The basis for the complaints is that the law schools require applicants who wish to apply online to use a centralized Internet-based process provided by the Law School Admissions Council via its website – a process that is inaccessible to blind law school applicants.

According to today’s article at PR Newswire, the nine law schools named in the complaints are the University of Chicago Law School, Yeshiva University’s Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School, University of Denver’s Sturm College of Law, Washington and Lee University School of Law, University of Miami School of Law, William Mitchell College of Law, Gonzaga University School of Law, and Northeastern University School of Law.

The complaints ask the Justice Department to require these law schools to suspend use of the LSAC application system until it is accessible to blind and other print-disabled students, and to require each law school to provide the same application process in a format available to all students.

Founded in 1940, the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) is the nation’s largest and most influential membership organization of blind persons. With fifty thousand members, the NFB has affiliates in all fifty states plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, and over seven hundred local chapters. As a consumer and advocacy organization, the NFB is considered the leading force in the blindness field today and is the Voice of the Nation’s Blind.

• New Trends in Legal Education
• University of Miami Law School Offers Deferrals to Incoming 1Ls
• University of Miami Law to Defer Incoming Students
• Harvard Dedicates Bathroom to William Falik
• Little Sympathy Given By ABA To Jobless Lawyers

A Minnesota man undergoing electro-convulsive therapy goes before a judge in St. Paul on Tuesday to try to stop the court-ordered procedure. Ray Sandford says he’s losing his memory after having more than 30 treatments so far. His doctors have argued that the procedure is necessary to treat Sandford’s psychotic episodes.

The courts have determined that Ray isn’t competent to make decisions regarding his own welfare….

[His] condition [is] described in court records as schizo-affective disorder with bipolar tendencies.

There are no good numbers on how many people receive forced ECT in the U.S. It’s up to states to track these cases and most, like Minnesota, do not.

The MPR story includes the opinions of multiple lawyers and advocates, on the topic of forced medical treatment.

“Sometimes people say you should use the perspective of a reasonable person,” said [Dean of William Mitchell College of Law Eric] Janus. “And it’s assumed that a reasonable person wants to protect him or herself against a relapse of a terrible mental illness.”

Still the “reasonable person” test doesn’t make sense to everyone, including even himself, Janus says.

Janus says even greater weight should be given to what the patient wants — even if it appears their illness might be clouding their judgment. Competent or not, not everyone wants to be treated when they’re sick, he says.

“That’s really what the court should be asking,” said Janus. “What are this person’s values? What does he want? What kind of life does he want to live? And it should be trying to make the decision in his behalf.”

Link to Minnesota Public Radio.

• IP Attorney Group Joins Merchant & Gould
• Teachers in Northern Wisconsin Awarded Bonuses
• How Will London Olympic Games Affect Summer Programs for Law Students?
• Ogletree Deakins Continues to Grow Firm with Addition of Trio of Attorneys to Minneapolis Office; Shareholders to Phoenix Office
• University of Minnesota Law School considers private funding