Bobby Coward, who was left a quadriplegic after a car accident and became an advocate and agitator for rights and full accessibility to public accommodations and services for persons with disabilities, died Aug. 25 at a hospital in Baltimore. He was 50 and a District resident.

The cause was cardiac arrest and infections-related sepsis, said Marjorie Rifkin, a friend and litigator on behalf of people with disabilities through University Legal Services, a nonprofit community legal group in the District.

In an auto accident 22 years ago in Prince George's County, Mr. Coward broke his neck and suffered severe spinal injuries that left him quadriplegic. Most movement from one place to another was possible only in a motorized wheelchair.

Since then, he had been instrumental locally in bringing about reforms, such as making available wheelchair-equipped taxicabs, wheelchair lifts on public buses and wheelchair access to public housing.

Over the years, he had been executive director of Direct Action and chairman of Capital Area Adapt, both private, nonprofit advocacy organizations for persons with disabilities.

Bobby Coward had been executive director of Direct Action and chairman of Capital Area Adapt, two private and nonprofit advocacy organizations people with disabilities. (2004 photo by Larry Morris/The Washington Post)
He participated in campaigns for greater access to public buildings for the handicapped and greater integration into mainstream care for handicapped people in nursing home and health-care facilities.

Robert Earl Coward Jr. was born in Washington on Feb. 13, 1964. He graduated from Eastern High School and attended the University of the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1990, he served in the Air Force as an airplane mechanic.

In 1992, he was driving on Marlboro Pike in Prince George's County when he swerved his car to avoid a collision with a police vehicle that was pursuing another automobile. Mr. Coward's car rolled over and he lost consciousness, waking up the next morning in a hospital with a broken neck.