By BitcoDavid Did you know that practically every police cruiser in this country is equipped with an on-board computer with a webcam and wireless Internet capability? Did you further know that Video Relay Services exist, virtually all across the Internet? Imagine this scenario. A young Deaf woman is a victim of domestic abuse. Her husband
By BitcoDavid I was asked, the other day, why DeafInPrison.com – a site dedicated to the plight of the Deaf inmate – reports on such a diverse palette of issues. We cover the School to Prison Pipeline, Prison Reform, solitary confinement, mental health issues, Women in prison, the drug war, prison gangs, prison rape, wrongful
By Jean F. Andrews A deaf person calls 911. Through a relay interpreter, she signs that her husband is beating her and she is afraid because he has pulled a knife. Now, she has locked herself in the back bedroom. Please send the police, she signs. Emotionally distraught, she sobs and hangs up. The relay
By BitcoDavid Yesterday’s New York Times contained an essay on Abreham Zemedagegehu – a homeless, Deaf, Ethiopian immigrant – who received an iPad from their Neediest Cases Fund, and uses it to communicate via Video Relay Service. For the past 100 years, The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund has provided direct assistance to children, families
By Glenn Langohr We now look at drug addiction as a disease in government and medical institutions, so when are we going to end the War on Drugs and how will we? The War on Drugs has only made drug use more desirable by making them more taboo, thus creating an underground culture where it
By BitcoDavid Ramon Rustin, warden of Metropolitan Detention Center in Albuquerque, plans on halting the center’s Methadone program, thereby saving Bernalillo County about $10,000 a month. Since 2006, the Center – the largest non-penitentiary facility in Heroin plagued New Mexico – has been treating its addicted inmates with Methadone. As well as the expense, Rustin who
By Joanne Greenberg Part of the problem of Deaf low reading levels is due to insufficient education. Why should this be? The problem of low reading levels among the Deaf was supposed to have been solved 30 years ago, when mainstreaming was instituted to give Deaf kids an equal classroom experience, among their hearing neighbors
By BitcoDavid The New York Times, on January 3rd, reported on the case of Joseph A. Buffey. Eleven years ago, Buffy was sentenced to 70 years for the robbery and rape of an 83 year old woman. According to the Times, Buffey confessed to the crime, but DNA tests prove his innocence. In fact, Buffey
By BitcoDavid The New York Times did a photo-essay on the burgeoning trend of teaching yoga to inmates, as an attempt at corralling the recidivism problem. Even though states’ spending on corrections has quadrupled during the past two decades, to $52 billion, the rate of recidivism has remained stubbornly high, with roughly four in 10
By Joanne Greenberg In Lakewood, Colorado as in many other places in the United States, people are protesting the placement of schools and other facilities for the Deaf. They worry about increased traffic, and the lowering of property values. They fear danger from the pupils in those schools, or the recipients of those services. ”We
