Uploaded March 2019 | Updated September 2026, 3 days ago
In the past five years, over seventy people with disabilities have been murdered by their parents.
These acts are horrific enough on their own. But they exist in the context of a larger pattern. A parent kills their disabled child. The media portrays these murders as justifiable and inevitable due to the “burden” of having a disabled person in the family. If the parent stands trial, they are given sympathy and comparatively lighter sentences, if they are sentenced at all. The victim is disregarded, blamed for their own murder at the hands of the person they should have been able to trust the most, and ultimately forgotten. And then the cycle repeats.
For the last four years, ASAN, ADAPT, Not Dead Yet, the National Council on Independent Living, the Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, and other disability rights organizations have come together at local vigils across the country to mourn those losses, bring awareness to these tragedies, and demand justice and equal protection under the law for all people with disabilities.
We prefer that people attend an in person vigil. However we recognize that not everyone has that option- either it would involve a lot of travel, or health/mobility concerns make leaving the house tricky, or a number of other serious factors. Please check and see if you can make it to an in person vigil first: autisticadvocacy.org/2015/02/2015-day-of-mourning-vigil-sites
You can join the virtual vigil on March 1, 2015 3-7pm EST at sites.google.com/site/dayofmourning2015virtualvigil/home
If you have something you'd like to read, have read, or have recorded yourself reading/talking for the virtual vigil, please email SBreakstone@autisticadvocacy.org ASAP
The Hashtag for this event as well as the in-person vigils is #DDoM2015
In the past five years, over seventy people with disabilities have been murdered by their parents.
These acts are horrific enough on their own. But they exist in the context of a larger pattern. A parent kills their disabled child. The media portrays these murders as justifiable and inevitable due to the “burden” of having a disabled person in the family. If the parent stands trial, they are given sympathy and comparatively lighter sentences, if they are sentenced at all. The victim is disregarded, blamed for their own murder at the hands of the person they should have been able to trust the most, and ultimately forgotten. And then the cycle repeats.
For the last four years, ASAN, ADAPT, Not Dead Yet, the National Council on Independent Living, the Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, and other disability rights organizations have come together at local vigils across the country to mourn those losses, bring awareness to these tragedies, and demand justice and equal protection under the law for all people with disabilities.
We prefer that people attend an in person vigil. However we recognize that not everyone has that option- either it would involve a lot of travel, or health/mobility concerns make leaving the house tricky, or a number of other serious factors. Please check and see if you can make it to an in person vigil first: autisticadvocacy.org/2015/02/2015-day-of-mourning-vigil-sites
You can join the virtual vigil on March 1, 2015 3-7pm EST at sites.google.com/site/dayofmourning2015virtualvigil/home
If you have something you'd like to read, have read, or have recorded yourself reading/talking for the virtual vigil, please email SBreakstone@autisticadvocacy.org ASAP
The Hashtag for this event as well as the in-person vigils is #DDoM2015
