Earlier this year, NPR reported that people with intellectual disabilities are victims of some of the highest rates of sexual assault. NPR found previously undisclosed government numbers showing that they're assaulted at seven times the rate of people without disabilities. Now states, communities and advocates, citing NPR's reporting, are making reforms aimed at improving those statistics.

In Pennsylvania, legislation passed the state House of Representatives earlier this month that would make it easier for people with intellectual disabilities to testify in court. The proposed law, introduced by Republican Rep. Garth Everett, would set out circumstances in which a judge could allow a person's testimony to be taken outside of a courtroom.

In Massachusetts, a proposed law would create a registry of abusive caregivers, even if the case isn't prosecuted. Currently, when an allegation of abuse emerges, a state agency investigates to see if the claim can be substantiated, but the names of alleged perpetrators are only made public if a prosecutor decides to take the case to trial. Advocates cited the NPR series in pushing for the law.

And in California, legislation was proposed — but ultimately stalled — that would have started a pilot program to give prosecutors extra money to

Without a big change, advocates are warning that a recently-established vehicle to help people with disabilities save money without risking their government benefits could be unsustainable.

ABLE programs across the country desperately need an infusion of more account holders, according to a letter sent to congressional leadership this month from over 150 disability advocacy groups.

Established under a 2014 federal law, ABLE accounts allow people with disabilities to save up to $100,000 without risking eligibility for Social Security and other government benefits. Medicaid can be retained no matter how much money is in the accounts.

To date, 37 states offer ABLE programs, though many are open to those with disabilities nationwide.

A drunken James Steven Jennex sent a text message to a friend apologizing in advance for his actions and then fired a bullet into the heads of each of three developmentally disabled men in his care before setting his Temecula-area home ablaze and killing himself with a .357 revolver blast to the head.

The fire, on Aug. 29, 2016, at the Renee Jennex Small Family Home, killed a fourth developmentally disabled man and burned all five people beyond recognition. Investigators pulled a gas can from the rubble.

At 11:45 a.m. a bell rings, and an employee at Abilities Solutions in Westville jumps up from his station and darts to the door, eager for lunch.

Shauna Hilbmann stays perched on her stool, methodically affixing price tags to plastic Crayola thermoses, a dozen per box.

And just a few stations away, state Senate President Stephen Sweeney, locked in a state budget battle with Gov. Phil Murphy, greets employees holding signs urging continued funding for this south Jersey vocational program that provides employment for 185 people with developmental disabilities.

The employees know Sweeney, whose daughter has Down Syndrome, and he knows them.

Sweeney, D-Gloucester, coupled his praise for the workshop with harsh criticism for Murphy, whose proposed budget cuts $5 million of $43.8 million the state is spending on these "sheltered workshops."

"You see people feel a sense of purpose and pride, and they want to be employed. They want to

As my son, a client of 12 years at the Sonoma Development Center, and I walk through the soon-to-close campus, I keep thinking of the fervent mothers who — 128 years ago — secured this land and intended it to be there in perpetuity for those with special needs.

A van drives by slowly. The driver waves to my son, and says, “Hello there, Carsten. How are you?” My son beams. We pass by the swimming pool, now closed. We cross over Arnold Drive toward the hill. We meander by what still is or used to be the store, the upholstery shop, the laundry, the bakery, the paint place, the coffee shop, the shoemaking workshop, the tailoring place, the adaptations shop, the framing workshop, the nursery, the school, the gymnasium, the auditorium, the sensory therapy/activity place, the on-site hospital and many other buildings. This used to be a village that provided both services and work opportunities, including farm and dairy, for its villagers.

I keep thinking of Julia Judah and Frances Bentley who fought for this place so it could be there in perpetuity for those who needed it.

A fire engine returns to the station. The firemen greet Carsten. He waves back enthusiastically. He understands the tremendous and courageous effort they put forth to save the Sonoma Developmental Center from the October fires.

Shaded by magnificent magnolias and oak trees, we make our way up the hill toward Fern Lake. It is deliciously quiet and peaceful; the only sounds we hear are birdsong and a light breeze. We encounter just one other person on the path, who

It is a major victory for the only school in the country that uses painful electric shocks on its disabled students.

A Bristol County Probate and Family Court judge has sided with the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, allowing the school to continue administering electric skin shocks.

The administration of former Gov. Deval Patrick tried to put a stop to the practice, which is known as an aversive treatment, in 2013, months after video surfaced of 18-year-old Andre McCollins receiving dozens of electric skin shocks at the center in 2002.

But Bristol Probate and Family Court Judge Katherine Field denied the motion in a ruling that came after a 44-day evidentiary hearing that ended in October 2016.

“(The state) failed to demonstrate that there is now a professional consensus that the Level III aversive treatment used at JRC does not conform to the accepted standard of care for treating individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities," Field wrote in her June 20 ruling.

Donald Vitkus’ final act of advocacy is being buried at the Warner-Pine Grove Cemetery among his “brothers and sisters” of the former Belchertown State School.

On Saturday, Vitkus, 74, who spent more than two decades helping the developmentally disabled, had his dying wish granted. His cremated remains were lowered to his resting place alongside the people he grew up with at the institution where allegations of neglect and abuse prompted a class action lawsuit.

Vitkus, who died in January, was placed at the state school as a 6-year-old foster child and lived there until he was 17. He died in January. His is the first burial at the cemetery, where there are 204 other gravesites, in nearly a decade.