Skip to main content

New top story from Time: How Britney Spears’ Case Could Change the Future of Conservatorship

https://ift.tt/3qsSdMQ

When Britney Spears told a judge on Wednesday about her experience with her conservatorship—the legal arrangement that gave her father control over her finances and personal life—her words horrified the public.

“This conservatorship is doing me way more harm than good,” she said, detailing how her legal guardians have dictated where she lives, works and receives therapy, stopped her from seeing friends, forced her to take medication against her will and prevented her from having her IUD removed so she could try to get pregnant. “I deserve to have the same rights as anybody does by having a child, a family, any of those things.”
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]

But while Spears’ speech was shocking for many listeners, disability rights lawyers and advocates say what she described is not unusual for many conservatorships in the United States, which are typically instituted for elderly adults, people with mental illnesses or those with intellectual or developmental disabilities. Spears is arguably the nation’s most high-profile conservatee, and people with disabilities who have been fighting to reform conservatorships for years now hope that the attention paid to her case can give momentum to the push to rethink the entire system.

“I’m really heartened by the support that people have shown her and the outrage that people express when they see what conservatorship has done to her life,” says Sam Crane, legal director at the Autistic Self Advocacy Network. “What I really hope is that people can go beyond advocating for her and start really advocating for broader reforms that will help ensure that other people don’t have to go through this either.”

“It’s supposed to be a last resort”

If the system was born of good intentions, in practice, it can become warped and strip people of their basic civil rights.

A conservatorship, also known as a guardianship, is a legal tool that puts a court-appointed guardian or “conservator” in charge of making decisions for another adult who is deemed incapable of managing their own affairs. “The idea of conservatorships and guardianships is supposed to be a protective mechanism to protect a person who cannot take care of their own basic needs,” says Zoe Brennan-Krohn, a staff attorney with the ACLU’s Disability Rights Project. There is limited data on conservatorships, but a National Council on Disability report estimates that at least 1.3 million Americans are under guardianship. Once people are under a conservatorship, there can be periodic reviews, but the process varies by state and there is little oversight.

Conservatees don’t have to lose all of their freedom. In California, for example, where Spears’ case is located, the system is supposed to favor limited conservatorships and give the conservator only those powers that a judge determines are truly necessary. This could mean someone only gets help with making financial decisions or has a guardian attend medical appointments, while retaining the rest of their autonomy. However, the National Council on Disability has found that most guardianships for people with disabilities go way beyond that and give all of the conservatee’s rights to the appointed conservator.

And once a guardianship is in place, it is incredibly difficult to end it. It can only be lifted by a court. Conservatees often lose access to their money, to their ability to sign a contract and in some cases even to the Internet. Their conservator might be the one hiring a lawyer for them, they might not be able to afford a lawyer, or in cases like Spears, the court can appoint a lawyer they didn’t choose. “It’s supposed to be a last resort because it’s so invasive. It’s supposed to be only if there’s nothing else that works,” Brennan-Krohn says. “But in reality, it’s very often the first resort.”

This is in large part because of the way society views people with disabilities, advocates and lawyers say. “It’s a cultural failure,” says Jonathan Martinis, senior director for law and policy at Syracuse University’s Burton Blatt Institute and a leading expert on alternatives to conservatorship. He notes that the idea of guardianship for people with disabilities goes back as far as the first codified laws in ancient Rome, and it’s been a fixture of western legal systems since then.

Assumptions that people with disabilities can’t take care of themselves can also lead to situations like Spears being denied the choice to remove her IUD and have another child. “There have been efforts to control the reproduction of people with disabilities, and especially women of color with disabilities, for a long time,” says Crane. “And it really was born from the eugenics movement.”

In 1927, the Supreme Court ruled in Buck v. Bell that it was constitutional for the state of Virginia to forcibly sterilize a “feeble minded woman” for the “welfare of society,” and this kind of practice continued for decades. States have stopped allowing this kind of sterilization, and most have extra protections before someone under conservatorship can be sterilized, but Crane argues that Spears’ forced IUD constitutes reproductive coercion and should fall under that category as well.

Some guardianships are abusive, as Spears has alleged, but disability rights advocates say there are serious problems with the system even when everyone is acting in good faith. This is especially an issue for young adults. Among those with intellectual and developmental disabilities, people ages 18-22 are the age group most likely to be under guardianship. Educators routinely recommend guardianship for teenagers leaving school, creating a “school-to-guardianship pipeline,” according to a 2019 report from the National Council on Disability. For other young adults, making mistakes and learning from those choices is part of growing up. But for people with disabilities, those mistakes can be used against them in guardianship hearings.

