Police 'Showdown' Averted ['Team of State Agents Were En Route to Seize Terri']

Miami Herald ^ | Sat, Mar. 26, 2005 | CAROL MARBIN MILLER

[West Coast Conservative]

Hours after a judge ordered that Terri Schiavo was not to be removed from her hospice, a team of state agents were en route to seize her and have her feeding tube reinserted -- but they stopped short when local police told them they would enforce the judge's order, The Herald has learned.

Agents of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement told police in Pinellas Park, the small town where Schiavo lies at Hospice Woodside, on Thursday that they were on the way to take her to a hospital to resume her feeding.

For a brief period, local police, who have officers at the hospice to keep protesters out, prepared for what sources called ``a showdown.''

In the end, the squad from the FDLE and the Department of Children & Families backed down, apparently concerned about confronting local police outside the hospice.

''We told them that unless they had the judge with them when they came, they were not going to get in,'' said a source with the local police.

''The FDLE called to say they were en route to the scene,'' said an official with the city police who requested anonymity. ``When the sheriff's department and our department told them they could not enforce their order, they backed off.''

The incident,known only to a few and related to The Herald by three different sources involved in Thursday's events, underscores the intense emotion and murky legal terrain that the Schiavo case has created. It also shows that agencies answering directly to Gov. Jeb Bush had planned to use a wrinkle in Florida law that would have allowed them to legally get around the judge's order. The exception in the law allows public agencies to freeze a judge's order whenever an agency appeals it.

[Gondring]

My emphasis added, of course...

Terri's girlfriend is Cindy Shook.
[...]
Get off the pot and try to convince someone else who doesn't know about this case.

Let's see... you don't even know who Cindy Shook is, and you're claiming to know about this case? Ha!

[...] see if Michael needs any help. Perhaps you can pull weeds in his garden [...]

Hmm... Pot...Weed... Are you trying to tell us something about maybe why can't keep the case straight? ;-)

[LadyDoc]

do me a favour: When you ping us, don't put such a long long list of stuff on your reply. Just ping us and say: Check list of stuff to do.

I don't have broad band anymore

[PeoplesRepublicOfWashington]

Perhaps I'm certifiably nuts, but you are certifiably unprincipled and unAmerican.

[Apogee]

If Mrs. Schiavo were to ask for water, grab a burger, etc., she would not be stopped. What Greer has ordered is that nobody try to force-feed her, via tube or mouth. She is to be allowed to pass without interference.

~~~~~~~~~~~~
Guess folks better be careful about nourishing any patient who is unable to speak for a day or two, eh?
Or perhaps one can raise the defense, "He did not ask me for water?"