Excuse me, Mr. Schiavo, I just have one more question...
Posted on 03/27/2005 6:31:02 AM PST by gesully
When did Michael Schiavo first start trying to kill Terri? Mary Mostert March 23, 2005
Because I try to track down facts before I write about a subject, I have not written about Terri Schiavo and the battle over her condition. What actually happened to Terri back in 1990 that caused her to be the topic of world conversation today? Before we decide to permanently dispose of her, shouldn't we first find out how she got into this predicament?
Well, she collapsed, we are told by her husband Michael, in 1990 and was taken to the hospital . Some stories say she had a heart attack. Other stories, including a medical report by Dr. William Hammesfahr, a world-reknowned neurologist, totally refute any heart attack. Hammesfahr reported:
"Ms Schiavo was in her usual state of good health until 2/25/90, when her husband reported that he was awakened from sleep approximately 6 Am by her falling. He reports that she was unresponsive. "Paramedics were called, and aggressive resuscitation was performed with 7 defibrillations en route.
"In the Emergency Room, a possible diagnosis of heart attack was briefly entertained, but then dismissed after blood chemistries and serial EKG's did not show evidence of a heart attack."
Some reports guess that she collapsed due to an effort to lose weight — although, she was not at the time overweight. Hammesfahr's report stated:
"The patient had a difficult hospital course with the development of poorly controlled seizures and prolonged coma state requiring, for a time, ventilator support. However, the staff noted improvement, and it was recommended by several physicians that she be discharged to an intensive rehabilitation center."
In 1992, Michael Schiavo sued for malpractice and won over a $1 million. He was personally awarded $300,000 for his "loss" and $700,000 for Terri's rehabilitation and care for the rest of her natural life. However, the therapy, after the award, was not approved by Michael Schiavo and she was confined to a nursing home after the settlement.
It was after the settlement that Michael first claimed that Terri had previously stated that she didn't want to be kept alive by artificial means — a statement he never mentioned during the malpractice trial. He has never produced any written proof that Terri said that.
Beginning almost immediately after receiving the malpractice funds, Michael Schiavo, as Terri's legal guardian, began to refuse approval for ANY therapy or rehabilitation efforts and she has been confined to bed.
Since 1995, Michael Schiavo has lived openly with a girlfriend, Jodi Centonze, with whom he has two children, while remaining legally married to Terri, as well as being her legal her guardian.
In 1998, Michael Schiavo petitioned the court to have Terri's feeding tube removed. In 2003, Michael Schiavo's attorneys reported that the trust fund was down to $50,000, with more than $430,000 going to "pay for court costs associated with her husband's legal battle to remove his wife's feeding tube." Meanwhile, Medicaid helps to pay Terri's $5,000-a-month nursing costs at a hospice in Pinellas Park, Florida. 13
During this time period, Terri's parents have attempted to gain guardianship over their daughter. During the legal battles that have ensued, in 2003 a deposition was taken from Dr. William Campbell Walker, a radiologist, concerning a bone scan the hospital did on Terri in 1991. That bone scan revealed what Dr. Walker reported at the time as "compression fracture in the 19 vertebral body of the spine."
For seven years as Terri has been consistently denied rehabilitation treatment that, according to several doctors, would have significantly improved her chances of recovery, Michael spent her money awarded for her therapy on lawyers trying to get her starved to death. Several doctors pointed out, including Dr. Hammesfahr, that Terri not only CAN swallow on her own, but frequently DOES swallow and pictures shown clearly indicate, as Hammesfahr and other testify, that she can and does respond to voice commands and particularly to her parents.
This would indicate that she is NOT in what the State of Florida defines as a "vegetative" state. It also makes me wonder, now that the feeding tube is removed, if any effort to help her swallow water or food is being made today, or whether under the court order spoon feeding also has been outlawed? Terri's parents, if they just came and got her and took her home, I guess would be arrested for kidnapping under Florida's legal system.
At this point, the legal system of Florida has, in the words of one legal observer, created the "framework for legal euthanasia." Of course, euthanasia is technically the practice of killing someone painlessly because they prefer death to life for whatever reason. I would not classify starvation as a "painless" way to die.
Dr. Hammesfahr stated in his report:
"In the spring of 2000, three physicians, including Dr. Jay Carpenter, who is a former Chief of Medicine at Morton Plant Hospital, filed affidavits after observing Ms. Schiavo. All three physicians stated that it is visually apparent that Ms Schiavo is able to swallow and, in fact, does swallow her own saliva.
"The patient continued with no physical therapy, communication or speech therapy, or routine medical screening evaluations and treatment such as dental care, mammography, gynecological exams or pap smears during this time."
Under these conditions and questions, it would appear to me that Terri SHOULD have a totally different guardian, such as her parents, until some questions are answered about the spinal and other injuries that appeared on her bone scan a decade ago. Why is it that a man who clearly wants his wife dead, cannot explain how she actually got into the state she is in, or produce ANY proof, other than his unsubstantiated words, that she would want to die, is being unquestioningly defended by the Florida courts?
Increasingly, it appears to me, that Terri would have gotten better care had her husband never won that malpractice suit and been given $1 million to spend — much of it on lawyers to legally kill off his wife.
