Jennifer Gonnerman is the author of Life on the Outside: The Prison Odyssey of Elaine Bartlett, which is described as “the first major work of journalism on the subject of re-entry: the challenge of leaving prison and re-entering the free world.” Gonnerman joins Coy Barefoot on “WINA’s Charlottesville–Right Now!” to discuss “School of Shock“, a recent investigative piece in Mother Jones about a mental health facility in Massachusetts that uses electric shocks to treat autistic children, as well as children with other serious mental illnesses.
Ms. Gonnerman’s article “School of Shock,†which appears in the September/October issue of the Mother Jones magazine, is an entirely one-sided and biased account of the court- and parent-approved behavior modification therapy used at the Judge Rotenberg Center to successfully treat, without drugs, severe (sometimes life-threatening) behavior problems of children and young adults with special needs that have not responded to any other form of treatment. For readers who would like to hear the other side of this story, please see http://www.judgerc.org/ResponsetoGonnermanArticle.pdf
Matthew L. Israel
Executive Director
Judge Rotenberg Educational Center
http://www.judgerc.org