Tennessee Protection & Advocacy, Inc. v. Jon A. Wells, Esquire

*The Honorab le Ann Aldrich, United States District Judge for the
Northern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.
1
RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION
Pursuant to Sixth Circuit Rule 206
ELECTRONIC CITATION: 2004 FED App. 0172P (6th Cir.)
File Name: 04a0172p.06
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
_________________
TENNESSEE PROTECTION &
ADVOCACY, INC.,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
JON A. WELLS, ESQUIRE;
RONALD BRUCE ARRISON;
and KING’S DAUGH TERS &
SONS NURSING HOME, INC.,
Defendants-Appellees.
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No. 02-6221
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Tennessee at Cookeville.
No. 01-00078—William J. Haynes, Jr., District Judge.
Argued: March 9, 2004
Decided and Filed: June 9, 2004
Before: BOGGS, Chief Judge; DAUGHTREY, Circuit
Judge; and ALDRICH, District Judge.*
2 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
_________________
COUNSEL
ARGUED: Gary Housepian, TENNESSEE PROTECTION
& ADVOCACY, INC., Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellant.
Tyree B. Harris IV, WILLIS & KNIGHT, Nashville,
Tennessee, Brigid M. Carpenter, BAKER, DONELSON,
BEARMAN, CALDWELL & BERKOWITZ, Nashville,
Tennessee, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Gary Housepian,
TENNESSEE PROTECTION & ADVOCACY, INC.,
Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellant. Tyree B. Harris IV,
WILLIS & KNIGHT, Nashville, Tennessee, Brigid M.
Carpenter, BAKER, DONELSON, BEARMAN,
CALDWELL & BERKOWITZ, Nashville, Tennessee,
Ronald L. Smith, Michael Kirkman, OHIO LEGAL RIGHTS
SERVICE, Columbus, Ohio, for Appellees.
BOGGS, C. J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which
ALDRICH, D. J., joined. DAUGHTREY, J. (pp. 18-20),
delivered a separate dissenting opinion.
_________________
OPINION
_________________
BOGGS, Chief Judge. Tennessee Protection & Advocacy,
Inc. (TP&A) is a federally-mandated independent non-profit
agency that investigates allegations of abuse against the
disabled. It appeals the district court’s holding that one of its
clients, Martin Earle Bentley, is not covered under the
Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights Act
(DD Act), and that therefore TP&A has no statutory authority
to obtain Bentley’s records without the permission of his
court-appointed conservator. We hold that the plain meaning
of the statutory definition of developmental disability covers

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
3
individuals with Bentley’s kind of traumatic brain injury, and
we reverse the decision of the district court.
I
Martin Earle Bentley, a long-haul truck driver, suffered a
traumatic brain injury from an on-the-job crash in 1976, when
he was 20 years old. As a result, he was permanently
disabled and must live in a nursing home because he is unable
to care for himself. In light of Bentley’s condition after the
accident, the Probate Court of Macon County, Tennessee
appointed attorney Jon Wells to be the conservator of
Bentley’s person and estate in 1980.
In 2001, Bentley contacted TP&A because he had concerns
about both the handling of his financial affairs and restraints
on his personal autonomy. In a conference call with TP&A
representatives, including a TP&A staff attorney, Bentley
explained his grievances. In the staff attorney’s opinion,
Bentley demonstrated “adequate cognitive ability” to speak
for himself, and expressed his wishes in an “unequivocal
consistent manner.” Bentley summed up his situation as
follows: “A man of my age and ability should not be locked
up in a nursing home.” Bentley authorized TP&A to examine
all the necessary records to advocate on his behalf.
