Judge Robert W. Sweet of Federal District Court in Manhattan, NY on April 17th found the Mount Sinai Medical Center guilty of discriminating against the husband of a Deaf couple for not providing a sign language interpreter during Lamaze classes. The hospital also did not provide interpreters during birth of the couple, Jeffrey & Naomi Bravin’s newborn son, Ethan Raymond nor the following week when the baby was treated for low blood sugar in the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit. This occurred in 1997 when the Bravins were living in New York City.  The birth, according to their attorney Alan J. Rich, was like a Marx Brothers movie” with Mrs. Bravin Trying to interpret between contractions, to explain what [Jeff] Bravin was supposed to be doing. The judge ruled that the hospital violated state and Federal laws requiring accommodations for the disabled, but rejected the class-action claim of the Bravins and the Civic Association of the Deaf of New York City, a watchdog group on the legal rights of the Deaf. The judge, after ruling in favor of the Bravins, scheduled the decision on the amount of damages for May.