Terri Schiavo passes away Death comes after courts repeatedly ruled against parents BREAKING NEWS MSNBC staff and news service reports Updated: 11:06 a.m. ET March 31, 2005PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - Nearly two weeks after a court ordered her feeding tube removed, and after multiple, failed attempts by her parents to get the order lifted, Terri Schiavo passed away on Thursday at the age of 41. Schiavo died at the Pinellas Park hospice where she lay for years while her husband and her parents fought over her fate in the nation’s most bitter — and most heavily litigated — right-to-die dispute. The family battle over whether to keep her alive galvanized the nation over the last month, with even President Bush and Congress weighing in. The case focused national attention on living wills, since Schiavo left no written instructions in case she became disabled. The case had spent seven years winding its way through the courts, with Terri Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, repeatedly on the losing end. They have been at odds with their son-in-law, Michael Schiavo, who consistently won legal battles by arguing that his wife would not have wanted to live in her condition. Schiavo suffered severe brain damage in 1990 after her heart stopped because of a chemical imbalance that was believed to have been brought on an eating disorder. Court-appointed doctors ruled she was in a persistent vegetative state, with no real consciousness or chance of recovery. Parents weren't present Brother Paul O’Donnell, an adviser to the Schindlers, said the parents and their two other children “were denied access at the moment of her death. They’ve been requesting, as you know, for the last hour to try to be in there and they were denied access by Michael Schiavo. They are in there now, praying at her bedside.” After the tube that supplied a nutrient solution was disconnected on March 18, protesters streamed into Pinellas Park to keep vigil outside her hospice, with many arrested as they tried to bring her food and water. The Vatican likened the removal of her feeding tube to capital punishment for an innocent woman. The Schindlers pleaded for their daughter’s life, calling the removal of the tube “judicial homicide.” Dawn Kozsey, a musician who was among those outside Schiavo’s hospice, wept when she learned of the woman’s death. “Words cannot express the rage I feel,” she said. “Is my heart broken for this? Yes.” Politicians and courts Although several right-to-die cases have been fought in the courts across the nation in recent years, none had been this public, drawn-out and bitter. Six times, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene. Schiavo’s fate was debated on the floor of Congress and by President Bush, who signed an extraordinary bill on March 21 that let federal judges review her case. “In extraordinary circumstances like this, it is wise to always err on the side of life,” the president said. But federal courts refused again and again to overturn the central ruling by Pinellas County Circuit Judge George Greer, who said Michael Schiavo had convinced him that Terri Schiavo would not have wanted to be kept alive by extraordinary means. At a federal appeals court in Atlanta, one judge rebuked the White House and lawmakers Wednesday for acting “in a manner demonstrably at odds with our Founding Fathers’ blueprint for the governance of a free people — our Constitution.” “Any further action by our court or the district court would be improper,” wrote Judge Stanley Birch Jr., appointed by President Bush’s father.
Not everyone can read that. C'mon Clutch!!! Two week trial run!!! BTW, RIP Terry Schiavo. No matter what side of the argument one was on, it's still sad to see someone lose their life.