TP&A is the Tennessee chapter of a network of
independent agencies, known as the Protection & Advocacy
System, that Congress funded in the DD Act as part of the
Protection and Advocacy for Persons with Developmental
Disabilities (PADD) Program. In order to receive funding
under the Act, each state must “have in effect a system to
protect and advocate the rights of individuals with
developmental disabilities.” 42 U.S.C. § 15043(a)(1). For
the state to qualify for funding, the agency must “not be
administered by the State Council on Developmental
Disabilities [and must] be independent of any agency that
provides treatment, services, or habilitation to individuals
4 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
with developmental disabilities.” 42 U.S.C. § 15043(a)(F)-
(G). In general, the P&A System serves individuals with a
range of developmental disabilities by, among other things,
investigating allegations of abuse; the agency is authorized to
take legal action on behalf of its clients if claims cannot
otherwise be resolved. See 42 U.S.C. § 15043(a) (giving full
recitation of the agency’s powers).
Following normal procedures, a case advocate with TP&A
faxed a letter to Wells on December 8, 2000 asking to see
Bentley’s records and offering to help resolve any dispute
between the two. She then called Wells on December 11,
when he informed her that he would only release Bentley’s
records in response to a court order. TP&A also tried to
secure the records through the King’s Daughters and Sons
Nursing Home, where Bentley is a resident, but met with the
same response. The Nursing Home administrator also
forbade his staff to discuss the litigation with Bentley.
Unable to obtain the necessary information to investigate
Bentley’s allegations, TP&A filed suit in district court in
September 2001 against Wells, the Nursing Home, and its
administrator, Ronald Arrison. TP&A moved for summary
judgment and a preliminary injunction; Wells cross-claimed
for summary judgment. The Nursing Home did not respond
to TP&A’s motion for summary judgment.
In September 2002, the district court granted Wells
summary judgment on the grounds that the DD Act did not
cover traumatic brain injury, Bentley’s type of disability, and
therefore TP&A had no right to review Bentley’s records.
This appeal then followed.
II
This court reviews a grant of summary judgment de novo.
Copeland v. Machulis, 57 F.3d 476, 478 (6th Cir. 1995) (per
curiam). Summary judgment is appropriate when the

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
5
1There appea rs to be no dispute that if Bentley is covered, then
TP&A has authority to access his records under the DD Act. 42 U.S.C.
§ 15043 (a)(2)(I)(iii) (stating that the P& A system shall have access to all
records of any individual with a develop mental disab ility in a situation in
which 1) the individual has a legal conservator; 2) a complaint has been
received; 3) there is probable cause to believe the person has been subject
to abuse or neglect; and 4) the representative has been contacted and
offered assistance but has failed to act on behalf of the ind ividual).
evidence submitted shows “that there is no genuine issue as
to any material fact and the moving party is entitled to
judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). The
facts in this case are not disputed, and therefore one of the
parties is entitled to summary judgment as a matter of law.
Jerome-Duncan, Inc. v. Auto-By-Tel, L.L.C., 176 F.3d 904,
909 (6th Cir. 1999).
To demonstrate that it has legal authority to gain access to
Bentley’s records, TP&A must show that he is covered by the
DD Act. 42 U.S.C. § 15001 et seq.1 This case turns on
whether the term “developmental disability,” as used in the
Act, can apply to those who suffer from traumatic brain
injury, rather than being limited to those afflicted by some
type of congenital or disease-related defect. The district court
concluded that the “clear language of the statute reflects that
it is intended to cover individuals who have some physical or
mental disability or condition as a result of natural causes.”
Tenn. Protection & Advocacy v. Wells, No. 2:01-0078, at 4
(M.D. Tenn. Sept. 30, 2002) (Mem. Op.) (emphasis added).
The court invoked the rule of statutory construction that all
words of the statute are intended to have meaning and no
interpretation should be adopted that “would render statutory
phrases meaningless, redundant, or superfluous.” Ibid. (citing
United States v. Holmquist, 36 F.3d 154, 160 (1st Cir. 1994)).
To expand the definition further to include disabilities
resulting from injury, would, according to the district court’s
opinion, ignore the meaning of the word “developmental,”
6 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
and therefore Bentley was not qualified for protection under
the Act. Id. at 5.
