The following items are among many very frustrating circumstances that Terri Schiavo’s parents, brother, and sister consider to be abuses of Terri on the part of Michael Schiavo. As a parent, can you imagine having to just be a bystander while these abuses are inflicted on your child? All of these have been condoned by Judge Greer and the Pinellas County officials.
Denial of Therapy, Rehabilitation and Necessary Services
- FS 744.3215 Rights of persons determined incapacitated
- FS 837.021 Perjury by contradictory statements
Contrary to Michael Schiavo’s testimony, medical records indicate that after receiving the proceeds of the 1992 Medical Malpractice Trial totaling close to one million dollars not a single day of proper therapy or rehabilitation has been administered to Terri Schiavo, and Terri has been confined to a bed.
In fact, the spring of 1993, just several months after Michael Schiavo promised to provide life-long therapy and care for his wife, Michael revealed his first attempt to end Terri’s life testifying that he instructing caregivers not to treat Terri’s life-threatening infection. In 1995, Michael Schiavo again attempted to end Terri’s life in this manner by refusing Terri proper medical treatment.
In 1998, with close to eight hundred thousand dollars in Terri’s fund, Michael Schiavo petitioned the court to remove Terri’s feeding and hydration tube so that she would die.
Michael Schiavo is the inheritor of Terri’s Medical Trust.
Visitation Lists and Violation of Court Orders
In March 2000, Michael Schiavo, Terri Schiavo’s legal guardian, requested an emergency hearing in front of Judge George Greer, asking the court to severely restrict all family members and friends of the Schindler’s from visiting Terri.
The court agreed to restrict those that could visit Terri, and granted the Schindler family a fifteen minutes recess to create a visitors list. The court then allowed Michael Schiavo to deny/accept the visitors listed by the Schindler’s before any anyone could visit with Terri.
Further Visitation Restrictions
Subsequent to this, in a separate hearing, Michael Schiavo asked the court to again restrict visitations asking that the court to only allow those on the approved visitors list to visit Terri while in the company of Terri’s family.
This would take the place of the previous court order in which those on the approved visitation list could visit Terri, on their own schedule, without Terri’s family present.
The court approved this request.
Without Court Order
Additionally, Michael Schiavo has added and deleted visitors from the approved list without seeking court permission.
Recently, Michael Schiavo arbitrarily decided to remove several of Terri’s family members from the list because he felt they did not visit Terri regularly.
Many of Terri’s family members live out of the state of Florida and can only make occasionally trips to visit Terri.
On several occasions, the family has asked permission from Michael Schiavo to add individual friends and family members to visit with Terri. Michael Schiavo has denied this request each time.
Refusal to Fix or Replace Wheelchair
FS 744.3215 Right of persons determined incapacitated.
Records indicate that since 2000, and regardless of the requests by Terri Schiavo’s parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, to have Terri’s wheelchair repaired, Michael Schiavo, Terri Schiavo’s legal guardian, has refused to repair her wheelchair.
If Terri was permitted by Michael to leave her Hospice bedroom and go outside, the fact that Terri does not have a properly working wheelchair makes it very difficult to transport Terri in anything other than the bed, which is where her guardian instructs for Terri to spend most of her day.
Subsequently, for over four years, Terri’s family has been refused by Michael Schiavo the permission for Terri to be taken outside, or leave her room for any reason.
Denied Swallow Therapy
FS 744.3215 Rights of persons determined incapacitated
Contrary to what is reported by Michael Schiavo, Terri Schiavo’s legal guardian, and his attorney’s, records indicate that Terri Schiavo has not received a swallowing test to determine if she could swallow since sometime in 1992.
Terri’s parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, have the testimony of several physicians and have submitted additional affidavits to the court since the original January 2000 trial stating that, with proper therapy, Terri could be taught to not only eat food again, but also speak.
Furthermore, a speech therapist from the University of Chicago, Ms. Sara Green Mele, MS, CCC-SLP, submitted an affidavit in 2002 stating that after thoroughly studying tapes and reading Terri’s medical files strongly believes that Terri can be taught to once again swallow food, and also be taught to speak again. In fact, Ms. Mele believes that Terri is
communicating right now. Additionally, Ms. Mele stated the she has treated patients in worse condition than Terri that have been successfully re-taught to swallow and consume food.
Michael Schiavo has brought contradictory testimony from doctors to the court stating that Terri cannot swallow food. They claim that it would be very dangerous to see if Terri is able to eat and could cause her to aspirate, which could then lead to a painful death by choking.
The Judge in this case, George Greer, has sided with Michael Schiavo’s doctors believing that Terri cannot be taught to eat again and therefore has refused to grant even a test to see if this in fact would be true.
