Hate Mail, Threats Go to Man With Judge's Name (Terri Shiavo case)

ST. PETERSBURG -- A judge named George Greer has ordered the removal of the feeding tube keeping brain-damaged Terri Schiavo alive.

A George Greer who isn't the judge wants people to stop calling him to complain.

"The first call I got was about three years ago," said Greer, 79, a St. Petersburg retiree who is listed in the phone book but has no connection to the case. "Now they're sending me hate mail, enough to make me concerned."

Emotions are running high among some of the right-to-life advocates who oppose ending Terri Schiavo's life by removing her feeding tube, an act some equate to murder. As the Oct. 15 date for the tube's removal approaches, a torrent of letters, emails and calls have flooded anyone connected to the case.

Not all those messages are polite. A few have been downright menacing. Lawyers involved in the case disagree about whether anyone needs to be worried about their security.

"We get a fairly steady stream of very unsavory e-mails and letters," said attorney George Felos, who represents Terri Schiavo's husband, Michael Schiavo, and has won court approval to withdraw the feeding tube.

"I feel uncomfortable talking about it," he said. "By putting attention on it, it may encourage people. We do receive this sort of stuff. And we are security conscious."

In a recent court filing, Felos said the inflammatory language used by the lawyer representing Terri Schiavo's parents, who oppose ending their daughter's life, "foster(s) a climate of violence."

"Characterizing one side in litigation as the defender of God and the other as anti-God is an attempt to inflame fanatic elements who believe that the ends justify the means when one is doing `God's will,' " Felos wrote.

Attorney Pat Anderson, who represents Terri Schiavo's parents, said Felos' worries are a figment of an overactive imagination.

"There has been nothing that I have seen coming across my computer screen that is of a threatening nature," Anderson said. "There's a lot of outrage. But I haven't seen evidence of anyone involved with violent tendencies. If I can believe my emails, I know there are thousands of people praying for the judge and Michael Schiavo."

In 2000, a woman called the nursing home where Terri Schiavo lived and, according an administrator, said, "I am going to kill the judge and Michael, and if anything happens to Terri, I will kill you."

A judge ordered a guard posted outside Terri Schiavo's room and assigned one to her husband. Felos refused to say whether the guards are still around.

The Pinellas Sheriff's Office said it has not investigated or received any threats against anyone involved in the case since.

Take this e-mail sent to Judge Greer on Sept. 21 by someone named Noelle: "If (Schiavo) dies because of you, I HOPE THAT YOU ----- DIE AND ROT IN HELL. YOU DON'T DESERVE TO LIVE IF YOU KILL HER ... I HOPE TO GOD THAT YOU CHANGE YOUR MIND. YOU BETTER."

Ron Stuart, a spokesman for Pinellas-Pasco courts, said the judge has probably received dozens of e-mails. And Stuart himself has fielded about 40 calls in recent weeks.

Stuart said the courts would not comment on security precautions. Felos and the Pinellas Park hospice where Terri Schiavo lives also refused to discuss security. Michael Schiavo will not comment.

Stuart said many of the calls to the courts come from people living out of state associated with the Christian right.

Bob Schindler, Terri Schiavo's father, said he has received more than 8,200 e-mails in the last several years. In all of that, he said only half a dozen would be characterized as disturbing.

"A lot of this gets blown completely out of proportion," Schindler said, referring to Felos' fears.

In Missouri, the case of braindamaged Nancy Cruzan drew protesters after her parents won a court order to remove her feeding tube in 1990. Cruzan died 12 days later.

A group of religious activists stormed the hospital where Cruzan was located in an effort to force feed her. They reached the second floor before police stopped them.

"That's part of how our society works," said attorney Bill Colby, who represented the parents. "When we're trying to make social policy with people of strong beliefs on all sides, we should never forget that people with regular lives are in the middle of the social debate."

Six years after Nancy Cruzan's death, her father committed suicide. Dr. Steven Miles, professor of medicine at the Center for Bioethics at the University of Minnesota, said he thinks the constant hounding by pro-life critics took a toll.

Picketers protested at the hospital constantly, he said. The father was called a murderer.

"By the time I met him, he was just a shell of a man for having gone through this," said Miles.

Felos, the lawyer representing Michael Schiavo, said he often speaks to groups about right-todie issues. But he said he recently stopped because of disruptions by Schindler supporters.

At one church event recently, someone put a flier under car windshields that said, "Get your DEATH CONTRACT here! No one spared, guaranteed!"

9PM EST

Radio program Wednesday night on Schiavo case featuring Ron Panzer, Vickie Travis and Nancy Valko-see website

Pro-Death Judge "Greer Denies Motion Allowing Terri Schiavo to Eat on Her Own"

Bob Schindler - father of Terri Schiavo will be co-hosting a 2-hour radio broadcast
with other guest speakers (below) who will chime in on this subject.

Ron Panzer, Vickie Travis, and Nancy Valko - will join Mr. Schindler on the broadcast.

Please distribute this email broadcast far and wide - tune in, educate yourself, and participate. We encourage your phone calls to our guests and in specifc to Mr. Schindler.

Please see information on our website on how you can also talk to the guests FREE long distance,
using Yahoo! Msgr.

TIME > 9:00 PM - Eastern Standard Time. (9-11 PM)
GO HERE > http://www.highway2health.net

CALL-IN LINE: (321) 984-4505

Highway 2 Health Radio Broadcast - with Dr. Sal Martingano & Peter Kawaja, co-hosts.

