Lois Curtis, lead plaintiff in Olmstead case, dies

Abstract

Lois Curtis, the lead plaintiff in Olmstead v. L.C., the monumental Supreme Court case that solidified the right for people with disabilities to receive services in the most integrated settings possible, died of pancreatic cancer on Nov. 3, at 55, reported the nonprofit, disability‐led organization able South Carolina, along with several news outlets. Curtis fought for the elimination of unnecessary segregation of people with disabilities. Curtis had cognitive disabilities and schizophrenia and was known to wander off into the community. Because of a lack of education and understanding of disabled people, Curtis often found herself in the custody of authorities who demanded that her family force her into institutionalization. In the mid‐90s she sought help from the Atlanta Legal Aid Society, asking to be released and given services that would allow her to live on her own in the community. They filed a case against the state of Georgia, the defendant being the commissioner of the Georgia Department of Human Resources, Tommy Olmstead. In 1999, Curtis won her case after the Supreme Court found that she was unjustly segregated as a person with a disability and that such segregation was discrimination in violation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act! Curtis went on to live her life in her community, just as she wanted. Ira Burnim, legal director of the Bazelon Center, in an article in The New York Times about Curtis' life and death, wrote, “This is the first time the court has announced that needless institutionalization is a form of discrimination.”