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In February 1962, doctors recommended placing the emotionally troubled youth Marion Daniels in an institution for the retarded. Daniels, who has been tested and shown to have an I.Q. in the normal range, spent 7 years in three Sunland institutions in Gainesville, Marianna and Miami. It was not until he won two gold medals at the Special Olympics for the handicapped in Chicago 1968 that he came to the attention of retardation activist Eunice Kennedy Shriver. Shriver became convinced Marion was not retarded and special psychiatric tests were provided after which Daniels was finally released from the institution in 1969. He promptly finished high school, graduated from Santa Fe Junior College and enrolled in Florida State University. Florida House Speaker Don Tucker filed a claims bill that would make the state pay Daniels $75,000 compensation for the years lost during his confinement. The state was found not negligent by special hearing officer Tom Woods and the bill was rejected by the Claims Committee in April 1976.

Biographical Note

From 1963 to 1992, photographer Donn Dughi worked for a number of media outlets in Tallahassee, including WCTV, the United Press International (UPI), and the Associated Press. From 1992 until his retirement in 2001, Dughi was a photographer for the Florida House of Representatives.