[blindlaw] Accessing documents required for drafting

[Rod Alcidonis, Esquire]

This is an important discussion to be had and I believe we need to exhaust 
our collective opinions on this thread. I cannot offer much of a suggestion 
as I am a sole practitioner, but I always wonder, to what extent a firm does 
accommodate to allow a blind atty to gain comprehensive access to the file. 
Do they really go out of their way to insure that all docs are scanned? And 
for hand-written docs that there are readers on hand to assist?

I scan everything that come in my office. But I still need sighted 
assistance to review photographs, police reports, hand-written witness 
statements, etc.  before I draft pleadings. I would measure this to about 35 
percent lack of access with my ability to operate independently.

I cannot imagine being in a firm and all that I ever do is research and 
research without being able to engage other parts of the litigation process.



Rod

-----Original Message----- 
From: Rahul Bajaj via blindlaw
Sent: Thursday, July 02, 2015 6:59 AM
To: blindlaw at nfbnet.org
Cc: Rahul Bajaj
Subject: [blindlaw] Accessing documents required for drafting

Hi All,

I am typically given research-related tasks during my internships and
am not given any opportunities to draft plaints/written statements/
other documents because one is required to carefully analyze a large
set of documents such as charge-sheets/ sale deeds/invoices/
correspondence between the parties, etc., which are mostly
inaccessible, for crafting a cogent and comprehensive petition or
application. One obvious way to grapple with this problem would be to
scan all the concerned documents, but most firms that I have worked
with neither have the resources nor the time to allocate the task of
making these documents accessible to one of their employees. Another
potential solution would be to ask someone to verbally read these
documents to me, but very few employers are willing to go the extra
mile. Generally, no one overtly refuses to provide such
accommodations, but they simply choose to assign these tasks to other
interns. Most employers are far too busy and preoccupied with their
own work to engage in a meaningful dialogue about the coping
strategies that can be employed in such situations. How can I grapple
with this challenge, in light of the problems that I have sketched
above?
Any help would be invaluable!

Best,
Rahul

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