During a dispute in the early hours of July 24, 1988, Armando Dimas was shot in the neck. The bullet lodged high in his spinal cord, paralyzing him from the jaw down. From that day on, Dimas would be unable to breathe without a ventilator, unable to move his arms or legs, unable to feed or dress himself. The doctors who first treated Dimas at the emergency room at Hermann Hospital in Houston, Texas, were surprised that he lived through the night.

When it became apparent that Dimas would indeed survive, the question became what to do with him. Dimas, his parents, and his eleven siblings were illegal immigrants from Mexico. His parents felt that they did not have the resources or the expertise to care for their quadriplegic son at home. The ventilator in particular intimidated Dimas’s family. “We...