Jake Niederquell is a man in Washington state with high-functioning autism who encountered discrimination against his disability at a local business. The encounter with the business escalated to include experiencing discrimination and misconduct by local police, prosecutors, and state courts. Jake filed a civil lawsuit against the business while also representing himself to get criminal trespass charges dismissed. The prosecutor dropped the criminal charges earlier this year (2025) after Jake filed a very well argued motion to dismiss and motion to suppress.
On Jake’s GoFundMe page he explains that for his civil legal case, “the trial court ignored established law, distorted facts, and counted on known financial barriers to insulate obviously unjust rulings, trusting that I couldn’t afford an appeal. This effectively denied me due process simply because I am autistic, poor, and self-represented.”. Jake needs to file an appeal to litigate his case in higher courts and needs financial support to afford the costs of filing the appeal.
In Tennessee I have had encounters similar to Jake. In 2024 Tennessee’s Davidson County Chancery Court made rulings upon my 2024 petition for judicial review which were not based upon a sound interpretation of law or principles of justice, but based upon unlawful discriminatory practices that are endemic throughout Tennessee’s public institutions. The state courts of Tennessee rather than protecting people with disabilities are prejudiced against them and preferential to supporting the continued abuse, neglect, exploitation, injury, and killing of people with disabilities throughout Tennessee by the state and its agents. All to help able-bodied people profit from abusing people with disabilities.
The sad truth is that people with disabilities are often taken advantage of by people throughout society, and what few civil cases get brought by litigants representing themself often get dismissed in lower courts despite the merit of the case. These lower court cases don’t usually get published, and get ‘swept under the rug’ so that no one, not even interested parties, can effectively access them and tell their community about it. Only cases which are appealed might get published and put into a publicly accessible case law database that citizens can search (e.g. Google Scholar, CourtListener).
I’ve documented a wide array of problems which harm people with disabilities throughout Tennessee’s legal system, including in our courts. In example, while preparing my civil lawsuit that I intend to file later in 2025, I found a need to review cases from Shelby County Circuit Court, and inquired about accessing a specific case. I was told it would cost $192.51 for 372 pages, at $0.50 a page. I explained via email:
“Presumably, most of these records are already digital files (e-filed by attorneys and judges) and what were physically submitted by the pro se plaintiff probably scanned into a digital record upon filling. So the actual ‘work’ of producing the records should be simply copy pasting PDF files and attaching them to an email. As such, .50 cents a page seems inappropriate and even extortionate. And frankly, from a public interest standpoint it would make sense to make the digital records of court documents publicly searchable and accessible rather than charging exorbitant fee’s for access.
These matters are made all the more pertinent due to the context of my situation. I’m a disabled adult medicaid recipient. I’m on SSI and Medicaid. I’m indigent. I must engage in pro se litigation because I cannot afford attorneys, and because the legal community discriminates against this population of people, and the state imposes restrictions on our income and assets. You could say I am prohibited by law from affording your records request fees, and in need of doing this legal work myself pro se because of the unethical discrimination perpetrated by Tennessee’s legal community.”.
I asked for a justification for the cost and the Shelby County Circuit Court clerk could not or would not provide one. I tried to followup after 10 days of no response, only to be told my request was forwarded to a manager who would contact me, and after two months still has not.
There are very real barriers preventing people with disabilities from accessing justice. The Shelby County Circuit Court requires SSI recipients to pay hundreds of dollars for their clerk to copy paste some PDF files for just one case. Presumably, requests to view other cases would cost additional hundreds of dollars. As a result, the courts are preventing me, and other disabled medicaid recipients like me, from properly building legal case’s meant to protect the rights of myself and other disabled adults in Tennessee. A case that also can stop billions of dollars of fraud being perpetrated against Tennessee taxpayers. By preventing us effective access to court filings the courts help hide the history of misconduct that is harming our community.
Like Jake I too am having to represent myself in court. And at the same time I’m having to fight against discrimination and other obstacles that prevent people with disabilities from protecting their rights through legal action. Whether it’s in Tennessee or in Washington state there’s a need to enforce the laws that protect people with disabilities. That need is acknowledged by the laws enacted by Congress that disability discrimination like this needlessly costs the United States of America billions of dollars every year and undermines our national security while trampling upon the individual liberties of societies most vulnerable [42 USC 12101(7-8)]. It’s a senseless waste of resources and betrayal of our Nation’s ideals, and it occurs because of unethical and illegal conduct by people who prefer money over decency or rule of law.
People like Jake and I are few and far between. Our dedication is exceedingly unusual. We have studied the law to understand our rights as people with disabilities and understand how the law applies to our situation. We’ve dedicated ourselves to learning how to litigate these matters because we can find no attorneys who will help people like us. People like Jake and I pursuing our cases through self-representation, occurs because everything else that should happen to help people with disabilities have human rights has failed. It means Jake and I pushing to get our cases heard and get court rulings to protect people with disabilities by punishing violators of the law, if we don’t make it happen it’s just not going to happen. All the other people with disabilities who are less able, who have no hope of being able to study the law and understand how to represent themselves, those people are dependent upon people like Jake and I litigating our cases pro se. Jake and I are dependent upon our communities to support us so that we can effectively litigate our cases.
In Tennessee I have personally documented that there are no attorneys in West or Middle Tennessee that will practice disability and Medicaid law to protect the civil and Constitutional rights of disabled Medicaid recipients. I personally believe that disabled Medicaid recipients don’t have human rights in the state of Tennessee because of the neglect and abandonment of this class of individuals by Tennessee’s legal community and Tennessee’s government. No one is doing what is necessary to protect us. I hope Jake will make more of an effort to communicate his experiences in Washington state publicly.
From following Jake’s case I believe that he is facing a similar albeit different situation that occurs because of the same societal failure to respect and enforce the rights of people with disabilities. Jake has communicated encountering systemic disability discrimination being perpetrated by private citizens at a business servicing the public, Spokane Police Department, district attorneys, and state judges located in Washington State. I believe that Jake’s case is important, and that the reason there is so much that goes wrong in our United States is that cases like Jake’s and mine are not being heard fully in court because our communities are not properly supporting us.
I ask that people donate to support Jake’s case and help him meet the legal costs for his appeal.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/help-fund-a-landmark-appeal-for-marginalized-voices
Jake filed a “STATEMENT OF GROUNDS FOR DIRECT REVIEW BY THE SUPREME COURT” on 6.16.2025. It explains the basis for his case in detail, and provides past filings from his prior court case he is appealing. Here are some links to the document he filed: https://www.courts.wa.gov/index.cfm?fa=controller.showEfiledDoc&fileName=1042523_State_of_Grounds_for_Direct_Rvw_20250616104916SC761483_5041.pdf
He is an alternative link hosted on my website in case the above isn’t accessible:
Click to access 2025.06.16_statement-of-grounds_full_signed_comp.pdf
I uploaded the filed document to Google NotebookLM, and am providing a link to a public notebook which anyone with a Google account can use to ask questions about Jake’s case, or to access the Brief, Appeal Summary, Timeline, or Audio Overview. https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/2ca2b850-d9de-47d9-b0ab-519b77b63fa0?pli=1
Defend The Disabled 