Schindlers’ legal battle near an end
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (AP) – It’s no coincidence, some supporters of Terri Schiavo’s parents say, that the couple’s long struggle to keep their brain-damaged daughter alive would reach its most desperate moments yet as the holiest day of the Christian calendar approached. As intense as the religious overtones have been in the legal fight over Schiavo, they seemed even more pronounced Saturday, the day before Easter. Twenty-two protesters arrived outside her hospice bearing wooden crosses and Schiavo’s parents urged her husband to let her receive communion, which in her case would be a tiny fleck of host and a droplet of wine.
Schiavo’s brother, Bobby Schindler, and others drew parallels between the fight over Terri Schiavo and Holy Week celebrations.
“It’s the most significant weekend for Christians, and God wants us to be aware of the preciousness of life,” said Louis Hymel, one of the coordinators of the cross demonstration by an Augusta, Ga.-based Christian community. “God calls us always to the cross, and this is an example of us taking up our cross.”
Schiavo’s parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, appeared to be near the end of their legal battle with her husband, Michael Schiavo, who has maintained for years that his wife would not have wanted to be kept alive in what a judge has agreed is a persistent vegetative state. The tube that supplied her food and water was removed March 18, and experts say she probably would live only a week or two without it.
Michael Schiavo’s brother said religious conservatives’ criticism of his position has been painful because he believes he is acting out of compassion for his wife.
“He knows in his heart he is doing the right thing, he is doing what Terri wanted,” Scott Schiavo said. “He’s having a hard time understanding why people are fighting him on this, why they are calling him a murderer. It’s very tough on him.”
Lawyers for the Schindlers made a last-ditch plea to the Florida Supreme Court on Saturday to get the feeding tube reinserted, but the request was dismissed later in the day. The family decided against filing another motion with a federal appeals court, essentially ending their effort to persuade federal judges to intervene – something allowed by an extraordinary law passed by Congress.
At least two appeals by the state and Gov. Jeb Bush still loom, but those challenges were before the state 2nd District Court of Appeal, which has rebuffed the governor’s previous efforts in the case.
“Time is moving quickly and it would appear most likely … that Terri Schiavo will pass the point that she will be able to recover over this Easter weekend,” Schindler attorney David Gibbs III said. He filed an emergency petition arguing that a Pinellas County judge ignored new evidence of Schiavo’s wishes and her medical condition.
Meanwhile, the Schindlers urged Michael Schiavo to allow his wife to receive the sacrament of communion at sundown Saturday – when Catholics begin celebrating their holiest feast of the year.
“Please, Michael. Have compassion,” said Paul O’Donnell, a Roman Catholic Franciscan monk and a spokesman for the Schindler family. It was not immediately clear Saturday evening whether the request was granted.
Pinellas Circuit Judge George Greer and the state’s high court rejected the family’s latest motion Saturday. The family claimed Schiavo tried to say “I want to live” hours before her tube was removed, saying “AHHHHH” and “WAAAAAAA” when asked to repeat the phrase.
Doctors have said her previous utterances weren’t speech, but were involuntary moans consistent with someone in a vegetative state. Greer agreed.
Contrary to Michael Schiavo and court-appointed doctors, the Schindlers believe their daughter could improve and say she laughs, cries, responds to them and tries to talk.
Dehydration was taking its toll on Terri Schiavo, but after visiting her inside the hospice Saturday afternoon, her father said she was “doing remarkably well under the circumstances.”
“She has put up a tremendous battle to live. She’s not throwing in the towel,” Bob Schindler said.
George Felos, attorney for Michael Schiavo, insisted that Terri Schiavo’s condition was stable and that death “is not imminent.” He denied reports by the parents’ attorneys that her tongue and eyes were bleeding.
“She is calm. She is peaceful. She is resting comfortably,” Felos told reporters Saturday as four sheriff’s deputies stood by to protect him.
Bobby Schindler called Felos’ assessment “sick” and “heinous” and challenged him to allow videos and photos of his sister to be released. Felos said earlier Saturday that allowing video recording inside Terri Schiavo’s room would violate her privacy.
Outside the hospice, about 60 protesters maintained a subdued vigil and, like her parents, hoped for a miracle.
“Things are all done in God’s timing,” said David Vogel, a 47-year-old Steubenville, Ohio, musician who was arrested for trespassing last week when he tried to enter the hospice to take water to Terri Schiavo. “Does he have his hand upon this? Oh, yeah. The parallels are there with what happened to Jesus Christ. He was condemned to death, an innocent man. She’s an innocent woman.”
Schiavo was reared in the Roman Catholic church and her parents have made heavy use of her faith as the basis for the numerous appeals to reinsert the feeding tube that was removed more than a week ago.
The Schindlers have argued, for instance, that she should be spared based on statements by Pope John Paul II that people in vegetative states have a right to nutrition and hydration.
They say Terri would have obeyed the pope and would not choose to have her tube removed.
That argument was rebuffed in the state courts.
Terri Schiavo has been without food and water longer than she was in 2003, when the tube was removed for six days before Bush pushed through a law to have it reinserted. The law was later thrown out by the state Supreme Court.
Many supporters of the Schindlers say the governor could simply ignore the courts and take emergency custody of Schiavo. But Bush, himself a convert to Roman Catholicism, has said he’s not willing to go beyond the boundaries of his powers.
Terri Schiavo suffered brain damage in 1990 when her heart stopped briefly from a chemical imbalance believed to have been brought on by an eating disorder. She left no living will.
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Associated Press writers Mike Schneider and Allen Breed contributed to this report.