It all makes me wonder just when Michael Schiavo made his first effort to kill Terri? Was it before or after she ended up in the hospital with an unexplained problem that put her in a coma?
Mary Mostert is a nationally-respected political writer. She was one of the first female political commentators to be published in a major metropolitan newspaper in the 1960s. After working in President Lyndon Johnson's failed War on Poverty programs in New York state, she became a Republican. She ran, unsuccessfully, for the New York State Senate and became campaign manager for a number of candidates. She once served as the secretary of "Positive Action NOW!"--a South African women's group that sought to reduce the hostility among South Africa's various racial, religious, and political groups.
In recent years, Mary has researched, written, and edited articles for national talk show host Michael Reagan's Information Interchange on the Internet, and for The REAGAN MONITOR, a monthly newsletter that provides in-depth information on key issues. Her book, COMING HOME - Families Can Stop the Unraveling of America," was published in 1996 by Gold Leaf Press. Mary maintains a political media site, Banner of Liberty. She can be contacted at mary@bannerofliberty.com . Click here for more information.
They tried. Michael got the malpractice award Nov 92. He stopped all therapy & put a DNR on her chart 3 months later - Feb 93. In Aug 93 he tried to stop treatment for a life-threatening infection, and in Sep 93 the Schindlers petitioned the court to have him removed as guardian. The sut was dismissed in Feb 94.
They tried again with Greer and were again denied.
There's lots of that to go around.
Michael Schiavo's star witness was a neurologist named Ronald Cranford. He testified that Terri was indeed in a PVS and Greer accepted his testimony as convincing. Problem is, he's a well-known euthanasia who is a professional witness in cases like this, always testifying that patients are in a PVS.
One of his patients, Robert Wendland, could operate his own wheelchair and pick up colored blocks correctly, but that didn't stop Cranford from testifying to his PVS state. Fortunately the CA Supreme Court didn't buy it.
He's had patients recover from PVS after he's diagnosed them with it. And he openly admits that he doesn't feel anyone should have a feeding tube, says that a spoon is often artificial life support, and doesn't believe advanced alzheimers patients or PVS patients have constitutional rights.
Should he have been trusted as a credible witness in this case?
Hospice of the Florida Suncoast is currently under federal investigation for just that.
From the article -
According to records The Empire Journal has obtained from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the federal agency has initiated collection procedures against the Hospice of Florida Suncoast to recover some $14.8 million which they say was unlawfully paid to the hospice as a result of fraudulent claims made for Medicare reimbursement for patients that were not terminally ill and therefore not eligible for hospice care. According to the 2004 annual report of HHS filed Dec.31, 2004, the agency has initiated collection procedures against the hospice.
The federal agency has been trying to recover the Medicare overpayments made to the hospice since May, 1997 at the time when Felos was chairman of the board.
The Office of Inspector General (OIG) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services conducted an audit of the Hospice of Florida Suncoast Inc. during 1995. The objective of the review was to evaluate hospice eligibility determinations for beneficiaries that remained in hospice care more than 120 days. OIG also determined the amount of payments made to the hospice for those Medicare beneficiaries that did not meet the Medicare reimbursement requirements.
Cremation chosen by Michael Schaivo.......hmmmmmmmmmm
Then we agree. :)
Felos? And the plot thickens.
Didn't you know he was chairman of the hospice board? He resigned after taking Michael Schiavo's case (though apparently, not immediately), and is the reason Terri ended up in that hospice in the first place.
He also was instrumental in lobbying FL legislators to revise the "end of life" statutes in 1999 to include feeding tubes as life support and PVS as reason to remove them, thereby allowing Michael Schiavo's petition legal standing.
There are so many intersecting relationships to unravel and dots to connect that the mind just boggles.
We have the live in's name-maybe someone could appeal to her senses as a mother?
We have the live in's name-maybe someone could appeal to her senses as a mother?
And still he gets away with killing her? I would think Gov Bush could have used that against Felos to save Terri in some way.
We have the live in's name-maybe someone could appeal to her senses as a mother?
Punk Greer is a probate judge. Can you believe a punk probate judge decided Terri Schiavo must die? A punk probate judge gave her a death sentence
Thank you for your input. About Terri supposedly having low potassium, did she exercise a lot?
Most peculiar rulings this judge Greer seems to have. Thanks for input. This case gets more curiouser by the minute.
Don't blame Jeb Bush. Take a look in the mirror. If folks like you had accepted the responsibility for saving Terri, millions would have marched on Washington and Florida demanded that she be saved, and she would have been saved. But all you idiots do is bad mouth the Governor, while you sit snug bitching in your cozy corner. Get a life, my friend, and either do something yourself, or just shut your mouth. I am just sick and tired of Freepers on this site that moan and groan about others and do absolutely nothing themselves. The death of the innocent Ms. Schiavo rests clearly not on your babbling mouth, but on your do-nothing hands!
Dont know but she drank 13 or so glasses of ice tea a day. If she took a diuretic her potassium wouldl be low. And if she were vomiting alot or a bulemic.
I don't know about that night.
No. There's much more here than meets the eye.
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