Parents of Terri Schindler-Schiavo Told to Pay to See Their Daughter

The Terri Schindler Foundation ^ | May 7, 2004 | Terri Foundation

[amdgmary]

Parents of Terri Schindler-Schiavo Told to Pay to See Their Daughter

Clearwater, FL May 7, 2004: In yet another bizarre twist of the Terri Schindler-Schiavo case, the Schindler family was informed that they must now pay a fee for “security” each time that they want to visit their daughter.

On Wednesday, May 5, 2004, Deborah Bushnell of Dunedin, an attorney representing Michael Schiavo, faxed a letter to attorneys representing the parents of Terri Schindler-Schiavo.

In her communication, Ms. Bushnell recommended that Ms. Schiavo's parents could be permitted to visit their disabled daughter if they would agree to hire an off-duty police person to accompany them. This comes after attorney Patricia Anderson, who represents Ms. Schiavo's parents, filed a Writ of Quo Warranto, demanding that Mr. Schiavo demonstrate what authority he has to deny his wife visits from her immediate family. Should the Schindlers fail to pay, they would be denied visitation rights.

Ms. Schiavo currently has an off-duty police person, paid for by Hospice of the Florida Suncoast, assigned to her on a 24 hour a day basis. Additionally, the Schindlers have reported that, during their visits, nursing staff frequently enter their daughter's room.

Ms. Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, have not been permitted to visit her since March 29, 2004 (39 days), when attorney George Felos of Dunedin issued a press release stating that suspicious marks were found on her arm. A toxicology study conducted on Ms. Schiavo concluded that no unauthorized chemicals were found in her system. Ms. Schiavo's parents, along with her siblings, had attempted to visit her the following day at Park Place Assisted Living and were turned away by nursing staff in compliance with "Mr. Schiavo's orders".

Statement of Attorney Patricia Anderson:

By recommending that the financially-strapped Schindlers may only visit Terri if they pay yet another off-duty police person to accompany them, is an effort to inhibit them from freely seeing their own daughter. A couple of years ago, Michael Schiavo contacted Terri's parents and offered to give the balance of Terri's money over to charity. He and his attorneys used this a talking point for the media - claiming that Michael had no financial interest in Terri's death. What they neglected to mention was that that particular offer was predicated upon the Schindler's agreeing to Terri's dehydration and starvation death.

This latest tactic from Ms. Bushnell is really no different. I will not be surprised if Ms. Bushnell uses this as another talking point with the media in an attempt to make her and her client appear less cruel.

No mother should have to pay an admission fee to see her child on Mother's Day. Perhaps Ms. Bushnell has forgotten how most people spend Mother's Day."

[floriduh voter]

I'd be sending that insurance/Jim King post to the Governor at jeb@jeb.org. You won't get an auto responder but they'll get the info. As a backup email him at: jeb@myflorida.com. Jeb wanted to depose Jodi IMO to find out ABOUT JERGER & SONS which is run out of their comfortable home while Terri's confined to ONE ROOM for over 10 years. SHE CAN'T EVEN GO TO A FREAKING BIRD SHOW for the residents at Park Side Assisted Living!!!!!

[FR_addict]

Interesting information you're finding on the contributors to Senator King.

[mtbopfuyn]

To re-emphasize what Ohioan from Florida said, Terri's only means of medical intervention is a feeding tube. She's had ample time to will herself to die but instead has fought to stay alive through untreated infections, isolation, and starvation. Terri is a fighter. This survival against all odds it what makes me wonder what it is she's determined to prove.

[cyn]

Hi, tut -- thanks for the ping to that incredible info you've uncovered. I'm wondering if they also donated in King's last race. How did you search that out? I'd tried via http://www.opensecrets.org but couldn't find the 8th district info.

Wondering as always about the mispelling of "Insurance" >> Insurnace -- doesn't make business sense, that's for sure.

[William Terrell]

Please bear with me.

I believe cruel and unusual punishment on has to do with those who are convicted of a crime, and I'm pretty sure it only applies in criminal proceedings, not civil proceedings.

Constitutions determine what laws can be made, not how individual people are treated. The federal constitution in amendment 5 is a prohibition against laws awarding punishment for a crime. The state constitutions are pretty much the same.

As far as constitutional protection, let me use an example. If I were to come into your house and take your TV, I would be guilty of a crime. If I had a contract with you that unless you did such and such a thing for my doing such and such a thing, your TV would be forfeit. If I did and you didn't, I have the right to come into your house and take your TV.

Constitutions protect people from government, sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

The war on drugs has expanded the allowance of federal and state police powers to the effect that much constitutional protections have vanished or been severely reduced. 60 years ago the notion that the government could tell a person what to eat, smoke or drink or not to eat, smoke or drink would have been met with derision, especially after it was tried by Prohibition. This is an erosion of constitutional protections.