“One of the things that we’ve seen with guardianships really commonly is that when you don’t have the ability to steer decisions around your life, you’re not in the driver’s seat, you disengage,” says Crane. “So people don’t develop skills under guardianship, they actually lose skills under guardianship. And it keeps people trapped in the cycle where people are making decisions for them without consulting them.”

A new model of support

Increasingly, advocates are promoting the model of “supported decision making” instead of conservatorship.

Supported decision making is a process by which an individual builds a network of people who they trust to help them make decisions, instead of having a court designate people for them to manage their affairs. This can be done informally, codified in a notarized agreement, or in some states recognized by a court. In 2013, Martinis represented Jenny Hatch, a Virginia woman with Down syndrome who was suing to end her guardianship, and the case became the first trial in which a judge denied permanent guardianship in favor of supported decision making.

Since then, 12 states and Washington, D.C. have recognized supported decision making as an alternative to guardianship, and there are movements in most states to bolster the model, says Martinis. Guardianship laws have come a long way in recent years, and legislators in California and other states have introduced bills to strengthen the rights of those under conservatorships.

But advocates says there is still more work to be done to educate teachers, doctors, judges, and families of people with disabilities about steps to take before or instead of guardianship. People who need support could also designate a power of attorney, for instance, which transfers more limited authority, or work with experts like a financial manager before moving straight to guardianship. With so many people now focused on Spears’ situation, advocates are hopeful that the star’s wrenching testimony can serve as a call to action for others.

“Every time we shine a little bit of light, things get easier for everyone after that. Britney’s not just shining a light, she’s a huge spotlight,” says Martinis. “So maybe just maybe the conversation changes a little bit and the culture changes a little bit. And we say before guardianship, what else can we do?”

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

New Sculptures Light up Van Ness Avenue

New Sculptures Light up Van Ness Avenue By Luis “Loui” Apolonio Light sculpture at Van Ness Avenue and O'Farrell Street Spectators gathered both online and in person to watch new lighting sculptures on Van Ness turned on for the first time on March 31, 2022. The whimsical and brightly colored sculptures located on the new Van Ness BRT boarding platform between Geary and O’Farrell are made of steel with LED lights inside on a timer set to illuminate at night.  The lighting event was kicked off with SFMTA Director Jeff Tumlin and MTAB Chair Gwyneth Borden serving as emcees. Mary Chou, Director of Public Arts and Collections at the San Francisco Arts Commission, spoke about the art installation itself, as well as the process for selecting the artist who would be awarded the project. In addition, Maddy Ruvolo, a member of the SFMTA’s Accessible Services team and a recently appointed member of President Biden’s U.S. Access Board, shared the importance of having accessibility as a ...

New T Third Connecting Chinatown to Sunnydale Starts Saturday

New T Third Connecting Chinatown to Sunnydale Starts Saturday By Christopher Ward New Muni Metro map. This Saturday the T Third starts its long-awaited new route connecting Chinatown-Rose Pak Station from 4th & King in Central Subway, Mondays through Fridays, 6 a.m. to midnight every 10 minutes and Saturdays and Sundays, 8 a.m. to midnight every 12 minutes.   The K Ingleside will now travel between Balboa Park and Embarcadero Station. Customers using Embarcadero & Folsom, Embarcadero & Brannan and 2nd and King platforms should transfer to the N Judah at Powell Station or 4th & King. Watch the new Muni Metro service  map animations . The following bus service changes also start this Saturday: The T Third Bus will now run along 3rd and 4th Streets in SoMa and on Stockton Street north of Market Street to align with the new T Third rail line and will no longer travel on the Embarcadero and Market Street.   The 6 Haight/Parnassus  will now...

Residents Overwhelmingly Support Slow Streets

Residents Overwhelmingly Support Slow Streets By Eillie Anzilotti After over a year of Slow Streets providing safe, low-volume corridors for people to walk, bike, play and travel during the pandemic, we’re excited to share our first comprehensive evaluation of the program . The key takeaway? San Franciscans are overwhelmingly in support of Slow Streets. Slow Streets are designed to limit through traffic on certain residential streets and allow them to be used as a shared roadway for people traveling by foot and by bicycle. Since introducing Slow Streets in April 2020 in response to the Mayor’s Emergency Health Order, SFMTA has designated around 30 corridors covering 47 miles of roadway as Slow Streets. The program has evolved from a critical component of San Francisco’s pandemic response and recovery to a potential new avenue to further the city and SFMTA’s goals around climate action and sustainable transportation. As the Slow Streets program has grown, we wanted to make sure we...

