Schorr v. Borough of Lemoyne, et al.

Williams, Cuker & Berezofsky partner Jerry Williams, together with lawyers Steve Pennington and Jamie Ray of the Center for Disability Law and Policy, represented the family of Ryan Schorr, a mentally ill man who was killed in an encounter with policemen who were attempting to execute a warrant to commit him involuntarily for psychiatric treatment. The suit alleged that the municipality employing the policemen violated his Constitutional rights and discriminated against him in violation of the Americans with Disability Act (ADA), in part through a failure to train and a failure to modify policies and practices to ensure meeting his needs as a disabled individual. In an important decision dated February 10, 2003, Judge Kane of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania held that plaintiffs could proceed under both a federal civil rights statute and the ADA. The decision stands for the important proposition that the ADA applies to a broad scope of police services and activity. Full text of the opinion in Schorr v. Borough of Lemoyne, et al., No 1-CV-01-0930, amy be found on the website of the Center for Disability Law and Policy, www.equalemployment.org. The settlement of the case included numerous county-wide changes in the treatment of the mentally ill by the criminal justice system, and the adoption of a model program to provide systematic liaison between care providers and law enforcement officers.