'Dead' man shocks family by asking for a drink

The Sunday Times ^ | January 26, 2003 | Bruce Johnston

[MadIvan]

A Sicilian man who had been pronounced dead by doctors startled relatives by sitting up just before he was to be put into his coffin and demanding a glass of water.

Minutes later 79-year-old Roberto De Simone, from Palermo, was rushed back to the Vincenzo Cervello hospital in the Sicilian capital, where 12 hours earlier doctors said he had died.

His wife and children, who had been praying over what they believed to be his corpse, declared his recovery to be a miracle. Hospital staff admit that they are baffled by his revival.

Mr De Simone himself was more enigmatic. "Old Uncle Giuseppe hasn't got me yet. Both he and paradise can wait," he is said to have declared in a quavering voice on his re-admission to hospital.

A family friend told The Telegraph that the comment was a reference to a late relation with whom Mr De Simone had never been on good terms. It was customary in Sicily, the friend said, for people to talk of the day they would die as being "taken by the Lord - but in Roberto's case, he was over the moon to find that he had not been taken by his eternal enemy, Uncle Giuseppe".

Details of the retired council employee's remarkable recovery were last week gripping locals who have an irresistible fascination with the afterlife.

Relatives said that after feeling unwell at his home in Palermo, Mr De Simone had been taken to the hospital the previous week. There he suffered a serious heart attack.

Doctors managed to restart his heart with an adrenaline injection but Donald Trozzi, his son-in-law, a policeman from Pescara, in mainland Italy, said: "At 3.30am, the doctors told us that my father-in-law had entered a coma and that later there had been brain death."

In an effort to spare the grieving family members the usual red tape that follows deaths in Italian hospitals, doctors arranged for Mr De Simone - whose heart was still beating - to be discharged as if he were still alive. He was sent home in an ambulance.

There, his body was laid out on a bed, the undertaker was sent for and his Sunday best was being readied to dress him for his coffin. As his daughters Rosaria and Anna sat with other friends and relations weeping over his corpse, the nearly-departed Mr De Simone opened his eyes and in a plaintive voice said: "I'd like some water, please. You know, I'm awfully thirsty."

The women cried that it was a miracle and Mr De Simone was rushed back to the hospital, where he is now recovering from "serious respiratory problems".

The family friend told The Telegraph: "The family is understandably very tired and feeling fragile, and have asked to be left in peace."

[MadIvan]

I guess he was only stunned.

Regards, Ivan

[MadIvan]

Bump!

[FReepaholic]

I grew up in the South where I recall people used to "sit up with the dead" for several days.

I never knew why. Maybe it was in case the dead woke up like this guy did.

[AK2KX]

Yep, that's why it's called a "wake"

freegards...

[sd-joe]

My God. Don't they practice embalming in Italy? Do they just throw bodies into the ground? This is hard to believe.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

I am reminded of the story of a man who was at his wife's funeral. As the pall bearers were carrying the casket out of the church, they bumped it against a support beam. Suddenly, there was a knocking sound emanating from the coffin. They opened it up and found the woman very much alive. She lived for another 12 years, but finally expired. Once again, the funeral was held, at the very same same church. As the pall bearers carried out the casket, the husband warned them,
"Watch out for that beam."

[dixiechick2000]

It's a good thing he wasn't an organ donor.

[Republic of Texas]

Eeee's jus' sleeping!

No e's not!

[ABG(anybody but Gore)]

He's pinin' for the fjords!

[MadIvan]

He's pinin' for the fjords!

Now what kind of talk is that. How come he fell flat on his back the moment I got him home? ;)

Regards, Ivan

[Amelia]

In an effort to spare the grieving family members the usual red tape that follows deaths in Italian hospitals, doctors arranged for Mr De Simone - whose heart was still beating - to be discharged as if he were still alive. He was sent home in an ambulance.

There, his body was laid out on a bed, the undertaker was sent for and his Sunday best was being readied to dress him for his coffin.

They were going to bury him with his heart still beating? Weird.

[PaulJ]

Or maybe he was just pining for the fjords.

[wingnuts'nbolts]

During the Victorian era when death reached the heights of being the "in" thing, people were so afraid of being buried alive, because it happened, they rigged their coffins with bells that rang above ground to notify the mourners of life below ground. It became the "in" thing when Albert, Queen Victoria's Consort, died and left her to a life of perpetual mourning. Monuments became positively necessary and vied with each other for grandeur and status. The Queen was petrified that Albert was really alive after burial and the fear caught on. It became fashionable to provide an out. Victorians were obsessed with death and the fear of death.

[Mr. Mulliner]

Is that how the term "dead ringer" came about?

[Cicero]

"Brain death" is NOT the same thing as death. It's a convenient fiction, so hospitals can clear out inconvenient people or harvest their organs. The body doesn't really die until the heart stops beating and the cells die and cool.

This guy is very lucky to have undergone "brain death" in an Italian hospital, where they let him go home to die in peace and at less expense to the family.

[Cvengr]

I wonder what people would say if he had laid in the street for three days and then rose up.

[Cindy]

This is a totally credible story and it's great. Prayer is powerful. AMEN!

[eccentric]

"Prevent burial of the living: Embalm!"

[FBD]

Dr Kevorkian will be paying this guy a visit, I'm sure...
Where is Dr. Death these days, anyway?

[Thinkin' Gal]

My God. Don't they practice embalming in Italy? Do they just throw bodies into the ground?

Tourist enjoying a visit to the catacombs of Palermo.