Long-term Deprivation of Liberty
ties is advisable, similar to the ones that already exist for relevant matters, in ac
cordance with the mission entrusted in the Spanish Constitution and the Public
Prosecutor’s Office Organic Statute.
Moreover, the General Council of Spanish Lawyers [Consejo General de la Aboga
cia Española (CGAE)] was informed that it would be advisable to establish legal
guidance services for persons with disabilities at the Bar Associations that did
not yet have them, in order to provide the defendants in incapacity or committal
proceedings with an adequate technical defense. In this respect, the General
Council of Spanish Lawyers reported that the program to provide said services
was launched within the framework of the collaboration agreement signed in
2004 by the ONCE Foundation and the Spanish Committee of representatives of
persons with disabilities (abbreviated as CERMI in Spanish) with five «Bar As
sociations» (Colegios de Abogados) with the objective of establishing within the
legal aid structure a group of lawyers specialized in all topics that could affect the
rights of persons with disabilities. Nonetheless, given the uneven development of
the program in different Bar Associations and the lack of collaboration of the
public administrations, at present the service is being fomented through training
and awareness-raising actions for the members of the different Bar Associations.
In turn, the Bar Association of Toledo has informed this Institution that it does
not have resources to create a specific legal guidance service for persons with
disabilities.
A recommendation has
170. The inspection visit to the Assisted Living Residence (Residencia Social
Asistida) «San José» (Toledo) was carried out over a period of three days. In addi
tion to having experts from the Ombudsman Institution, it was deemed neces
sary to have a psychiatrist, a psychologist and a general practitioner as external
experts. During the inspection, the different aspects examined were, amongst
others that are mentioned in this section, the admissions procedure, the center’s
internal operations, the living conditions of the residents, the medical and psy
chosocial care provided, the use of physical and pharmacological restraints, and
the suitability of the staff in quantitative and qualitative terms. Likewise, inter
views were held with the center’s management, staff, residents and relatives, and
some of the center’s activities were viewed, such as meals, distribution of medica
tion and «bedtime». The twenty residents who were individually interviewed
were chosen on the basis of the following criteria: sex, age, diagnosis, cognitive
impairment and the amount of time they had been there, together with certain
behavior that was observed during the inspection.
A psychiatrist, a
171. The «San José» Assisted Living Residence, which belongs to the Toledo Pro
vincial Council, attends to persons with very different profiles who are distrib
uted amongst 4 buildings: the first one is for persons with mild to severe mental
disabilities; the second is for psychogeriatrics and assisted psychogeriatrics; the
third is for persons with moderate to severe mental health problems; and the
fourth is for assisted geriatrics and persons able to manage on their own. In addi-
The residence attends to
THE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN
been made to establish
legal guidance services for
persons with disabilities
psychologist and a
physician participated in
the inspection visit as
external experts
elderly persons and persons
with disabilities with many
different profiles
133
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