The Terri Schiavo matter has to do with that example I mentioned. There has been a contract of sorts, more like a covenant, made between Mr. and Mrs. Schiavo when they were married. The state constitution protects the institution of marriage under the common law and statutes that add to and modify the common law.

The weight of law has to be on the side of Terri's Schiavo's husband, no matter how much of a creep he is. For every creep like Mr. Schiavo, there a million wives and husbands that benefit from that system. If you damage that system, you may save Terri to continue as she is, but you stand a long chance of establishing a precedent that will negatively affect a million others.

So, this issue with Terri Schiavo and the issue with constitutional protection being destroyed by the war on drug doesn't have anything to do one another.

Also, where was that quote of mine where I called for Mrs. Schiavo to be cruelly put to death?

Sorry for the long wind. I sound pompus, I know, but only because I try to take care that I communicate clearly.

[mtbopfuyn]

Beyond my considerations in this matter, I personally believe the Mr. Shiavo is trying to avoid a personal responsibility to his wife he accepted before God when he married her, and he is using the rights that matrimony gives him from centuries of English and American law to do it.

Much like King Henry VIII.

[tutstar]

Yes I thought the same. Jergers were contributing to King getting into the Senate. I wonder if there's a connect-the-dots fun page for this scenario. I checked Greer's contributors and don't see any Jergers, but it's possible that someone in one of their businesses may have contributed to him. I would have to check the businesses then compare to his list of donors.
There are quite a few medically associated businesses that contributed to King so there is a lot of cross checking to be done to see if anyone who knows someone is giving to someone they know who knows someone else! LOL
And I'm getting off track, I need to post something re Greer, I'm getting crosseyed at the moment and think I need to get offline til later.

[Republic]

Is Jerger Jodi's maiden name? If not, start with her maiden name, and her mother's last name if her mother has 'remarried'. MS is a very slick taskmaster.

[tutstar]

Ok cyn, here's the secret! hahahaha
I went to Fl Div Elections
http://election.dos.state.fl.us/campfin/contrib.asp

It took me a while to come up with the right search combinations. So I have a window open with that and
I have another window open
http://www.sunbiz.org/corpweb/inquiry/search.html

I was just curious at first who was funding King. I saw Jerger and boom! I was definitely into digging more.

When you enter Jerger at sunbiz it doesn't return the business of The Jerger Company but it will come up if you enter the business name. Strange I thought, but what hasn't been?

I really need to give my brain a break, I'll come back on later tonight.

Oh, the campaign contribution results you have to copy/paste and save. I tried to email or download the page and I couldn't.

[William Terrell]

I'm not afraid of reaching 60 and beyond. When the good Lord wants me, He will bring about an event for my body to die. It's the folks that can't stand my passing and will feel much pain when I do, are whom I worried about. Man can go against God's will; he does it all the time.

[William Terrell]

I think when the Lord shuts your body down, that's it. By the grace of God, for me, that will be it. Contrary to what many think, I think there is a better state of being on the other side.

[William Terrell]

Much like King Henry VIII.

I don't think there much we can do about bad people using good law. All we can do is try to catch them. Many can't be caught. Perhaps Mr. Schiavo is one; he is smart and careful, and, if guilty, proves again that goodness has nothing to do with intelligence. There may be some peace in the fact that God's justice provides for much greater amounts of Hell than any human being can.

[windchime]

Bump!

[PropertyRightsResearch.org]

I agree, but being in Ohio, I must use other means of getting their attention:-) Here's what I sent to him: dyckman@sptimes.com
Mr. Dyckman:

I write to you from Ohio, as one who knows several people that have been on feeding tubes for various reasons, from having had facial injuries in a car accident to having had a minor stroke.

A feeding tube is not by any means a 'heroic measure' to prolong life. In Terri's case, she has been able to be spoon fed. She has -- for all these years -- been able to maintain her own blood pressure. She swallows. She does not drool.

You surely know all these things, Mr. Dyckman. Why, then, do you and your paper continue to 'vilify' those that love Terri and seek her safety and rehabilitation -- and continue to paint a violent and pro-euthanasia, proven unfaithful 'husband' as the 'good guy'?

You SURELY know that Michael wants Terri quiet, forever, only because he knows that she knows what happened that night. He is terrified that somehow she'll talk and tell the truth about that night in early 1990.

There but for the grace of God could be anyone that did not do as few do and make SPECIFIC WRITTEN DIRECTIVES for such an unforeseen 'event' as what happened to Terri in February 1990. This entire charade has been Michael Schiavo's fight to keep the ONE PERSON that might tell the truth about what happened that night, from ever being able to tell it.