Therefore, Judge Greer has denied any swallowing therapy believing that a potential death by aspiration and choking is more agonizing than his order to have Terri die by starvation and dehydration.
Note: In the January 2000 trial, Michael Schiavo was asked by his attorney if there was some type of therapy that could possibly help Terri would he provide it for her.
Michael’s answer was that he would be there in a heartbeat.
Confining Terri to a Single Room
FS 744.3215 Right of persons determined incapacitated
When Terri Schiavo’s family, the Schindler’s, visit with Terri at Hospice and would like to take her outside, the nursing staff must first ask Terri’s legal guardian, Michael Schiavo for permission.
For the past four years, Michael Schiavo has repeatedly denied the request by Terri’s parents and siblings for permission to take Terri outside. Subsequently, Terri has been confined to her Hospice room, not permitted to leave her room for any reason, for over four years, and is confined to her bed where she spends most of her time.
Additionally, prior to 2000 when Michael Schiavo began his orders for Terri not to leave her room, it is impossible to know the frequency in which Terri was taken outside other than when her parents requested to do so.
Denial of Medical Treatment for Life Threatening Infection
FS 825.102 Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of Elderly Persons and Disabled Adults
According to the testimony of Michael Schiavo, he assured a judge and jury in November 1992 that his wife, Terri Schiavo, would be given proper therapy and care for the rest of his life.
However, medical records indicate that after receiving the proceeds of the 1992 Medical Malpractice Trial totaling close to one million dollars not a single day of proper rehabilitation or therapy has been given to Terri.
And in the spring of 1993, just a few months after this Medical Malpractice was awarded to Terri, Michael Schiavo, Terri’s legal guardian, instructed caregivers not to treat Terri who had acquired a common but life threatening infection. This happened again in 1995. Note: Michael is the inheritor of this Medical Trust.
Michael Schiavo’s testimony - November 1993.
Q. What was her bladder condition?
Michael Schiavo: She had a UTI.
Q. What is that?
Michael Schiavo: Urinary tract infection.
Q. What did the doctor tell you treatment for that would be?
Michael Schiavo: Antibiotic usually.
Q. And did he tell you what would occur if you failed to treat that
infection? What did he tell you?
Michael Schiavo: That sometimes urinary tract infection will turn to sepsis.
Q. And sepsis is what?
Michael Schiavo: An infection throughout the body.
Q. And what would the result of untreated sepsis be to the patient?
Michael Schiavo: The patient would pass on.
Denial of Personal Items, Gifts
FS 744.3215 Right of persons determined incapacitated.
Terri Schiavo resides is at a Hospice facility and is confined to a small room. Therefore, Terri’s family, the Schindler's, will try and personalize and warm her room by adding family photos. Michael Schiavo, Terri’s legal guardian, has removed family pictures from Terri’s room not to be returned.
Additionally, on several occasions, family and friends of Terri have sent flowers and cards of support to be given to her and placed in her room. Michael Schiavo has refused any cards to be displayed or for flowers to be to be delivered and placed in Terri’s room. He instructs the nurses to place the flowers at the nurse’s station.
Denial of Stimulation
In Terri Schiavo’s room, there is a small radio equipped with a CD player that Terri is permitted to listen to.
On several occasions, Terri’s family has brought some of Terri’s favorite music CD’s for Terri so that she can listen with earphones. In order to play Terri these CD’s, the Hospice nurses must first phone Michael Schiavo to ask permission. Without any reason given, Michael Schiavo refuses to allow Terri’s family to play her these CD’s.
One occasion in particular, Terri’s mother, Mary Schindler, played Terri a CD in the portable CD player. Mrs. Schindler was reprimanded by Michael Schiavo when this incident prompted the nurses to phone him inquiring what Mrs. Schindler was doing.
This restriction continues, and Terri is not permitted to listen to music via headphones.
Denial of Interaction with Parent
Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube was removed in October 2003. During one of the visits by Terri’s mother, Mary, attempted to apply lip-gloss to Terri’s lips. A security policeman stationed outside Terri’s door informed Mrs. Schindler that she was not permitted to apply any lip-gloss to Terri’s lips.
During a family visit with Terri in February 2004, Terri’s brother, Bobby Schindler, attempted to move Terri’s Geri chair that she was sitting in to the front of the window so that she could receive some fresh air. The nurse stopped Terri from being moved and informed Terri’s brother that he was not permitted to move Terri without the permission of the nursing staff. This information was given to Michael and Bobby was warned not to be a disruptive visitor.
Michael Schiavo Refuses to Dissolve Marriage
FS 798.01 Living in Open Adultery
Since 1995, Michael Schiavo, Terri’s legal guardian, has been engaged to and living with Jodi Centzone. Michael Schiavo has fathered two children with this woman.
