PART- Parents and Allies for Remarkable Texans

09/17/2026

09/16/2026

Putting your hand on someone’s shoulder lets them know that you are with them. My hope is that PART will continue to stand beside families whose pain is too often disregarded—families whose children have severe medical and behavioral challenges and whose intense support needs are too often overlooked or dismissed. They, too, are made in the image of God, and their lives are worthy of dignity, compassion, care, and respect.

Judge Frank Caprio’s funeral, his son David played a powerful archival recording of a speech the beloved judge gave 20 years prior, allowing him to symbolically "speak" to the mourners one last time and inspiring an emotional standing ovation. Judge Caprio delivered the philosophy that would come to define his life: help others, treat people with civility, decency, respect and compassion, and never measure a successful life simply by what you have accumulated.

At Judge Frank Caprio’s funeral, his son David shared something ext...

09/14/2026

You know what? Just cancel me. I’ve reached the point where I don’t care.

I’ve been talking about autism publicly for 12 years. I have spent an absurd amount of time choosing every word carefully, trying not to ruffle feathers, acknowledging every possible perspective, and walking on eggshells before saying things that reflect the reality MY family actually lives.

I’m done doing that.

Here’s what I believe:

• Profound autism should be its own distinct diagnostic category.

• I don’t give a s**t whether you use a puzzle piece or an infinity loop

• People with lower support needs have dominated the online autism conversation for too long. “Nothing about us without us” cannot mean excluding people who can’t advocate for themselves or the caregivers who know their needs.

• Having Level 1 autism does not give someone insight into what it is like to live with Level 3/profound autism. You can share a diagnosis and have completely different experiences.

• Self-diagnosed adults should not dictate what services, terminology or supports are appropriate for profoundly autistic people

• Calling every disagreement “ableist” has made the word meaningless

• Parents should be allowed to talk honestly about raising children with profound disabilities without being accused of exploiting, hating or dehumanizing their children.

• ABA is not abuse. Bad ABA exists. Bad practitioners exist. So do families whose children have gained communication, safety and daily-living skills through good ABA.

• Residential care is not abandonment. Sometimes loving your child means recognizing that their needs exceed what your family can safely provide at home

• Wanting treatment for dangerous behaviors, self-injury, aggression, elopement, pica or severe communication problems is not trying to make someone “less autistic”. It’s caring

• Caregivers belong in this conversation. Especially when the autistic person they care for cannot tell their story themselves.

We have reached a weird point where arguments over terminology, symbols and who used the most politically correct sentence receive more attention than autistic people dealing with life-threatening realities.

I care about autistic people more than I care about saying all the approved words.

So go for it. Screenshot it. Share it. Call me ableist. Cancel me.

I won’t shrink and I’m going to keep talking about profound autism anyway. 🥂

09/13/2026

🛕🛕
🥺 Have a tissue ready. 😭

Michael Benfante and John Cerqueira were already trying to save their own lives when they reached the 68th floor of the burning North Tower and found Tina Hansen sitting in a wheelchair.

Everyone else could keep taking the stairs.

Tina couldn’t.

The tower had roughly 95 minutes left.

So Michael and John stopped escaping for themselves, strapped a woman they had never met into an evacuation chair, and started carrying her down 68 floors.

Michael was 36.

John was 22.

Tina was 41.

None of them knew whether the building would still be standing by the time they reached the street.

That morning, Michael was working on the 81st floor for Network Plus.

American Airlines Flight 11 struck the North Tower above his office at 8:46 a.m.

The building shook violently.

Michael got 28 members of his sales team out of the office and into the stairwell within minutes.

Then he and John started down.

They had already descended about 13 floors when Michael noticed people gathered on 68.

Then he saw Tina.

She used a motorized wheelchair.

The elevators were useless.

And 68 flights of stairs stood between her and safety.

Beside her was a lightweight emergency evacuation chair.

Michael and John did not know Tina.

Michael later said he could not even remember seeing her before that morning.

But leaving her there meant accepting something neither man could accept.

So they lifted her out of her wheelchair.

Strapped her into the evacuation chair.

And started down.

Sixty-eight floors.

Two men carrying one woman.

No rescue training.

No certainty that the tower would hold.

Just stairs.

Smoke.

Water.

Debris.

And the weight of another human life in their hands.

Floor after floor, they kept moving.

Tina said very little.

Michael’s mind was racing.

How fast could they move?

How much farther?

Would the stairwell stay open?

Would they make it?

Around the 10th floor, a huge cloud of dust appeared.

The South Tower had collapsed.

Michael, John and Tina were still inside the North Tower.

They kept going.

By the fifth floor, conditions became worse.

The area was dark.

Water from the sprinkler system covered the floor.

Firefighters eventually directed them through the remaining route and toward the outside.

Then, finally, daylight.

Michael and John carried Tina out.