Transit Lanes Keep Muni Moving on Mission Street in SoMa

Transit Lanes Keep Muni Moving on Mission Street in SoMa By Erin McMillan The full-time transit lanes on Mission Street downtown installed as a temporary emergency measure during the pandemic will be made permanent. The first of the city’s Temporary Emergency Transit Lanes to get permanent authorization, they were unanimously approved by the SFMTA Board of Directors at their June 15, 2021 meeting. This shows how a quick-build project can be installed, evaluated, and refined in a relatively short amount of time.   Thousands of daily riders have already felt the impact of the full-time transit lanes since they were first temporarily installed last summer. Now, riders of the 14 Mission, 14R Mission Rapid, and many SamTrans and Golden Gate Transit customers will continue to benefit from the transit time savings we have seen with the implementation of these lanes. Mission Street in SoMa has been a major transit corridor for years, serving regional commuter...

New top story from Time: As Joe Biden Touts ‘Bidencare,’ Donald Trump Promises a Health Care Plan That Doesn’t Exist

https://ift.tt/3jmvugC President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden have starkly different visions for the future of health care in America, and during Thursday night’s debate they clashed over whose ideas would help more people. The catch? Only one of the candidates actually has a health care plan to talk about. Trump began this portion of the debate by repeating his usual criticisms of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare. “I’d like to terminate Obamacare, come up with a brand new, beautiful health care,” the President said. His administration is currently backing a challenge to the landmark health care law at the Supreme Court. If the high court overturns the ACA—an outcome that is more likely since Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died—more than 20 million people would lose their health insurance coverage. As many as 133 million Americans who have pre-existing conditions could also be denied coverage or charged significantly higher prem...

FOX NEWS: What is TikTok's 'Check Your Privilege' challenge?

What is TikTok's 'Check Your Privilege' challenge? Activists are calling for awareness and change following the death of George Floyd. via FOX NEWS https://ift.tt/3crYd00

New top story from Time: A Photographer’s Journey Through the Dangerous New Age of Conspiracies in America

https://ift.tt/354JVAF In November 2017, the House Intelligence Committee released fake advertisements found on Facebook in the walk up to the 2016 election. As politicians on each side argued over whether the ads changed the election results, the heart of the revelation was way more disturbing. The Russian ads targeted the American public to deepen wounds on divisive issues and spread false information. Facebook said the posts were “ what we saw from these actors was an insidious attempt to drive people apart ,” according to Colin Stretch, the general counsel for the company. In 2020, less than one month before the election, America seems even more divided and deeply fractured after a turbulent year with a deadly pandemic, economic pain, and a chaotic presidency. With many Americans on lockdown, social media has been a vital form of communication — but one that is also driving dangerous conspiracies. From the false QAnon conspiracy, which promotes Trump as the final de...

New top story from Time: WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange Accused of Conspiring With LulzSec and Anonymous Hackers

https://ift.tt/3hZ0cN4 WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange conspired with hackers affiliated with the “Anonymous” and “LulzSec” groups, which have been linked to numerous cyber attacks around the world, according to new indictment by the U.S. Justice Department. Assange, who’s detained in the U.K. on a U.S. extradition request, gave the leader of LulzSec a list of targets to hack in 2012 and told this person that the most influential release of hacked materials would be from the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency or the New York Times, according to a statement Wednesday from the Justice Department. The LulzSec leader was cooperating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation at the time, according to the statement. An Anonymous and LulzSec-affiliated hacker stole emails through a data breach of an American intelligence consulting company that were published in WikiLeaks, according to the statement. Assange indirectly asked that hacker to spam that company a...

FOX NEWS: California woman seen posing with power drill in front of boarded-up store goes viral, prompts extreme backlash The woman is seen in the short clip as holding a power drill and posing in front of a boarded-up store.

California woman seen posing with power drill in front of boarded-up store goes viral, prompts extreme backlash The woman is seen in the short clip as holding a power drill and posing in front of a boarded-up store. via FOX NEWS https://ift.tt/3dvLfj6

New top story from Time: New York Prosecutor Convenes Grand Jury in Criminal Investigation of Donald Trump

https://ift.tt/3wuXF3R (NEW YORK) — New York prosecutors have convened a special grand jury to consider evidence in a criminal investigation into former President Donald Trump’s business dealings, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Tuesday. The development signals that the Manhattan district attorney’s office was moving toward seeking charges as a result of its two-year investigation, which included a lengthy legal battle to obtain Trump’s tax records. The person familiar with the matter was not authorized to speak publicly and did so on condition of anonymity. The news was first reported by The Washington Post . Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. is conducting a wide-ranging investigation into a variety of matters such as hush-money payments paid to women on Trump’s behalf, property valuations and employee compensation. The Democratic prosecutor has been using an investigative grand jury through the course of his probe to issue sub...