Michael Schiavo is currently married to Terri Schiavo. The two were married in a Catholic Nuptial Mass, November 1984.
Incidentally, in order to be married in a Catholic ceremony, and at the insistence of Terri because Michael was not Catholic, Michael agreed to get a special dispensation. One stipulation to receive a special dispensation was that Michael agreed to raise any children that Terri and he may have as Roman Catholics.
Incidentally, the manner in which the Schindler family was made aware that Michael was engaged to another woman while still married to Terri was receiving the obituary of Michael’s mother, Claire Schiavo, when she died in 1997.
In part of the obituary it was stated that Claire Schiavo is survived by Michael Schiavo and his fiancé Jodi Centzone. There was no mention of Michael Schiavo’s wife, Terri.
This happened once again in 2001 when Michael Schiavo's father passed away. While Jodi Centzone was mentioned as Michael’s fiancé, there was no mentioning of Michael’s current wife, Terri.
Note: Michael Schiavo did testify that he was in fact engaged to marry Jodi Centzone once his wife has passed away.
Source: Hyscience
Update: The latest articles on Terri are tracked via the Blogs for Terri Aggregator
Update II
The following officials in Florida can intercede on Terri's behalf. However, they are going to need encouragement, lots of encouragement.
Florida Attorney General's Charlie Crist, AG Citizen's Services & OfficeAnd, please do remember Terri and the Schindler family in your prayers.
1-850-414-3990 / 850-414-3300
ag@oag.state.fl.usBernie McCabe, State Attorney Pinellas and Pasco Counties
727-464-6221
bmccabe@co.pinellas.fl.usGov. Jeb Bush 850-488-4441
jeb@jeb.org
jeb@myflorida.com
any judge complicit with this attempted murder should not only be removed from the bench and given a sentence for that crime. The nurse who goes out of her way to call Michael Schiavo because Terri is enjoying music is not worthy to be called "nurse." She is the opposite.
Whatever happened to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?" We are no better than the Nazis if we allow this attempted murder to take place in full view of the world. Shame on America. Woe unto them who sit with their hands folded as the innocent are sent to their destruction. I am paraphasing a Biblical admonition. We are mocking God by our inaction. God have mercy on us in Jesus holy name. Deliver Terri and her family from the snares of the devil and please send Michael the Archangel to her room.
Perhaps you would be interested in a current story of a girl hit by a drunk driver 20 years ago and declared in a vegetative state since that time. A nurse was going to read a child's story book to her and suddenly the girl started to read the book. She is now able to talk and communicate. The story is now showing on KAKE TV in Wichita, KS. The girl's name is Sarah and her father's name is Jim Scantlin from Hutchinson, KS. Her doctor's name is Dr. Bradley Sheel, I presume from Hutchinson also. I hope you may be able to use this story to help save Terri. I have been praying for all of you and doing whatever I can to help. God's will be done now and evermore!!
MAY GOD HAVE MERCY ON MICHAEL'S SOUL.
WE PRAY FOR ALL WHO WALK IN SUCH DARKNESS.
We have become a people who care only about our own wants & needs. Selfish is a mild term to be used about the American mindset.
I just don't understand how the deeds of Michael Schiavo can be totally ignored. Why can't he and the 'justices' and 'attorney' who is representing him be prosecuted? The evidence seems obvious to me. I just can't understand why Terri's doctors and witnesses cannot bring a case against her estranged husband and the 'courts'? I am praying for a miracle.
You know I think it is pretty safe to say now with everything that is going on with her that Micheal has bought off alot of people and they should all be ashamed of theirselves for being a part in this Murder.That is what I feel is going on. He has done something to her and is doing everything he can to cover his tracks.Micheal you should be ashamed of yourself.Judge BUYOFF GREER needs to be arrested for the removal of her tube, as well as Micheal and everyone else that had a part in this. He needs all of his Guardian Rights Revoked , heck he isn't fit to be a father he needs those revoked as well. I mean come on if he could allow this to happen to his wife what makes the world think this wont happen to his kids if he can get the opportunity he is out to make some quick money and I guess taking human life is the only way he can get rich quick. MAN GO GET A JOB.OR IS A MURDERER GOING TO BE THE NEW JOB DESCRIPTION FOR YOU.
Jorge Mederos – La Raza
As of the close of this edition, Clara Martinez, 39 years old and mother of two children aged five and seven years – had been almost 30 days without food and was still alive, taking only water. For the last year she has been cared for in her home, with special medical equipment installed in the living room, while the rest of the family try to go on with their lives.
This woman has remained in this condition since suffering a stroke. She was cared for in the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) Medical Center, later at an intermediate care facility, then at the hospital again, and finally she was taken to her home. At that time the physicians had judged her condition to be irreversible.