However, the statute in Holmquist did not define the term
in dispute. Instead, the court had to solve an “interpretive
riddle” presented by a customs statute. Holmquist, 36 F.3d at
158. In contrast, the DD Act contains an explicit and multi-
faceted definition of the term “developmental disability,” and
that definition must govern the resolution of this case; we are
not at liberty to put our gloss on the definition that Congress
provided by looking to the generally accepted meaning of the
defined term. Babbitt v. Sweet Home Chapter of
Communities for a Great Oregon, 515 U.S. 687, 698 n.10
(1995) (pointing out that “Congress explicitly defined the
operative term ‘take’ in the [Endangered Species Act] . . .
thereby obviating the need for us to probe its meaning”);
United States v. Smith, 155 F.3d 1051, 1057 (9th Cir. 1998)
(observing that when “the meaning of a word is clearly
explained in a statute, courts are not at liberty to look beyond
the statutory definition”). Therefore, although it may not be
intuitive to think of a brain injury that results from a vehicle
accident when the victim is 20 years old as a “developmental
disability,” we must do so because Bentley’s condition fits the
definition that is provided in the statute.
TP&A is not reading the term “developmental” out of the
statute, but is asking us to follow the definition that Congress
crafted. According to the statute:
The term “developmental disability” means a severe,
chronic disability of an individual that--
(i) is attributable to a mental or physical impairment or
combination of mental and physical impairments;
(ii) is manifested before the individual attains age 22;
(iii) is likely to continue indefinitely;

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
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2This opinion refers to the appellees collective ly as “Wells.” Bruce
Arrison, the nursing home administrator, indicated that he was following
W ells’s instructions and does not obje ct per se to releasing B entley’s
information. T herefore, W ells is de facto the sole appellee in this case.
(iv) results in substantial functional limitations in 3 or
more of the following areas of major life activity:
(I) Self-care.
(II) Receptive and expressive language.
(III) Learning.
(IV) Mobility.
(V) Self-direction.
(VI) Capacity for independent living.
(VII) Economic self-sufficiency; and
(v) reflects the individual's need for a combination and
sequence of special, interdisciplinary, or generic services,
individualized supports, or other forms of assistance that
are of lifelong or extended duration and are individually
planned and coordinated.
42 U.S.C. § 15002 (8)(A).
For the reasons below, we reject Wells’s2 arguments that
Bentley does not have a developmental disability because
1) he did not gradually acquire it; 2) his condition does not
satisfy the medical definition of chronic; and 3) it did not
manifest, or reveal, itself over a period of time. Under a
straightforward reading of the statute, Bentley is covered.
Nature of the Disability
The definition of developmental disability in the DD Act is
framed in terms of a person’s functional limitations and does
not refer to any specific diseases or causes. Earlier versions
of the DD Act defined the term by a list of specific
conditions, such as mental retardation or cerebral palsy.
8 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
3Bentley’s brain injury is perm anent (42 U .S.C. § 150 02(8)(A )(iii)
and has resulted in more than three “substantial functional limitations”
(subsection iv). Finally, B entley requ ires “lifelong” specialized and
general care (subsection v).
Congress consistently expanded the definition to include
more diagnoses; in 1978, it amended the statute again,
“deleting all references to specific handicapping conditions
and establishing a definition based on functional limitations.”
Rehabilitation, Comprehensive Services, and Developmental
Disabilities Amendments of 1978, Pub. L. No. 95-602, Sec.
503, 42 U.S.C. § 6001, 92 Stat. 2955 (1978); S. Rep. No. 103-
120, at 5 (1994), reprinted in 1994 U.S.C.C.A.N. 164, 168.
