I’m done. I’m done playing nicely.
I’m taking the fight to the next level.
Unmask my child with no segregation, or I sue for Due Process.
Here is my letter to the BOE and Superintendent.
Hello all,
As you likely aware, I have spent nearly a year attempting to amicably resolve my request to accomodate my child's health needs. I have patiently negotiated, communicated and capitulated to your rules.
I can no longer allow your willing submission to unconstitutional mandates cause physical harm to my child. I refuse your proposed terms of mitigation strategies. Those proposals would segregate my child, ostracize him from his classmates, and stigmatize him.
The harm of forced masking of the children clearly outweighs any perceived benefits. You have yet to provide any statistical evidence to support continuing this policy, including any safety data, statistics on adverse incidents, and never has masking my child kept him from being forced to quarantine.
Therefore, I offer this final request. Grant his full exemption as provided by his medical provider, with no conditions. Failure to grant this accomodation leaves me with no further options but to pursue a due process claim for violation of the ADA and NJLAD.
Specifically, the New Jersey Law Against Discrimination Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of a disability. In relevant part, Title III of the ADA makes it unlawful for a place of public accommodation to discriminate against an individual on the basis of disability in the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages or accommodations. Schools are considered places of public accommodation under the ADA and NJLAD. The NJLAD and the associated administrative regulations require the owners and/or employees of any such place of public accommodation to make reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities. As in the NJLAD, the ADA provides a private right of action for injunctive relief to "any person who is being subject to discrimination on the basis of disability". The available remedies under the NJLAD are broader than those available under the ADA. In contrast to the ADA, the NJLAD also provides for damages in public accommodation matters which include personal hardships for physical and emotional stress; anxiety caused by lack of information; education, family and social disruption; and adjustment problems.
The NJLAD also provides for damages in public accommodation matters which include personal hardships for physical and emotional stress; anxiety caused by lack of information; education, family and social disruption; and adjustment problems.
To establish a violation of the NJLAD, a Plaintiff may demonstrate a Defendant’s failure to engage in a good faith interactive process by showing that "(1) the [defendant] knew about the [plaintiff’s] disability; (2) the [plaintiff] requested accommodations or assistance for his or her disability; (3) the [defendant] did not make a good faith effort to assist the [plaintiff] in seeking accommodations; and (4) the [plaintiff] could have been reasonably accommodated but for the [defendant’s] lack of good faith.
The New Jersey Department of Education ("NJDOE") has stated, ‘[i]t is necessary to acknowledge that enforcing the use of face coverings may be impractical for young children or individuals with disabilities’. The NJDOE has provided the following list of exceptions to the requirement for wearing face coverings:
Doing so would inhibit the student’s health
The student is in extreme heat outdoors
The student is in water
A student’s documented medical condition, or disability, as reflected in an Individualized Education Program (IEP), precludes the use of face covering.
The student is under the age of two, due to the risk of suffocation
During the period that a student is eating or drinking.
Face coverings should not be placed on anyone who has trouble breathing or is unconscious, or anyone who is incapacitated or otherwise unable to remove the face covering without assistance (e.g. face coverings should not be worn by pre-K students during nap time).
The student is engaged in high intensity aerobic or anaerobic activities.
Face coverings may be removed during gym and music classes when individuals are in a well-ventilated location and able to maintain a physical distance of six feet apart.
When wearing a face covering creates an unsafe condition in which to operate equipment or execute a task.
I have provided you with the required documentation to grant a mask exemption. I will not allow your contracted physician to make arbitrary determinations of my child's needs and entitlement to the exemption prescribed by his own provider. Same is blatantly discriminatory and denies my child a FAPE under the law, based upon the clear violation of the NJLAD.
There is existing data to establish masking children is unnecessary and harmful. There is plenty of evidence of the negative effects of the immunological and psychological level of forcing children and adolescents to wear a facemask, which outweighs the potential gains. School officials throughout NJ have been granted the ability to make decisions for their district. It can therefore be determined that the District deems it morally permissible to carry out non-consensual medical interventions using compulsory or coercive measures for the purpose of infectious disease control.
One of the most valuable rights our children have under the Constitution, is the right to receive a free and public education. Choices regarding health are a civil right grounded in bodily autonomy, dignity, and privacy of the individual. The profound lack of dignity, privacy, autonomy, and treatment of children under the age of twelve (12), who are ineligible for a medical intervention under EUA is appalling and discriminatory. The civil right to bodily autonomy with respect to a particular act if it is carried out must be with intention, understanding, and without controlling influences that determine the action. There is no current law requiring masks that supercedes the Constitution, nor is there a law preventing a District to permit a student to elect to be mask-optional. That Governor Murphy elected to re-assert a public health emergency upon expiration of his powers remains a questionable basis upon which a District would rely, over the Constitutional rights of a child.
The Medford Board of Education has negligently and willfully ignored the rights and needs of my child, and have therefore denied him the benefits of obtaining all advantages and privileges of a place of public accommodation. Despite the NJDOE’s admission that is may be "impractical" at times to utilize face coverings on individuals with disabilities, the District has nevertheless maintained an arbitrary policy to disregard legitimate accommodation needs in favor of a strict adherence to a "mitigation strategy" not grounded in any data-specific evidentiary basis.
I expect to receive your response no later than February 1, 2022.
Thank you,
Kristen M. Sinclair, Esquire
Freedom Speaking LLC and Shielding Liberty LLC have partnered with the Child Advocate Coalition LLC to highlight stories of freedom all across NJ, from candidates local Board of Education candidates through the gubernatorial candidates, lawyers and advocates pursuing an end to mandates and any helpers we find along the way. Views expressed by the interviewed parties may or may not represent the views of the entities referenced above, however the entities are proud to provide a platform for free speech. Featured interviewed parties are invited to submit responses to our interview questions, link their candidate, business and fundraising sites, and showcase their chosen photographs.
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