Guardian Ad Litem Report on Terri Schiavo (everyone should read this)

http://jb-williams.com/ts-report-12-03.htm ^ | 12/03 | Jay Wolfson

[teenyelliott]

Too many bad decisions on both sides. I am so horrified with a human being laying there being starved. However, I do think that an individual should have the right to be "unhooked". So, I dunno. I try to think of the larger implications of what is going on. The specifics of this case are just so debatable you could go on forever.

[JuliaAnne]

Bone scan original report is here :

http://www.zimp.org/stuff/bone.jpg

[Maggie4life]

Probably because there was no sign of injury, but there was cardiac arrest brought on by a potassium imbalance due to bulimia. Hospitals aren't stupid - they're able to recognize spousal abuse injuries. There were no such injuries in this case.

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This is a very late response to what can be considered some rather ill-informed comments regarding injuries from abuse.

I have been spending a lot of time studying this case because it is the classic case of abuse that has ever been publicized where the victim is the one who has been executed, and the perpetrator has been allowed to go about free as a bird.

First of all, anyone who continues to believe the bulimia line needs to eat humble pie. Terri did not suffer from bulimia. She did not exhibit any of the signs of bulimia. The outcome of that malpractice lawsuit should have been in the negative because of the lack of evidence of the existence of bulimia. The real cause of those results comes down to the emergency treatment that she received at the time that she collapsed.

Second, all of my own research on those results did not point to bulimia but to asphyxiation, probably attempted strangulation. Despite the fact that there has been mention that there were no signs of attempted strangulation, I still believe that this is the most probable cause of her collapse. In the past statistics have shown that more than 60 per cent of attempted strangulation cases never make it to court because of the lack of physical evidence. The police called to the scene of such a situation need to be specially trained to look for the signs that are not necessarily visible to the eye.

Third, I have no intention at this point in time of dealing with the autopsy report. There are some aspects of this report that are seriously flawed in the conclusions that have been reached. I need to do further research and study on the subject so that I can understand the particular flaws that have thrown up a smokescreen over the truth of this situation.

Fourth, according to that same autopsy report, the area of Terri's brain that controlled hearing was not damaged. She had cognitive function but she also had dysphasia and that meant she could not express herself, even though it is reported in her medical records that she used words such as "pain". If she had been totally comatose as is suggested by most people who have not understood the complexities of this case then the staff looking after her would not have recorded her saying "pain" or "stop".

Fifth, this concerns the other forms of abuse in this case. According to Florida law, where the death of a vulnerable adult is caused by neglect then this should be considered as a homicide. When Michael Schiavo attempted to prevent Terri from receiving antibiotics in 1994 and again in 2003, he acted in a criminal manner, and this criminal activity should have been investigated, ending in Michael Schiavo being charged with attempted homicide. The fact remains that in this case the Florida statutes pertaining to a vulnerable adult were ignored. When Michael Schiavo stopped all forms of therapy he was attempting to worsen Terri's steadily improving condition.

I did read again what was in the Pearse report where it states that Michael finally realised that she would not get better. However, this statement from Michael Schiavo was just more of his lying bulldust. The withdrawal of therapy for Terri was tantamount to criminal neglect. At autopsy Terri's brain was shown to have been in a very wasted state. What must be remembered is that her brain was affected by both the dehydration and the neglect caused by forced inactivity. This is criminal neglect and abuse of a vulnerable person. According to the affidavits of more than one carer, if anyone was caught giving Terri therapy they faced being sacked by the facility. This is the same as standover tactics and also a criminal offence since the staff were not allowed to carry out their ordinary duty of caring for a vulnerable adult.

I would hope that as the dust settles that those people who have been hysterical enough to claim that Terri should die, just because the husband wanted the balance of her money, will recognize that he was a very abusive man and that this whole case was based on ulterior motives, giving him the protection of judicial sanction for the completion of the murder of his wife.

[Maggie4life]

I am curious, because I cannot tell from any of the court records I have read. When they say she went home to be with family, was it her parents or Michael?
susie

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She was in Michael's care. He was the one who could not cope with her. However, he also has his supporters who would twist anything to make it look like the parents could not cope.

[Maggie4life]

It's not clear in the records, but I gather Terri was at the parents' home.
This is what is confusing me. You say the parents were caring for her. Are you only unsure of where she was being cared for? But you are certain they were doing the caring? susie

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Susie,

according to the information that I had seen, Terri was taken to her parents home but Michael Schiavo lived with them and was the one caring for her. They were not responsible for her personal care.