Functional limitations, i.e., the result of the condition, govern
the determination of whether a person falls under the Act’s
protection, not medical history, i.e., the cause. No one doubts
that Bentley meets the functional limitation requirements of
the DD Act.3 The statute treats the words “functional” and
“developmental” as essentially synonymous and we conclude
that his disability meets the statutory definition.
Chronic Condition
Bentley’s brain injury resulted in a severe, “chronic”
disability that is a result of physical impairment (subsection
i). Chronic means “persisting over a long period of time.”
Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary 363 (30th ed.
2003). The DD Act does not define the term, but the Family
Leave and Medical Act defines a “chronic serious health
condition” as one which “[c]ontinues over an extended period
of time (including recurring episodes of a single underlying
condition); and [is characterized by a] . . . period of incapacity
which is permanent or long-term due to a condition for which
treatment may not be effective. . . . Examples include
Alzheimer's, a severe stroke, or the terminal stages of a
disease.” Perry v. Jaguar of Troy, 353 F.3d 510, 515 (6th
Cir. 2003) (quoting 29 C.F.R. § 825.114(a)(2)). A “severe

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
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4W e construe the term “chronic” in the D D A ct in pari materia with
the FMLA, as both acts seek to protect those who have pressing medical
needs and their families. Cf. Sho tz v. City of Plan tation, Fla., 344 F.3d
1161, 1168 (11 th Cir. 2003) (drawing upon T itle VII, the Americans with
Disabilities Act, and the Fair Labor Standards Act to construe the term
“person” in the FM LA in confo rmity with other civil rights statutes).
stroke” is also a condition that comes on suddenly, with
devastating consequences, meaning that a chronic condition
is not limited to those characterized by a slow and steady
deterioration. The focus is on the prognosis for recovery, not
on the cause or onset of the medical disorder.4
Furthermore, a chronic condition can result from an outside
agent: the Black Lung Benefits Act defines
“pneumoconiosis,” the condition needed for an award of
benefits, as “a chronic dust disease of the lung and its
sequelae, including respiratory and pulmonary impairments,
arising out of coal mine employment.” 30 U.S.C. § 902(b)
(emphasis added). On one occasion, this circuit even
described a series of suicide attempts as a “chronic” health
problem. Williams v. Mehra, 135 F.3d 1105, 1109 (6th Cir.
1998) rev’d en banc, 186 F.3d 685 (6th Cir. 1999).
Therefore, neither Congress nor this circuit has limited its
understanding of a chronic medical problem to a long-term
condition resulting from natural causes. It is undisputed that
Bentley’s brain injury has resulted in permanent incapacity,
which would qualify it under the general understanding of the
term “chronic,” as used in § 15002(8)(A).
Manifestation of the Disability
Bentley’s disability “manifested” itself, that is became
obvious, before age 22 (subsection ii). The dictionary defines
“manifest” as “[c]learly apparent to the sight or
understanding; obvious” and “manifested” as “[t]o show or
demonstrate plainly.” American Heritage Dictionary 1064
(4th ed. 2000). Black’s Law Dictionary uses the term in
10 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
various legal contexts, consistently with the meaning of
obvious: e.g., “manifest injustice,” defined as “[a]n error in
the trial court that is direct, obvious, and observable,” Black’s
Law Dictionary 974 (7th ed. 1999); “manifest necessity” is
defined as a “sudden and overwhelming emergency” that
precludes completion of a trial. Id. at 975.
Wells argues that “manifest” means “revealed” and
therefore refers exclusively to the exposure of something that
already existed but was hidden. Bentley’s brain injury was
not a condition that lay dormant, but rather was the instant
result of his collision in the truck, leading Wells to conclude
that Bentley’s injury did not “manifest” itself, as the statute
requires. Although “reveal” is one plausible meaning, it is
not the only one. This circuit has consistently used the term
“manifest” to mean “be apparent:” Am. Ship Bldg. Co. v. Dir.,
Office of Workers' Compensation Programs, United States
Dep’t of Labor, 865 F.2d 727, 732 (6th Cir. 1989) (stating a
preexisting condition must have manifested itself either to the
employer through observation or to a doctor from a medical
examination for the company to qualify for special fund
disability payments due to subsequent injury); Abbott v.
