Disability criminalization occurs when individuals are exposed to criminal legal system involvement—whether stops, arrests, detention, discipline, and punishment—for engaging in behaviors, norms, and conduct linked to, or caused by, their disabilities. This Article provides a short primer on disability criminalization. It defines the concept before turning to key sites where disability criminalization occurs. The Article concludes with a discussion of Critical Disability Studies and how that discipline may be used by advocates as a vehicle for contesting disability criminalization.

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