Terri does not HAVE a REAL Husband; she has an unfaithful, violent and anything BUT 'loving' one -- one that should have been removed as her guardian due to VERY REAL SAFETY CONCERNS for Terri, YEARS AGO, concerns that are STILL VALID AND ONGOING TODAY. That, Martin, is a fact, whether you or your paper or the AP ever tell the truth and report it or not.

You need only visit:

http://www.sweetliberty.org//bulletins/terri/index.shtml

http://www.sweetliberty.org/bulletins/terri/hospice_collusion.htm

http://www.wilkesmchugh.com/schiavo

http://www.cogforlife.org/schiavo.htm

http://www.LifeNews.com

http://www.PropertyRightsResearch.org/articles4/TerriFrms.htm

http://heavenlyhands.net/terrislinks.html

http://libertytothecaptives.net/terri_schiavo_cognitively_able.html

http://www.frtl.org

http://www.TerrisFight.org

Search http://www.Google.com and get:

Results 1 - 10 of about 36,900 for "Terri Schiavo".

Search http://news.google.com and get:

Results 1 - 10 of about 735 for Terri-Schiavo.

Visit http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=35305

and read a vast array of articles that prove the SPTimes and its 'reporting' to be in error, regarding Terri, far more often than it is accurate.

As you know, Terri had an unfaithful 'husband' and one with a volatile temperament. Her original injuries were sustained when she was alone with him and were likely at his hands.

'Strangulation' certainly does not sound like the action of a loving husband.

Neither does failing to mention any wishes of Terri's until AFTER Mister Schiavo had been awarded the court judgements for his own 'loss of companionship' and for Terri's care.

No matter what your feelings or mine are on other matters, I believe in honest reporting.

Continuing to refer to Terri as being in a 'persistant vegetative state,' 'PVS' or 'coma' -- when she is NONE of these, but is, rather, profoundly brain-damaged -- is dishonest reporting.

Continuing to refer to a lascivious and adulterous 'man' with a formidable temper as Terri's 'husband' -- when he has proved by his living arrangements with Jodi Centonze and the TWO children he has sired out of wedlock with his concubine -- is dishonest and misleading reporting.

Continuing the openly biased reporting that paints Michael Schiavo as a 'loving husband' is FALSE reporting.

FAILING to report that Terri is being held hostage -- and has been held hostage for over THREE YEARS -- in a hospice, when she is not terminally ill, is FALSE reporting.

The FACT that Michael's live-in lover's mother was deemed fit to guard Terri to keep her own REAL FAMILY away during one of the times he and his cohorts sought to starve Terri to death is CRIMINALLY CRUEL, sir.

It is illegal to treat a dog or cat the way that Terri is being 'treated' -- or NOT treated. She has recently had FIVE TEETH REMOVED. This is directly due to the FAILURE of Michael Schiavo -- the 'loving husband' -- to provide any LOVING and REHABILITATIVE CARE WHATSOEVER for Terri.

Has the Saint Petersburg Times reporting and editorial staff followed Alice through the looking-glass?

One would certainly think so.

Julie Kay Smithson

London, Ohio

propertyrights@earthlink.net

----- Original Message -----
From: Dyckman@sptimes.com
To: (name redacted)
Sent: Friday, May 07, 2004 1:57 PM
Subject: Re: Terri Schiavo Coverage

Dear (name redacted):

I empathize with your situation. You have made the choices that are right
for you. That is all that Mr. Schiavo wanted for himself and his wife until
the governor and legislature intervened in violation of the Florida
Constitution.

However, I must tell you that as a person who knows the names of distant kin
murdered by the Nazis, I am insulted whenever anyone attempts to equate the
issue of Ms. Schiavo being allowed to die a natural death with the
deliberate genocide they practiced.

No reply is necessary.

Martin Dyckman
Associate editor and columnist
St. Petersburg Times
336 East College Avenue
Tallahassee, FL 32301
850-224-6394

______________________________________________________________________
THIS IS THE LETTER SENT TO MR. DYCKMAN FROM A FIGHT4TERRI ACTION GROUP VOLUNTEER REQUESTING FAIR AND EQUAL COVERAGE OF TERRI.

I am writing to you to express my disappointment with the manner in which
your newspaper covers Terry Schiavo. As a mother of a child who would be
described as being in a persistent vegetative state and is also fed by
feeding tube, I am fully aware of the needs a person like Terry has.

I think it would be a good idea for your paper to educate its readers on
exactly what caring for someone diagnosed as PVS is like. From your
reportage PVS could be misconstrued by your readers to be a coma-like state,
when in fact nothing could be further from the truth, and particularly in
Terri's case. Perhaps you could interview parents of a child with PVS to
learn exactly what kind of quality of life such a child has. I would be
happy to be interviewed for such a story.