Sullivan, 905 F.2d 918, 926 (6th Cir. 1990) (stating that an
impairment must be taken into consideration under the
Medical-Vocational guidelines for determining disability,
even if it does not manifest itself as a limitation on strength)
(emphases added). Therefore, nothing in either the dictionary
definition of “manifest,” the legal usage of the term, or the
way that this circuit has used the word, suggests that it must
refer to a condition that always existed and became obvious.
We see no reason why “manifest” cannot just as easily be
used to describe something newly created that is now visible.
It simply is another way of saying that a condition is readily
observable.

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
11
5See, e.g., American A cademy of Child and Adolescent P sychiatry,
Practice Parameters for the Assessment and Treatment of Children,
Ado lescents, and Adults with Mental R etard ation and Como rbid Mental
Disorders, 1999 (explaining that “deve lopm ental disability is actually not
a medical term but a ‘legislative/legal co ncep t’”).
End point of the Developmental Period
Nor is age 22 a random cut-off point; it is an eligibility
requirement that resulted from policy, rather than medical,5
judgments. In 1978, Congress revised the DD Act and raised
the eligibility age for assistance from 18 to 22 years. H.R.
Rep. No. 95-1188, at 8 (1978), reprinted in 1978
U.S.C.C.A.N. 7355, 7362. The initial objective was to
include everyone with a severe disability within the purview
of the statute. Advocates for disabled children objected,
however, fearing that universal coverage would spread the
available resources too thinly. Rehabilitation Amendments of
1978: Hearings Before the Subcomm. on Human Resources
of the United States Senate, 95th Cong. 83, 113 (1978)
(testimony advocating that the Senate adopt the definition of
development disability drafted by a task force that
recommended an eligibility cut off at age 22). Therefore, the
eligibility age of 22 represents the limitation that Congress
determined would provide the optimal balance between a
general commitment to helping the disabled and funding
realities. Restricting eligibility further through the cramped
reading of the statute that Wells proposes would ignore both
the plain meaning of the legislation and its intent.
In adjudicating disability claims, we must respect the
eligibility requirements established by Congress. For
instance, the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program
considers someone disabled “if he is unable to engage in any
substantial gainful activity by reason of any medically
determinable physical or mental impairment which can be
expected to result in death or which has lasted or can be
12 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
expected to last for a continuous period of not less than
twelve months.” 42 U.S.C. § 1382(c)(3)(A). However, to
receive SSI disability payments for mental retardation
evidenced simply by a low IQ score, a claimant must
demonstrate “a significantly subaverage general intellectual
functioning with deficits in adaptive functioning initially
manifested during the developmental period; i.e., the evidence
demonstrates or supports onset of the impairment before age
22.” 20 CFR Pt. 404, Subpt. P, App. 1 § 12.05 (emphasis
added). This circuit has denied benefits to claimants who
could not demonstrate mental deficiency before age 22.
Foster v. Halter, 279 F.3d 348, 354-55 (6th Cir. 2001)
(denying claim because Foster’s first IQ test was done when
she was 42 years old and therefore she could not demonstrate
that her subaverage intellectual functioning manifested itself
before age 22); Brown v. Sec’y of Health and Human Servs.,
948 F.2d 268, 271 (6th Cir. 1991) (remanding to determine if
the claimant's mental impairment was “‘manifested during
[claimant's] developmental period’ or rather [was] a partial
consequence of claimant's history of heavy alcohol use after
the age of twenty-two”). We accept the eligibility provision
in the DD Act at face value in order to be consistent with our
interpretation of the same age requirement in the context of
other public welfare legislation.
