Legal aid for person with disabilities in access to justice

Abstract

Some criminal cases took place in palm oil plantation and agriculture area as the crime scene. Unfortunately, the cases involved children and women. This paper discusses on the research results of a study on the development of legal aid model for marginal people including people with disabilities. There were two research questions namely the situation of PwD and how they access the justice. The data were collected through literature review and field study. There were 52 persons who participated in in-depth interview and 3 Focus Group Discussion. All informants are PwD and people who supported PwD. This study figured out a case of sexual harassment which located in palm oil plantation. The victim is a girl with hearing impairment. The result of the study shows that PwD could not access the justice due to the distance and lack of information concerning legal aid provider. Furthermore, data of PwD is not available properly either at the government office or Community Social Organization (CSO)