Arun Rath: This is GBH’s All Things Considered. I’m Arun Rath.
A lot of us might assume electric shock therapy is a thing of the past. It's been widely condemned by organizations like the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the American Association of People with Disabilities and the U.N. classifies the treatment as torture.
But there's one treatment facility that still uses electric shock therapy right here in Massachusetts: The Judge Rotenberg Educational Center in Canton.
Yesterday, the Supreme Judicial Court ruled the center can continue to use electric shock therapy on patients with developmental and intellectual diseases, including autism.
Here to discuss the ruling and what this means for patients at the center is Elisa Hunt, lead organizer for Stop the Shock Coalition. Elisa, thanks for joining us.
Elisa Hunt: Thank you for having me.
Rath: I'll just stipulate at the top — it probably goes without saying, based on the name of your organization — it's an advocacy organization, and you've got a point of view on this. Like the organizations I mentioned, you are opposed to this practice.
Hunt: Yes, very much opposed to it.
Rath: Also, we should stipulate that we're talking about a particular type of electric therapy, not to be confused with some others. This is a case where it's being used for behavioral issues. So, first off, tell us a bit about how it is used at the Judge Rotenberg Center.
Hunt: It's basically a device that is attached to their extremities. They can wear up to five devices at a time if they exhibit a behavior that is on their chart as a behavior that is aversive, then they will get a shock for that behavior.
The JRC contends that they only use this for dangerous behaviors, but at the same time, they also say that certain actions like standing up, for certain individuals, is an indication that they're going to be violent. And that is considered an actionable cause to get a shock — just standing up — because they might become violent when they stand up.
Rath: As you said, the center maintains that they're only using this in worst-case scenarios. Of course, there's anecdotal evidence to the contrary and a video — I think a lot of people have seen — of one of the patients being shocked over and over again. Are there cases, though, where this is as effective a therapy as the center is claiming?
Hunt: It's not been proven by anyone that it is effective — quite the contrary. It's been proven to be very ineffective. And there are so many more therapies now that are much more humane. These people deserve to be treated more humanely.
Rath: First off, give us your reaction to this ruling.
Hunt: I was shocked. Well, I guess I wouldn't even say shocked because this has been happening for 30 years. Advocates have been trying to shut down this facility, or at least put an end to the aversive therapies, and the judge continuously rules in favor of the Judge Rotenberg Center.
Rath: Is there anything that could happen next? There is work on a legislative fix, right?
Hunt: Yes. There's a bill in the House right now, an act regarding the use of aversive therapy. It's been introduced for the past 10 years, and it never makes it through.
So this year, we decided to get a group of organizations, which is our Stop the Shock Coalition. We've got 29 organizations now working together to try and get this bill passed. It would essentially make it illegal to use any type of painful procedure as a form of therapy, and it would guarantee the right to a humane existence.
So, for me, with this, the humane existence part of it extends even further to someone I lost to institutional abuse — where there were no consequences for their actions. She was found to have been treated inhumanely. She was a friend's daughter. I was very close with her, she was like a niece to me.
She suffered with behavioral health issues from the time she was probably 12. She was in and out of hospitals. She went into a facility, and they overmedicated her, neglected her or treated her inhumanely, and she died in their facility.
And I'm not just saying that's my opinion — that's what was found by the state and the Disability Law Center. And there were no consequences for it other than to write a corrective plan of action. So this bill, if we can get this bill passed, not only will it stop the shock, but if we can add some penalties to it, it would at least create a consequence for these facilities.
Rath: The FDA banned electric shock therapy in 2020, but a federal court overturned the ban, accusing the agency of overstepping its authority. Since this ruling seems like it's more on a technicality rather than the practice itself, do you have hope that electric shock therapy can be outlawed at some point?
Hunt: I would like to be hopeful. It's hard to do so considering the past 30 years of advocates trying to get it done, from legislators to just average people.
Yeah, this last one was a motion to overturn the judge's last ruling. Apparently, they just didn't have enough evidence. And it's the families of the individuals in the Judge Rotenberg Center who want their children to be on this device, and that has been a huge roadblock for getting these poor people off of the device.
I just have to think that they're misguided. I know that the Judge Rotenberg Center manipulates them into believing that there's no other treatment for their loved ones, but considering that there are approximately 60 people on the device, and it's the only place in the country that uses this type of shock device — it was actually invented by the person who opened the Judge Rotenberg Center — I have to think these parents are misguided because there's no way that they could believe that hurting their child is the only way, unless someone's manipulating them to think that.
Rath: Lisa, thank you so much for sharing your and your organization’s perspective on this controversial topic. We appreciate it.
Hunt: Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.
Many may assume that electric shock therapy is an antiquated practice and a thing of the past. It’s been widely condemned by organizations like the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the American Association of People with Disabilities, and the U.N.’s Human Rights Council considers the treatment to be torture.
But there’s one treatment facility left that still uses electric shock therapy, and it’s in Massachusetts: The Judge Rotenberg Educational Center in Canton. On Thursday, the Supreme Judicial Court ruled the center can continue to use electric shock therapy on patients with developmental and intellectual diseases, including autism, by upholding a consent decree specifically shielding the center that was put on the books decades ago.
Advocates like Elisa Hunt, lead organizer of the Stop the Shock Coalition, accuse the center of abusing that power and using the shocks in seemingly innocuous situations.
“The JRC contends that they only use this for dangerous behaviors, but at the same time, they also say that certain actions like standing up is, for certain individuals, an indication that they're going to be violent,” Hunt said. “And that is considered an actionable cause to get a shock — just standing up — because they might become violent when they stand up.”
Despite anecdotal evidence to the contrary, including a video of a patient being tied to a gurney and shocked 31 times, the JRC maintains they only use electric shock therapy in worst-case scenarios, in which the recipients are at risk of harming others or themselves.
The Judge Rotenberg Center and the school’s parents organization said they were “pleased” with the ruling that lets them continue the treatment, saying it is a “matter of life and death” for patients.
“JRC and the parents and guardians of JRC’s clients will continue to ensure that this treatment remains available to those for whom all other treatment options have been tried and failed,” the center wrote in a statement.
A representative for the center pointed to prior positive trial testimony from former patients and families, which, in the words of the ruling, “credited JRC’s aversive treatments with significantly improving these patients' problematic behaviors.”
Arguments that electric shock therapy is effective are unfounded, Hunt said, and there is a litany of other treatments that should be used instead.
“There are so many more therapies now that are much more humane,” she said. “These people deserve to be treated humanely.”
Hunt said she’s hoping to change the practice through legislation after decades of judges ruling in the center’s favor. She joined forces with 29 other organizations to form the Stop the Shock Coalition to try and further Bill H.180, which would “prohibit the use of procedures which cause physical pain or deny a reasonable humane existence to persons with disabilities.”
This specific bill, currently sitting in the House, has been introduced many times over the past 10 years but has never come to fruition.
Hunt said a particularly challenging roadblock for the legislation is a group of families of individuals at the Judge Rotenberg Center who advocate for the use of electric shock therapy.
“I just have to think that they’re misguided because there’s no way that they could believe that hurting their child is the only way,” she said. “Unless someone’s manipulating them to think that.”
Hunt said the Stop the Shock Coalition’s work is especially personal to her, as someone close to her died due to institutional abuse. She alleged the facility overmedicated the patient, neglected her and treated her inhumanely.
“If we can get this bill passed, not only will it stop the shock, but if we can add some penalties to it, it would at least create a consequence for these facilities,” she said.