Congress has determined that it is appropriate to consider
a person’s “developmental period” to extend to age 22 to
assess eligibility for government assistance. However natural
it would be to consider a 20-year old truck driver as a fully
grown adult, it is well-settled law that when a statutory
definition contradicts the everyday meaning of a word, the
statutory language generally controls: judges should
“construe legislation as it is written, not as it might be read by
a layman.” Meese v. Keene, 481 U.S. 465, 485 (1987). Only
when following the literal language of the statute would lead
to “an interpretation which is inconsistent with the legislative
intent or to an absurd result” can a court modify the meaning
of the statutory language. Appleton v. First Nat’l Bank of

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
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Ohio, 62 F.3d 791, 801 (6th Cir. 1995). Congress may not
have had truck drivers with brain injuries in mind when it
drafted the legislation, but Bentley easily falls into the
category of people whom Congress intended to protect.
Cleland v. Bronson Health Care Group, 917 F.2d 266, 270
(6th Cir. 1990) (clarifying that if the plain language of a
statute leads to a broader result than Congress might have
anticipated, it is still not automatically tantamount to an
absurd result). We have no basis on which to second guess
the language that Congress used because applying the statute
to Bentley neither contradicts the legislative intent nor
produces an absurd result.
The district court erred in inferring a requirement that the
disability result from natural causes because reference to
injury is lacking in the statute. It is axiomatic that the
statutory definition of the term excludes unstated meanings of
that term. Colautti v. Franklin, 439 U.S. 379, 392 n.10
(1979). The Supreme Court reiterated this rule last term,
rejecting the plaintiff’s attempt to read a requirement for
heightened burden of proof for a “mixed motive” jury
instruction into the 1991 Civil Rights Act. Desert Palace,
Inc. v. Costa, 539 U.S. 90 (2003). In a unanimous opinion,
the Court dismissed the plaintiff’s interpretation because
“[o]n its face, the statute does not mention, much less require,
that a plaintiff make a heightened showing through direct
evidence.” Id. at 99.
In this case, the statute does not distinguish between
disabilities caused by injury and those that result from organic
defects, but emphasizes improving the condition of all
citizens with disabilities by delivering various kinds of
assistance:
(1) disability is a natural part of human experience that
does not diminish the right of individuals with
developmental disabilities to live independently, to exert
control and choice over their own lives, and to fully
14 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
participate in and contribute to their communities
through full integration . . .; [but that] (5) individuals
with developmental disabilities are at greater risk than
the general population of abuse, neglect, financial and
sexual exploitation, and the violation of their legal and
human rights.
42 U.S.C. § 15001(a)(1), (5). The statute contrasts the
disabled with the general population, but does not distinguish
among the different categories of disability, because its
purpose is to erase all distinctions made because of handicap.
Narrowing the definition of “developmental disability” to
prevent TP&A from assisting Bentley in achieving greater
personal autonomy contravenes the basic intent of the statute.
The declaration that it is a “goal of the nation” that people
with disabilities “live free of abuse, neglect, financial and
sexual exploitation, and violations of their legal and human
rights,” 42 U.S.C. § 15001(a)(16)(F), confirms the
conclusion that the cause of the disability is immaterial for the
purposes of determining eligibility under the DD Act.
III
The district court bolstered its reading of the statute to
exclude Bentley from its protection by pointing to the
enactment in 2000 of the “State Grants for Protection and
Advocacy Services,” which authorizes the Secretary of Health
and Human Services to make grants to agencies such as
TP&A to provide services to individuals with traumatic brain
injuries. 42 U.S.C. § 300d-53. The statute’s general
provision states:
The Secretary, acting through the Administrator of the
Health Resources and Services Administration (referred
to in this section as the “Administrator”), shall make
grants to protection and advocacy systems for the
purpose of enabling such systems to provide services to
individuals with traumatic brain injury.

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
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15
6The parties dispute the lega l significance, if any, of this document:
TP&A argues that it is the work of a private organization that has the
same weight as “commentary by a co lumnist in a trade journal.”