Under these conditions her husband Salvador Martinez, 35 years old and also Mexican, resolved that his wife should not live artificially. He signed a “Do Not Resuscitate” order to keep her from being revived artificially and disconnected the feeding machine. Under these conditions the woman should have died by withdrawal of feeding and the case would have gone unnoticed, had it not been for the intervention of a pastor of the Hispanic Evangelical Church at 4340 W. 87th St.
The wife’s mother, Gregoria Ruano, who has lived 33 years in the US after coming from the state of Durango in Mexico, attends this church. She disagrees with her son-in-law’s decision and spoke about the situation with Pastor Guillermo Espinoza.
Indeed, family and members of this church seem to be against euthanasia, which has led the husband to refuse an interview with La Raza, saying he doesn’t want to go public with my troubles. “My problems are mine, I will take care of them, and when I need you, I will call you,” was his reply.
According to Pastor Espinoza, who is from Bolivia, “The husband made a decision and will not change it, even though the family does not agree.”
Just as in the much-discussed case of Terri Schiavo, in which even the Vatican has called death by withholding feeding “an offense against life,” the Evangelical pastor feels that withholding feeding is “a form of hastening a death that definitely was not occurring.”
In the interview he said that when he was with the wife, “she moved, opened her eyes, and when we prayed and sang together by her bedside, she blinked as though she was listening.” He said it was also significant that, in spite of her condition, the woman was still “able to take water.”
Espinoza said that his was not a personal opinion on the right to life but from the Bible, which establishes that “God is the one who gives life and takes it away at such times as He sees fit.” According to Espinoza, “We conceptualize life in the context of a perfection, and when perfection is lacking, we feel it is incomplete.”
And so, “The husband’s ideal is the sublimated ideal of life. He wants to see his wife healthy like always and can’t conceive of seeing her like this.”
Court battle
Schiavo was disconnected per court order on March 18 from the apparatus that was keeping her alive. The so-called “Schiavo case” took a seven-year court battle between the husband, Michael Schiavo, who argued that she did not want to live artificially, and her parents, who maintained the opposite, and carried it into political terrain.
Even the President of the US, George W. Bush, took part in the dispute, taking the side of the conservative and religious groups opposed to euthanasia. He declared that “Those who live by the mercy of others deserve special concern.”
The tragedy involving Terri Schiavo began in 1990 when she was 26 years old. She has been in a persistent vegetative state after suffering a hear attack caused by a sudden drop in her body’s potassium levels, brought on by a strict weight-loss diet.
She was fed artificially for eight years until 1998 when her husband, who exercised legal guardianship, became convinced that there was no hope for her to live normally and asked for her feeding tube to be withdrawn. He claimed that his wife never wanted to live that way, although there was no legal document expressing such a wish.
That was the year the long and drawn-out court battle between Terri’s husband and parents began, during which the woman’s feeding tube was disconnected and reconnected on three occasions.
After the second disconnection in October of 2003, Terri’s parents appealed to the Governor of Florida, Jeb Bush, who presented a special bill to the state legislature which passed the so-called “Terri’s Law” which allowed the governor to order the feeding tube to be reconnected again.
Michael Schiavo brought suit claiming that law to be unconstitutional, and in September of 2004, Florida’s Supreme Court struck down the law. The feeding tube was disconnected anew.
Terri’s parents appealed for intervention by the US Congress and President Bush, who promulgated a bill in Congress with majority Republican support for “relief for the parents of Teresa Marie Schiavo.”
And so the case went to the US Supreme Court, which finally denied the claim and decided in favor of disconnection. The woman died fourteen days later.
At that time, L’Osservatore Romano (the official publication of the Holy See) published an editorial expressing fear at the wave of devastation that will, as a result of this case, erase established values and wildly distort people’s beliefs. It lamented the quality of life being judged inadequately when under guardianship, when a patient is in no condition to relate and comprehend. It also rejected the woman’s vegetative state as being synonymous with brain death or incapacity to feel the “slow agony” of being without food and water.
Living will
Comparing Terri Schiavo’s case with that of the Mexican family, Pastor Espinoza told La Raza he is worried about laws that could be passed. “If we allow a law to determine who will or will not live, it will be an offense against God’s principles of ethics.” In his opinion, nobody should be allowed to determine that “this person is not a living human being, so I decide when I give life or take away life. It’s a sophisticated way of murdering somebody.”
The “Schiavo Case” points to the need for people to make arrangements for having a “living will” in which they set forth their wishes for not being resuscitated or kept alive by artificial means, although opinions have been expressed that feeding and hydration – with or without tubes – are not considered artificial. As for the Catholic Church, its followers cannot request in a living will that denied water and nutrition be withheld, “as that is starvation, a deliberate mutilation of the body.” © La Raza