long turned off their computers he would look for someone, anyone to talk with him.  Because of his speech delay he found it difficult to make friends in person.  But on the internet in chat rooms and with instant messages, he could ‘talk’ with his internet ‘friends’ and they couldn’t hear his speech problem.  He was just like anyone else.

    In some ways A is just like everyone else.  He has the same feelings and curiosities and hormones.  He was curious about adult pornography which is completely legal and he traded adult pornography pictures much like adolescent boys would trade girlie magazines.  The problem is that there are evil people on the internet. They do very bad things.  They sent him illegal pictures and he saved them on his computer for when other evil people would ask him to send them this type of picture.  A did whatever he could to keep his internet “friends” engaged on the internet and to keep the chat going.  A will spend 37 months in prison for possession of pictures.  He had no physical contact with anyone but will have to live with a horrendous label, which affects him and his family for the rest of all of our lives.

    We could have kept this private.  Many people do.  But if we can save one person, one family from having to go through what we have gone through and continue to deal with then it’s worth it.  If by our talking with you we can bring an awareness of what can happen and prevent your young adult from any situation with the criminal justice system then it’s worth it.  We have personally seen how the criminal justice system works in this country.  There is no sympathy for people with a disability.

    We had never imagined that this could happen, but as cited in the Dennis Debbaudt’s Book “Autism, Advocates, and Law Enforcement Professionals” persons with autism are guilty of making bad friends and may compound their mistakes by the actions they take in keeping them.

    The following is quoted from his book.  “These incidents are living hell for persons with autism and the worst nightmares for parents, advocates, and those who care.  Lack of credibility as a witness or reporter of facts will often leave the person with autism in the unenviable position of being victimized twice: once by the abuser and again by a system that lacks the ability or the resolve to understand him or her.  For those who are victimized, there can be lifelong traumatic effects.”

    People with Autism are 7 times more likely than the neurotypical population to have an encounter with the police.  Some police departments are providing training for their staff on how to handle situations involving people on the Spectrum.  Your adult child should carry a card stating they have Autism and give the card to any first responder in any situation. Without an understanding of the disability, the investigator may easily misinterpret the information provided as an indicator of guilt or behavior may seem indicative of a person with something to hide.

    A large number of people in prison have a mental illness or disability.  Some prisons are privately owned and need to show profit for the shareholders. The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate and total documented prison population in the world.  As of 2006, a record 7 million people were behind bars, on probation or on parole.  More than 1 in 100 American adults were incarcerated at the start of 2008.  $49 billion was spent, more than on higher education.

    We thank you for your listening to us this evening and we hope we have provided you with some valuable information.

Comments

[Liz Ditz]

Charles, what a heartbreaking story. Please extend my gratitude and sympathy to A.'s parents.

I have broadcast this post to all I know in the [rational] autism network.

[karenrz]

I feel for these parents, since he would have not been diagnosed in the last two decades before the dx criteria was expanded.

But, this child was high-functioning and I want to know: Didn't the parents have a clue as to what their son was up to? How could they have missed the signs? Didn't the parents speak to their son about sex and appropriate behavior - did they really leave it up to the school to educate their child in this?

All parents need to teach their children right from wrong. The ball got dropped, and now he has to pay unfortunately.

[Danielle D.]

This was a truly heartbreaking story to read.
One thing that concerned me was that the parents felt that if A. was diagnosed earlier he could have gotten the training that he needed to make better decisions. The prosecution even said himself that after ten minutes with A. you could tell that he had a problem. If the problem is noticed by a stranger in ten minutes, wouldn't the school's educators see the problem and gave him some sort of training on decision making? I truly feel that this should have been added on to his IEP.
What I feel is also important to remember in this situation is that this could happen to anyone, not just someone on the Autism Spectrum. The internet can be a scary place, and is used by almost all students in and out of classrooms. I feel that smart internet training should be provided to all students in and out of special education. With everything going on the internet these days, it definitely would not hurt to teach students good decision making techniques, and prevent this type of situation from happening in the future.

[Sue Keller]

Thanks to these parents for having the courage to share this tragedy. Before we criticize the parents, we would do well to remember that even special ed. legal advocates have said pick your battles with the school system. The special ed. system is adversarial against the child and family, trying to provide only as minimal services as possible. As parents we try to do the best for our kids and become experts in all facets of their disability and in special ed. law, but those 2 things together would constitute a full-time job. Many of us have to work outside the home, also. Some of us can't work outside the home because there is no appropriate child care available for our child, thanks to that big ADA loophole: "reasonable accomodations". My point is we're all doing the best we can. Truly these parents did all of us a service, by letting us know what could happen if we remain ignorant about the problems of lonely adults with disabilities. In addition to teaching our kids the dangers of the Internet, we also need to provide opportunities to socialize in person for our teens and adults with disabilities. Encouraging our kids to have friendships and later, dating relationships, would go a long way to make our kids less vulnerable to abuse.

[Sherry Hollis]

Danielle wrote - If the problem is noticed by a stranger in ten minutes, wouldn't the school's educators see the problem and gave him some sort of training on decision making? I truly feel that this should have been added on to his IEP.

Schools see alright. They just don't want to do a thing to help children. Lots of people question why schools seem to 'not notice'?
They notice, alright. They also notice that they will NEVER get reprimanded or have to pay the price for hurting children.

THIS is why they do it.