Appellant Br. at 34. W ells argues in his brief that it is a “federally-
mandated” report and therefore authoritative. Appellee Br. at 8. The
report itself was prepared by the Advocacy Training and Technical
Assistance Center, which receives funding from three government
agencies. Because the governm ent paid for the publication, and it does
not bear a disclaimer divorcing the sponsoring agencies from the opinions
expressed in the report, we consider the extent to which we should be
guided by the report’s characterization of those with traum atic bra in
injuries as a “new” population under the D D A ct.
42 U.S.C. § 300d-53. The rest of the section describes
funding mechanisms. Therefore, the statute is most easily
read as a funding earmark to support those with traumatic
brain injury. Its language does not shed any light on whether
TP&A should have access to Bentley’s records under the
current statutory regime because it does not address authority
to serve those with brain injuries under the DD Act. The
language is too sketchy to support the district court’s
conclusion that it is “highly probative of Congress’ intention
as [to] the scope of Section 15002(8) [the statutory definition
of developmental disability].” Mem. Op. at 4.
The Protection and Advocacy System is the network of
congressionally mandated advocacy agencies, of which
TP&A is a member. The 2001 annual report described the
§ 300d-53 legislation as a program “for [a] new population in
special need of our services — persons with traumatic brain
injury.”6 Mem. Op. at 5. A court should consider any agency
publication because it reflects expertise in the subject matter.
United States v. Mead Corp., 533 U.S. 218, 234-35 (2001).
Nevertheless, this court is not bound by the annual report’s
assertion that those with traumatic brain injuries constitute a
“new population” of clients. Christensen v. Harris County,
529 U.S. 576, 587 (2000) (holding that interpretations “in
policy statements, agency manuals, and enforcement
16 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
guidelines, all of which lack the force of law, do not warrant
Chevron-style deference”). Furthermore, we are forbidden to
defer to agency guidelines that contradict the plain meaning
of the statute. Sutton v. United Air Lines, 527 U.S. 471, 482
(1999) (holding that the EEOC guidelines reflected an
impermissible interpretation of the Americans with
Disabilities Act and therefore did not warrant judicial
deference).
The statement in the annual report may reflect the reality
that agencies such as TP&A have generally not, as a matter of
fact, included people with traumatic brain injuries in their
programs. It cannot, however, provide a basis to preclude
such individuals from receiving services under the DD Act
because, on its face, the statute’s definition of “development
disability” encompasses individuals, such as Bentley, who
have suffered traumatic brain injury.
The case law is not helpful in resolving this question of
statutory construction. TP&A is correct that federal courts
have generally interpreted 42 U.S.C. § 15043 to allow the
P&A system access to client records. Wisconsin Coalition for
Advocacy v. Czaplewski, 131 F. Supp. 2d 1039 (E.D. Wis.
2001) (holding right of access to patient records under the DD
Act preempts more restrictive state regulations); Iowa
Protection & Advocacy Services v. Rasmussen, 206 F.R.D.
630 (S.D. Iowa 2001) (same). Wells has not provided any
case law that prevents us from following the general trend of
allowing organizations in the P&A system liberal access to
patient records.
Wells properly challenges the cases that TP&A cites in its
brief for the proposition that traumatic brain injury is covered
under the DD Act because the cited precedent addresses the
legal rights of those with traumatic brain injuries under
different statutes, e.g., the Federal Tort Claims Act. See
Colleen v. United States, 843 F.2d 329 (9th Cir. 1987).
Furthermore, the court in each cited case assumed that the

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
17
disability is covered under the relevant statute. See, e.g.,
Blackmon ex rel. Blackmon v. Springfield R-XII School
District, 198 F.3d 648 (8th Cir. 1999) (noting without
elaboration that student with a bilateral brain injury was
covered under the Individuals with Disabilities Education
Act). However, Wells did not cite any case in which a court
held that traumatic brain injury is not covered under the DD
Act. Since Bentley can fulfill the five requirements in the
statute and construing the statute to include his kind of injury
furthers the legislative intent of the Act, the district court
erred in finding that it did not apply to him.