An ambulance was waiting.

They placed her inside.

Only then did the emotion finally break through.

Tina began crying.

She hugged Michael.

And after carrying her down nearly the entire height of the building, Michael realized something almost absurd.

He had never even asked her name.

There was no time.

Michael and John walked away.

Then the North Tower began to collapse.

Michael heard the rumbling.

He looked back once.

Then ran.

Dust and debris swallowed everything behind him.

In the chaos, Michael became convinced the ambulance carrying Tina had been caught.

He thought the woman they had spent more than an hour carrying down 68 floors was d*ad.

Days later, a reporter called.

She mentioned Tina Hansen.

Michael suddenly realized what the call meant.

Tina was alive.

He broke down crying.

The three stayed connected afterward.

Almost a year after 9/11, Michael married.

Tina sat in the front row.

Michael later testified before a U.S. Senate committee about what happened, emphasizing how crucial emergency planning and evacuation equipment were for people with disabilities.

But the most powerful part of the story happened before any testimony.

Before anyone called them heroes.

Michael Benfante and John Cerqueira were escaping a skyscraper that was running out of time.

On the 68th floor, they found a stranger who could not escape the way they could.

They had every reason to keep moving.

Instead, they stopped.

They picked Tina up.

And for the next 68 floors, they made her life as important as their own.

09/13/2026

09/13/2026

09/10/2026

When a community residential placement cannot safely manage an individual's needs, the failure can ultimately become a law-enforcement and incarceration problem rather than a service-system problem. Simply saying that an individual is "served in the community" does not necessarily mean that the person's complex behavioral, medical, and developmental needs are being adequately supported.

Disabled 18-Year-Old Spent a Week Without Medication in Tarrant County Jail

The June 16, 2023 KERA News article by Miranda Suarez tells the story of Gabriel Piñón, an 18-year-old autistic young man with intellectual and developmental disabilities who was arrested after an altercation at his group home and held in the Tarrant County Jail.

Gabriel had an intellectual disability and required 24-hour residential support. His mother said he needed assistance with everyday activities and could experience severe behavioral and mental-health episodes. He had lived in a group home for approximately two years because his parents could not provide the level of care he required at home.

What happened

On June 7, 2023, Gabriel became involved in a fight at his group home and struck another person with a skateboard. Police arrested him and charged him with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. He was booked into Tarrant County Jail on June 8, with a $5,000 bond.

The major concern was that Gabriel reportedly went approximately one week without the medications he relied upon to control anxiety and severe behavioral episodes. His mother had provided information about his prescriptions, but the medication was not immediately available to him.

Being without his medication causes Gabriel to have significant anxiety and panic attacks. His mother feared that being in jail without his medication could make his condition worse and place him at greater risk.

After KERA began asking questions about the situation, Gabriel's MHMR service coordinator contacted his mother for a list of his medications. Gabriel received his medication by June 16, according to his mother.

The larger problem: medication in jail

The article explains that people entering jail generally cannot simply bring their existing prescriptions with them. The jail must verify the medications and obtain them through its own medical system. This can create delays, and there is no guarantee that the jail will have or provide the exact medication a person takes in the community.

A Disability Rights Texas attorney explained that Texas regulations require medical personnel to review an inmate's prescription medications "as soon as possible," but the regulations do not clearly define what that means. This creates a significant problem when medications are necessary to stabilize someone's behavior or mental health.

The IDD and group-home issue

This case goes beyond just a medication problem. It raises an important question about what happens when an individual with IDD has a behavioral crisis in a group home.

The Texas Jail Project told KERA that arrests of people with IDD following incidents in group homes are not unusual. However, there is NO statewide data tracking how frequently this occurs.

Advocates said behaviors associated with disabilities can be misunderstood as criminal conduct and subsequently punished through the criminal justice system.

Importantly, Texas law gives police discretion not to arrest someone following an altercation at a group home when incarceration is not considered the best safety option. The article argues that this alternative is not being used often enough.

Once a person with IDD enters the criminal justice system, the situation can become considerably more complicated. The person may eventually be found incompetent to stand trial and potentially face lengthy waits for a state hospital bed.

Tarrant County Jail's history

Javonte Myers, who had a seizure disorder and died in his jail cell in 2020.

A woman who gave birth alone in her jail cell in 2020; her baby subsequently died.

Kelly Masten, a disabled woman with severe epilepsy, who reportedly did not receive her medication during a 10-day jail stay in 2022 and subsequently left the jail in a coma.

Gabriel's story illustrates a systemic gap between the IDD service system, group homes, law enforcement, jails, and behavioral-health services.

Gabriel was receiving residential services because he required significant support. When a behavioral crisis occurred, the response ultimately moved him from a residential setting into the criminal justice system, where his disability and medication needs created additional risks.

The Tarrant County Jail has a history of complaints about medical neglect.