In my case, my child who is 8 would be described as being in a PVS. She was
vaccine-damaged at the age of 4 months and her development was arrested.
She lost her swallowing reflex and has been unable to eat adequate amounts
of solids and so is dependant upon a feeding tube for her nourishment. The
past 8 years have been the most intense I have ever experienced; filled with
joy, laughter and sadness. The idea that a judge could decide whether my
child live or die is just abhorrent to me. My daughters contribution to her
family, friends and neighbours, in terms of the love and happiness she
brings could never be measured and is priceless.

Like Terri, my child does not communicate verbally, but there is an unspoken
communication between us, it is usually easy to determine what she needs or
why she might be unhappy. Likewise, it is very easy to know exactly what
makes her happy. With therapy my daughters condition has improved and I
believe that anything is possible with the right care and attention.
Reading Terri's parents testimony to her present condition, one gets the
impression that Terri is a very upbeat woman who is cognitive and
responsive. I find it incredibly cruel that her life could be used in the
way that it is being done so in the state of Florida to encroach on the
sanctity of life. It is ironic that we try to preserve the rights of unborn
embryos and yet in the case of Terri, we encourage the practise of
euthanasia. Is this because her life has no utilitarian function deemed
worthy of preserving? And who is entitled to make that decision?

It reminds me of the nazi euthanasia programme that saw the disabled killed
because they were not considered useful to society, this was accepted by
German society at the time. Unfortunately, this notion of utility did not
stop with the disabled but over time grew to include able-bodied humans that
society felt were of no value; the chronically sick and elderly, those
considered parasites, political dissidents and finally culminating in the
holocaust in which millions of jews were incinerated. The holocaust could
never have occurred without first convincing society that it was
compassionate to kill the disabled because they had no "quality of life".

Admittedly, caring for Terri is going to be expensive, Terri's parents are
fully aware of this but they love their child dearly and are battling to
protect her from harm because she is very precious to them. If we are
prepared to commit euthanasia despite the wishes of her parents, where
precisely do we draw the line and say, this life is worth preserving and
that one is not?

It is really important that your paper address these issues. Your readers
need to understand that Terri does feel. Removing Terri's feeding tube and
allowing her to starve to death, when she is in such a vulnerable state, is
the cruelest idea imaginable. It has been suggested that she is incapable
of feeling and yet she is clearly delighted by the presence of her parents
when they visit her in hospital. Michael Schiavo says that removing her
feeding tube would allow Terri to die with dignity. However, starving to
death would cause her enormous pain, physically and emotionally.

It is said that a society can be judged by how it treats its weakest
members. Allowing Terri to die in this way would not reflect well on the
state of Florida. I have always found that a good rule of thumb is "what if
the shoe were on the other foot". It has been claimed by Michael Schiavo
that Terri would wish for the "plug to be pulled". Is it not strange that
she would never have expressed this opinion to her parents and best friends?

I really do not think that removing Terri's feeding tube is a line that we
who are presently able-bodied, should be ready to cross.

Please endeavour to show the human side of the plight of Terri and her
parents. It is extremely sad and troubling that some 60 years after the
holocaust that we are ready to embark once more with a euthanasia programme
on the very same platform that was used by the nazis - i.e. compassion - and
when we know so well the experiment ended in the gas chambers.

I look forward to seeing more positive and humane coverage of Terri in the
future.

Yours sincerely

(name redacted)

[litany_of_lies]

Nice job.

I'm from OH as well.

I've decided from this point forward, instead of e-mailing Mr. Dyckman, to send an e-mail to corrections@sptimes.com and demand a correction every time something inaccurate is carried in an SPT article about Terri. I don't get to follow every single event in the case, but when it gets my attention and I see errors, I'll pounce.

In the meantime, if you want a good laugh, but also words to throw back into Mr. Dyckman's face, go to their "Standards of Accuracy" at this link:

http://sptimes.com/INCLUDE/specials/standards/index.html

What a complete farce.

It's interesting to see who owns the SPT and how it got that way (a self-serving and self-congratulatory link on their part but probably not too far from the truth if you filter the BS):

http://www.poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=4100&sid=41

Finally, I wonder if the president of the SPT is aware of Mr. dyckman's back of the hand response to you. If you think it would matter, you can contact or e-mail him at:

Paul Tash
Editor and president
(727) 892-2231
Timespresident@sptimes.com

[Republic]

For people newer to the thread-can you make a connection for them about the jerger company and MS? Isn't Michael Shivao a part owner or something of this company?

[phenn]

>>The Shiavo situaltion has the positive effect of motivating me to get a living will.<<

I hope you don't give anyone your permission to dehydrate you to death.

[pickyourpoison]

Yes, that sounds like the name of the book. I haven't read Felos book , just bits and pieces here on these threads.