Ron Panzer

President, Hospice Patients Alliance

http://www.hospicepatients.org

Vickie Travis
Former Caregiver and Eldest Daughter
of Adam Wesley Arnold
http://www.kaiserpapers.org
Board Secretary Hospice Patients Alliance
http://www.hospicepatients.org/
Vickie@kaiserpapers.org
Kaiser looks good on paper - but then so did Communism - A Kaiser observer

Nancy Guilfoy Valko, RN
A nurse for 35 years, working mainly in oncology, home health/hospice, hemodialysis and several kinds of ICUs, including trauma, currently full-time nurse in an ICU, recent hour-long program on the Terri Schiavo case for Wisconsin NPR, written for publications, both religious and secular, doing medical news analysis articles for the National Catholic Register. Spokesperson for the National Association of Prolife Nurses (http://www.nursesforlife.org president of Missouri Nurses for Life and a contributing editor for Voices, the magazine of Women for Faith and Family (www.wf-f.org)

Nancy Valko, a leading pro-life nurse who monitors end-of-life issues, says the Schiavo case should be a warning to the pro-life community that some want to deny rehabilitative care to the disabled or those with incurable diseases.

"The importance of saving Terri cannot be overestimated," Valko explained. "Not only for her but also to brake the movement to get rid of people with severe brain injuries or conditions by withdrawal of basic medical care, futility and other 'end of life' policies, inadequate insurance coverage for rehab services and even non-heart-beating organ donation."

Pro-Death Judge] "Greer Denies Motion Allowing Terri Schiavo to Eat on Her Own"
[for now]
by Steven Ertelt LifeNews.com Editor September 14, 2003
read it online at: http://www.lifenews.com/bio48.html
or read it below:
[beginning of article]
Clearwater, FL (LifeNews.com) -- On Monday, Circuit Court Judge George Greer told Terri Schiavo's parents that their motion to allow Terri to learn to eat on her own prior to the removal of her feeding tube would not be granted -- at least not now.

Greer denied the motion on a legal technicality, saying the family's attorney had not used the proper legal means to advance the motion and that the issue of allowing Terri to eat on her own would be decided later this week.

Greer is considering whether or not to allow Terri to have rehabilitative care. That's been a sticking point for the family who say that Michael Schiavo, Terri's husband, has denied her such medical help.

The Schindlers have doctors who believe she could be rehabilitated with new and aggressive therapy.

George Felos, the euthanasia crusader who is Michael's attorney, told Greer that doctors he has consulted with have testified that Terri is capable of swallowing her saliva. However, if given water or pureed food, Felos says Terri will choke on it and the blockage could lead to pneumonia.

The motion called for delaying removal of the feeding tube until the transition has been completed and Terri can eat on her own.

"The court must give her a chance to transition to nutrition by mouth," Anderson said, adding that Terri "has never been given the chance to get better. She's been treated as if she's already dead."

Anderson said if Greer withdraws the feeding tube without allowing Terri a chance to eat on her own, he is violating Florida law.

Tom Marzen, a pro-life attorney and expert on euthanasia who has been following the case, tells LifeNews.com, "the next question is whether anyone will even try to feed and hydrate Terri by mouth after the tube is removed if she can possibly swallow successfully. If not, then can't we abandon any pretense that this case involves anything other than fulfilling a death wish?"

Michael was awarded $750,000 in a malpractice lawsuit that was supposed to be used in part on rehab care for Terri. Her parents say only a small amount of the funds has been used this far.

Nancy Valko, a leading pro-life nurse who monitors end-of-life issues, says the Schiavo case should be a warning to the pro-life community that some want to deny rehabilitative care to the disabled or those with incurable diseases.

"The importance of saving Terri cannot be overestimated," Valko explained. "Not only for her but also to brake the movement to get rid of people with severe brain injuries or conditions by withdrawal of basic medical care, futility and other 'end of life' policies, inadequate insurance coverage for rehab services and even non-heart-beating organ donation."

[end of article]

Vickie Travis
http://www.kaiserpapers.org
Board Secretary Hospice Patients Alliance
http://www.hospicepatients.org/
Vickie@kaiserpapers.org
Kaiser looks good on paper - but then so did Communism - A Kaiser observer

A Kaiser Permanente Case Prosecuted by the L.A. District Attorney (unsuccessfully)

read it online at:

http://www.ascensionhealth.org/ethics/public/cases/case7.asp

or read it below:

[beginning of article]

Case of: Barber-Nejdl (Clarence Herbert)

Doctors Nejdl and Barber were charged with murder and conspiracy to commit murder following the death of Clarence Herbert. Herbert went into cardiac arrest following routine surgery. After being on a respirator for three days, the doctors concluded that Herbert would not recover consciousness. His family consented to removal of the respirator; Herbert continued to breathe on his own. After two more days, and with family consent, the patient’s intravenous lines providing nutrition and fluids were removed. The patient died several days later. Charges against Nejdl and Barber were eventually dismissed. The court stated that in the case of a "permanently unconscious patient," decisions should be based on whether potential benefits outweigh the expected burdens. The court also found that in the absence of legislation to the contrary, family members could act as appropriate surrogate decision-makers even if they are not legal guardians. [Source: 195 Cal. Rptr. 484 (1983).]

http://members.tripod.com/american_almanac/hmousele.htm

A nurse's testimony led to the Los Angeles County prosecutor attempting to bring murder charges against the doctors. While the case was not successful, what was discovered during the investigation and scandal, was the role of Kaiser's policies. Kaiser's policies dictated that the doctors were in danger of losing their year-end bonuses for cost-cutting if they had kept

him alive!

www.highway2health.net

DO NOT BE FASHIONABLY LATE FOR THE BROADCAST !

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