Services for Individuals & Families
Gemstone offers individuals and families limited-scope, targeted services to help you assess your legal situation and protect your rights, whether at work, in school, in your healthcare, or in life. For cases needing full-service or contingency-fee representation, we offer case evaluation and preparation through our Gemstone Referral Program at no additional cost to you.
Healthcare Advocacy · Special Ed & 504 Planning · Work Accommodations · Legal Case Review · Unbundled Legal Services · Pro Se Support
Legal Consultation
The American legal system used to be simple enough that sometimes cases were heard where the only person in the courtroom who could read was the judge. Now, the thought of trying to protect your rights or defend yourself in court without a lawyer – a good one – is frightening. Most people who earn a paycheck or a benefit check, though, can’t pay the fees for full-service representation. That makes defending your rights and pursuing your just claims in court seem almost impossible.
Gemstone offers legal consultation, limited-scope representation, pro se (self-representation) and case management coaching and other affordable services to make justice accessible to you.
Healthcare Advocacy
Just as our legal system has grown more and more complex, our medical system in the past 20 years has become vast, bureaucratic, and riddled with procedural pitfalls and baffling jargon. Patients are now considered “consumers” but treated as commodities traded between corporate provider networks, insurance enterprises, and government regulators — with actual healing taking low priority in a transactional system.
This is especially true if you or a loved one is living with a chronic or difficult-to-diagnose illness or disability. Navigating a bureaucratic medical system can leave you exhausted, frustrated, and with few solutions. Gemstone offers case review, coaching, and in-person advocacy services wherever you receive treatment.
Disability Support
Whether at work, at school, in public spaces or events, or while traveling, state and federal laws guarantee accessibility to everyone on equal terms, regardless of ability. In some settings, people with disabilities are entitled to accommodations to ensure equity of opportunity.
Disability discrimination can be overt cruelty or rejection of people with visible disabilities. It can take other forms, too, including actions by people who do not even realize you are disabled. People with disabilities are more likely to face school or workplace discipline and involuntary law enforcement contact, to be victims of crime, to be evicted or unhoused, to be denied entitlement benefits despite meeting eligibility criteria.
Gemstone consultants understand the challenges people with disabilities face and our services are tailored to meet you where you are to help you overcome whatever obstacles are in your path.