IV
We therefore REVERSE the district court’s grant of
summary judgment and REMAND so that the district court
may consider the release of Mr. Bentley’s records to TP&A
under the standards of the DD Act.
18 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
_____________
DISSENT
_____________
MARTHA CRAIG DAUGHTREY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting. In construing statutes, we are frequently
admonished to avoid interpretations that will produce absurd
results. In stretching the meaning, intuitive or as statutorily
defined, of the term “developmental disability” to cover the
effect of a traumatic brain injury suffered spontaneously by a
fully-functioning 20-year-old, however, the majority in this
case has failed to heed the admonition. To demonstrate the
absurdity of this interpretation of the statute at issue here, one
need only ask: Why would Congress provide protection under
the Developmental Disabilities Assistance and Bill of Rights
Act, 42 U.S.C. § 15043, to an adult who suffers such an
injury one day short of his or her twenty-second birthday, but
not to the same person injured in exactly the same manner 24
hours later? The answer is, of course, as the district judge
held, that the Act was never meant to apply to individuals in
Martin Bentley’s situation – the holder of a GED, who served
two years in the United States Army and then became a long-
distance truck driver, and who, according to the majority,
retains the “‘adequate cognitive ability’ to speak for himself
. . . and express[ ] his wishes in an ‘unequivocal consistent
manner’.”
It is not surprising that Congress initially attempted to
describe the term “developmental disability” in terms of a
diagnosis but then abandoned the effort. The term is a
contemporary euphemism for “mental retardation,” which
itself came into use in an effort to erase the stigma attached to
much cruder descriptive terms used in the early part of the last
century and before, terms such as “moron” (used to describe
those with intelligence quotients ranging from 50-69),
“imbecile” (having an IQ of 25-50), “idiot” (having an IQ
under 25), and the like.

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No. 02-6221 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
19
But there are many causes of mental retardation, and the
disability can (but does not necessarily) accompany other
conditions, such as cerebral palsy and autism – hence the
effort to describe developmental disability in terms of
function, rather than diagnosis. As the district court
recognized, however, the key concept here is not “disability,”
from which Mr. Bentley undoubtedly suffers. The key,
rather, is the descriptive term “developmental,” referring
obviously to an impairment that “manifests” itself over time
and impedes an individual’s progress from childhood to post-
adolescence and into adulthood, equipped with what are
recognized as adequate skills to live independently and
productively. Mr. Bentley was living independently, and
presumably productively, at the time he became the victim of
an unexpected and debilitating accident, one which
unfortunately befalls other adults all too frequently but which
does not implicate a potential for the denial of civil rights
such as the statute in question here was designed to protect
against.
Perhaps the problem here is merely poor legislative
drafting, an impediment we sometimes face in trying
rationally to construe statutes conceived by special interest
groups, drafted by committees working under pressure to
reach political consensus, and thereafter amended and made
increasingly complex. If so, the majority has compounded
the problem by reading a badly drafted statute too literally
and has thereby reached what I believe is a result that
Congress did not intend and would never have envisioned,
had it been prescient enough to foresee the application of this
civil rights statute to a situation such as the one before us.
This seems obvious from the fact that this case presents itself
as one of first impression, suggesting that the legislation has
never been understood to apply to victims of sudden
traumatic injury, regardless of age.
Despite my sympathy for Mr. Bentley’s disabled condition
and my conviction that the plaintiff here is acting with the
20 Tenn. Protection & Advocacy
v. Wells, Esquire, et al.
No. 02-6221
best of intentions, I would affirm the district court for the
reasons set out in its memorandum opinion and deny relief.

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