[Maggie4life]

How could he try to isolate her from her family when they lived with her family the whole time they were married. Including when she collapsed and he continued to live with them for three more years. Also I beleive they would have know if there was abuse in their home, but maybe not. I know if my daughter and her husband had lived with me for three years after they were married, I would have know if there was abuse and stopped it.

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But you are wrong. They did not live with her parents the whole time that they were married. They lived by themselves when they first moved to Florida and they had to stay with Terri's parents for a time because Michael was unemployed and they could not survive on one income.

No one said that the abuse was ongoing. However, there is evidence, provided by Terri's co-worker, that when the Schiavos were living in an apartment, (and not with her parents) that Michael was being abusive and that she often came to work with bruises. This co-worker also reported that Michael used to check the odometer of Terri's car and would get abusive if he thought that she was spending too much money.

People seemed to be confused about the nature of abuse. There is more than just physical abuse. It is mental abuse that causes most of the scarring to a person who has been abused. This is the kind of abuse that Michael had inflicted upon Terri prior to the incident in February 1990.

I have noted that a lot of what Michael Schiavo says does not stack up all that well in the credibility stakes. He has been lying about a lot of the facts of this case. It is true that he hid medical documents from her parents. They had to get the court to approve the release of those documents. That is how they found out about the bone scan results. Until 2002 they did not know of the existence of that bone scan report. A lot of information remained hidden in this case. That is why Michael Schiavo in my eyes continues to lack any form of credibility.

To this I will add that he claimed under oath that Terri's mother told him to put down her cats, but that was a blatant lie. The vet who euthanaised the cats stated that it was Michael alone who insisted that they be put down. This happened at the time he was dating Cindy Brasher and prior to the finalisation of the malpractice lawsuit.

[Maggie4life]

Also, when did bulimia cause broken bones
Actually, loss of bone mass resulting in very brittle bones and accompanying breakage, is one of the symptoms of Bulimia. Lack of proper nutrition and all.

How stupid can some people be?

I don't know. You tell me. But I do know they can be very uninformed.

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I agree that when someone has bulimia that a loss of bone mass can cause fractures etc. However, in 199o when Terri first collapsed, and in 1991 when the bone scan was performed she did not have at the same time a dexa scan that is necessary to measure bone density.

The bone scan performed on Terri was not able to diagnose osteoporosis and as stated by Dr. Walker in his testimony it is not the means by which osteoporosis is diagnosed. This is one area of the autopsy report that I believe to have flawed conclusions, since the M.E. has relied upon information from the Schiavo lawyers to make his assessment of the pertinent facts.

At the time of her collapse Terri was a healthy 25 year old woman. She did not exhibit any signs of bulimia. There were no purgatives in the house and there was no other evidence that she had been vomiting up her food that would have been detectable through further testing at the time. The only information regarding alleged bulimia has come from one source - Michael Schiavo. It is doubtful that Terri would have been consuming something like 15 litres of iced tea per day. That is also from Michael Schiavo's imagination - a necessary cover for what I believe was a crime scene.

The osteoporosis at the time of death was in fact the result of 15 years of being bedridden. During the first few years of therapy there is little chance that she would have developed such severe osteoporosis, however the further 10 years of neglect and refusal to allow any form of therapy would have caused the osteoporosis to have developed to such an advanced state in a young woman. I have no doubt that Michael Schiavo planned on this neglect so that he could claim that her condition was caused by bulimia (osteopenia being a symptom of bulimia) rather than by his abusive behaviour.

[brytlea]

Thank you for this info.
Of course, the bottom line is, she won an award from the courts for her long term care. She had first degree relatives (her parents and siblings) who were willing to care for her for the rest of her life. There was NO WRITTEN DIRECTIVE FROM TERRI. In light of these facts, putting her to sleep like a sick dog seems to me to have been death by judiciary. And very very wrong.
susie

[lolhelp]

LOL, how long are people going to keep digging this up? Be better to get on with our lives and make a difference in the present and future.

[Jotmo]

LOL, how long are people going to keep digging this up? Be better to get on with our lives and make a difference in the present and future.

Indeed.

Sorry Maggie, I'm NOT going to get into this again. I almost left FR over all the immature crap that was slung about over this.

I'm still a bit sore over the way I and others were treated. (I'm not sugesting you were in any way involved)

I'm simply not going to go there again.