Posted on 09/01/2005 9:51:24 AM PDT by NYer
TAMPA BAY, August 31, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Ten year-old Joshua Heldreth, the eldest of eight children, was arrested on Good Friday of this year for trespassing while attempting to bring a drink of water to Miss Terri Schaivo. Days later Schiavo died of intentional dehydration. In court Joshua pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 hours of community service and ordered to write an apology for his actions.
The boy whose arrest photo was splashed on front pages of newspapers across the nation wrote in his apology letter, "I was arrested on Good Friday for trespassing on the hospice center's property . . . Not giving Mrs. Shiavo (sic) food or water was wrong. The reason I had to go on your property was because Jesus would do the same thing. It made me sad that she was so thirsty and it made Jesus sad too. I knew she would die without water and I am called by Jesus to be a defender of the defenceless. So I had to go on your property to try to bring her a drink."
Joshua added, "I am sorry that you didn't like that and wouldn't allow me to help save her life and one day you will have to tell God why. I won't be able to help you then like I tried to help her. I will pray for you every day . . ."
LifeSiteNews.com caught up with Joshua's father Scott Heldreth today. Scott told LifeSiteNews.com he is very proud of his son. "My son has amazed me through this whole thing," said Heldreth. The proud father said it was his son's own initiative to attempt to give the starving woman a glass of water, and despite the warning of his parents that he'd be arrested, the boy insisted. "He was the one who begged us to go down, because he wanted to give her a glass of water . . . We explained that police will never let you help . . . you'll be arrested, but he went anyways."
Pro-life leader Rev. Flip Benham of Operation Save America told LifeSiteNews.com that the whole pro-life movement shares Heldreth's pride in his son. Benham recalls the reaction of Heldreth on Good Friday as he watched his son being arrested: "When that all took place Scott was weeping, this father was weeping tears of joy seeing his son not only talk the Christian talk but walk the walk."
While the apology letter has been submitted, Heldreth told LifeSiteNews.com he's not completely sure it will be accepted.
See Joshua's full handwritten apology letter here:
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005_docs/JoshuaApolog...
This little fellow has a VERY bright future ahead of him.
I would certainly hope that this young man got his values from his parents. That's usually the way it works. Where do you kids get their values? From the street? Or worse, from public schools?
I like this kid.
Maybe the Florida GOP can run him against Bill Nelson.
Nothing but net.......Great shot
lots of liberals in Florida.....too many liberals in California....like my own home state the Peoples Republic of NY.
but don't damn a state better than your own.
It is appalling that Pinellas County would make a child apologize for being a good samaritan!
That's my point. I don't consider Florida better than my own...not on this issue.
As Martin Katz said, what kind of society are we when we use armed guards to prevent a mother from putting water on the lips of her dying child.
See my last post. Child was under duress. Child knows that Pinellas County has KILLER JUDGES. The child will know he told a lie for the rest of his life. Guess he won't have any faith in a justice system that kills people and makes children PERJURE THEMSELVES.
Did you sign up today just to assure us that this boy didn't write his own "apology"?
I agree. He's a great guy, has the right values.
"In court Joshua pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 hours of community service and ordered to write an apology for his actions"
This goes BEYOND sad. My BIGGEST problem with the whole case was the judge FORBIDDING ice, water to be given to Terri. If they wanted to withhold her feeding tube...I guess that was one thing. But to withhold water given by natural means is what makes this so heinous. Had they given her water, she might have swallowed on her own...which Michael Shiavo couldn't have! If she had not been able to take water by mouth, then at least she would have had her lips moistened and she would have been more comfortable. And one could say that she was not being kept alive artifically, BUT ALSO that she wasn't denied basic human rights.
In that Kangaroo court, "community service" is probably defined as euthanizing unwanted animals at the pound....
There is no way in hell that I would set foot (or spend dollars) in Pinellas County.
GOP's redness is over. They won't even talk to Terri supporters. They hang up on them and take them off their email lists.
Precisely. And another poster on this thread has the gall to tell me that Florida is a "solid red state" and that everything there is just rosy.
And how precisely are you aware of that "fact"?
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