Terri Schiavo Before dehydration
Posted on 04/15/2005 1:05:20 PM PDT by phenn
Browning was "PVS".
Further to that, under Florida's evidence code, Michael Schiavo's testimony of Terri's alleged oral declaration was NEVER admissible.
False again. No wonder you can't understand why the Schindlers kept losing their court battles.
Zatso?
http://flsenate.gov/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=Ch0090/SEC602.HTM&Title=-%3E2004-%3ECh0090-%3ESection%20602#0090.602
Lawyers: can't live with em, can't live ... with em.
So says The Conspiracy.
Thank you Phenn.
Schiavo was being examined on his own behalf. Asked why he was taking the actions he was with respect to Terri. Terri's statements were not offered for the truth of the statement(ie: whether or not she actually wanted life support) but rather what Schiavo was basing his actions upon. He testified to his state of mind, not Terri's and to the truth of his actions, not Terri's. No hearsay and quite allowable.
Yes, she was diagnosed PVS by at least one doctor. Nevertheless, I have my doubts, and you seem to doubt the diagnosis also.
From Browning:
At the same time, the medical evidence reflected that Mrs. Browning was not comatose. Although she was noncommunicative, she "appeared alert and would follow [a visitor] with her eyes."That's why I asserted that she was not PVS, but after reading the case again, Browning quotes a doctor claiming that she was PVS by his definition:
Dr. Barnhill opined that she was in a persistent vegetative state, which he defined as the absence of cognitive behavior and inability to communicate or interact purposefully with the environment.
Nevertheless, being diagnosed PVS is not a requirement to refuse artificial life support. For instance, Mrs. Wons was not terminally ill, except for the fact that she refused medical treatment:
Norma Wons entered Jackson Memorial Hospital, a medical facility operated by the Public Health Trust of Dade County, with a condition known as dysfunctional uterine bleeding. Doctors informed Mrs. Wons that she would require treatment in the form of a blood transfusion or she would, in all probability, die. [...]Referring to Wons, the Court ruled in Browning that any competent person can refuse life-saving medical treatment:Nevertheless, the court granted the petition, ordering the hospital doctors to administer the blood transfusion, which was done while Mrs. Wons was unconscious. The trial judge reasoned that minor children have a right to be reared by two loving parents, a right which overrides the mother's rights of free religious exercise and privacy. Upon regaining consciousness, Mrs. Wons appealed to the third district which reversed the order
We held that a competent, thirty-eight-year-old practicing Jehovah's Witness could exercise her constitutional right to refuse an emergency blood transfusion, without which her death was certain to follow shortly. We approved the opinion of the district court, which concluded that Mrs. Wons was entitled "to exercise her religious freedom and to lead her private life according to her own conscience."And if you had any doubts whether feeding tubes are artificial life support, the Court continued:
We conclude that a competent person has the constitutional right to choose or refuse medical treatment, and that right extends to all relevant decisions concerning one's health. Courts overwhelmingly have held that a person may refuse or remove artificial life-support, whether supplying oxygen by a mechanical respirator or supplying food and water through a feeding tube. We agree and find no significant legal distinction between these artificial means of life-support.And any claim that a written directive was required in Browning is rejected by the Court.
Oral declarations are enough:
Although a surrogate may rely on oral statements made by the incompetent, while competent, to exercise the incompetent's wishes to forego life-sustaining treatment, the presumption of clear and convincing evidence that attaches to a written declaration does not attach to purely oral declarations. Oral evidence, considered alone, may constitute clear and convincing evidence. However, the surrogate would bear the burden of proof if a decision based on purely oral evidence is challenged.
Noooo, so says the video -
http://hometown.aol.com/GordonWWatts/myhomepage/ConversationWithTerri.wmv
I already quoted Browning , where the Florida Supreme Court specifically states that oral declarations to others are admissible.
" We conclude that a competent person has the constitutional right to choose or refuse medical treatment, and that right extends to all relevant decisions concerning one's health. Courts overwhelmingly have held that a person may refuse or remove artificial life-support, whether supplying oxygen by a mechanical respirator or supplying food and water through a feeding tube. We agree and find no significant legal distinction between these artificial means of life-support."
If the Court defined a rose as a jeep, the mileage would be zero.
The Court is a fool, and in this case a feeding tube is NOT the same as a respirator.
One simple proof is that Terri swallowed.
Another simple proof, ask any surgeon or surgical resident.
And Felos' exwife is a possible conspirator to this murder and its coverup
because the reading of a radiographic image
should be done by an individual certified by the American Board of Radiology
and not the Florida Scientology Board of Massage and Legal Wh&res.
You may wish to read his testimony.
I'll pick this post up again when I get home if you're all still here - I'm leaving work now.
That is precisely it. Life-sustaining treatment did not include feeding tubes until 1999. Not under these circmstances. Please, please, please read the statute. Until that point, a feed tube removal could only happen with a written instruction.
I don't argue with Browning. I think it may actually have some merit in and of itself. But it does NOT apply to this case in the manner it has been thrusted out by Felos. You know that as well as I. Terri had no written instructions as to her medical treatment desires and food wasn't medical treatment when she fell ill.
The law changed the following year, in 1999, a year after the petition. You may want to read the End of Life Panel Report to the Florida Legislature. They were bothered by advanced directives that favored medical intervention because they were 'confusing'. They didn't like that they had to wait until someone was dying to kill them. They didn't like that a family member from out of town had to be consulted prior to killing. They didn't like brain injured people.
Read it. It will make your blood run cold.
Most of the language was crafted by board members of the Hospice of the Florida Suncoast - at a time when Felos was Chairman. I didn't discover this on my own. Someone enlightened me.
The fix was in on this case. Florida wanted this woman to die. Email me on phenn at yahoo and I'll give you all I got. But, stop thinking the rule of law has been followed here. I would suspect the failure of the court to remove an unfit guardian who doesn't file timely annual guardian reports alone should be evidence of that.
phenn, the statute that you keep quoting was overriden by case law, such as Browning, ten years earlier.
Sodomy is illegal in many states, but the anti-sodomy statutes are worthless. Case law already declared those statutes unconstitutional.
Case law trumps statutes all the time, especially if case law is based in an enumerated right of the Florida Constitution.
What is the definition of PVS, according Florida law?
And to quote Charles Dickens:
"If this be the law, then the law is an ass."
Ghouls go home!!
None so blind as those that will not see. With any luck, someday you may open those eyes.
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