March 24, 2005
By JILL BARTON, Associated Press Writer
Yahoo News
PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - The U.S. Supreme Court turned down Terri Schiavo's parents Thursday, declining to intervene to keep the brain-damaged woman alive, but their supporters pressed a last-ditch effort in Florida courts.
Justices didn't explain their decision, which was received by somber supporters outside the woman's hospice with bowed heads and prayers for help from Gov. Jeb Bush.
"The governor is disappointed (at the Supreme Court decision) and will continue to do whatever he can within the law to save Terri's life," Bush spokesman Jacob DiPietre said.
Schiavo's husband, Michael Schiavo, had urged the high court Thursday not to intervene because her case has been endlessly litigated. This was at least the fifth time the nation's high court has declined to get involved in the Schiavo case.
The appeal by her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, was part of a rush of legal activity in the unprecedented right-to-die struggle.
The custody request by Bush was made before Circuit Judge George Greer, who has presided over the case for years and ordered the feeding tube removed last month. Greer planned to decide by noon Thursday on whether the case would go forward.
He issued an emergency order Wednesday to keep the Department of Children & Families from reconnecting the tube.
The parents have frantically tried to reconnect the tube, which was removed six days ago. Doctors have said Schiavo, 41, likely would die within a week or two at her hospice.
Attorneys for the Schindlers and Michael Schiavo did not immediately respond requests for comment on the Supreme Court decision.
"There is no legislative and legal option open to us now. ... Gov. Bush is now the only practical hope for Terri Schiavo. Let us pray now for that," the Rev. Patrick Mahoney, a Schindler family advocate, said after the Supreme Court acted. Paul O'Donnell, a spokesman for the Schindlers, told CNN that their hopes were "dimming."
The Schindlers filed their request with the high court late Wednesday, only hours after a federal appeals court refused to order the tube reinserted and the Florida Legislature decided not to intervene.
Lawyers for Michael Schiavo said in their Supreme Court filing that Terri Schiavo would want to die. The filing said Congress violated the Constitution when it passed a bill allowing federal court review of her case, because that tried to overturn state court rulings in favor of Michael Schiavo.
"That is not an exercise of legislative power, but trial by legislature. ... Any law that suspends, nullifies, or reverses a final court judgment is an exercise of judicial, not legislative power," the filing said.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and Republican Sens. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania and Mel Martinez of Florida filed a friend-of-the-court brief late Wednesday siding with Schiavo's parents.
"This is not about Terri anymore. This is all a political view," Scott Schiavo, Michael Schiavo's brother, told CNN on Thursday. "They're being bullied, actually, by these right-for-life people, basically telling them, `If you don't go our way, you won't get our votes.'"
About 20 protesters gathered outside the hospice Thursday, some holding signs that said "State-sponsored murder" and "Starvation (equals) cruel and unusual punishment."
"This is not a death with dignity," Mahoney said just before the Supreme Court decision was announced. "If Terri were an animal, she would not have to endure this."
Terri Schiavo suffered brain damage in 1990 when her heart stopped briefly from a chemical imbalance believed to have been brought on by an eating disorder. Court-appointed doctors say she is in a persistent vegetative state with no hope of recovery.
Her parents and their doctors argue that she could get better and that she would never have wanted to be cut off from food and water. But Michael Schiavo has argued that she told him she would not want to be kept alive artificially.
In the emergency Supreme Court filing, the Schindlers said their daughter faces an unjust and imminent death based on a decision by her husband to remove a feeding tube without strong proof of her consent. They allege constitutional violations of due process and religious freedom.
The filing also argued Congress intended for Schiavo's tube to be reinserted, at least temporarily, when it let federal courts review her case.
The Schindlers' appeal went first to Justice Anthony Kennedy, who has responsibility in the first instance for cases emanating from the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta. He referred the Schiavo case to the full nine-member court.
Gov. Bush and the state's social services agency filed a petition in state court to take custody of Schiavo and, presumably, reconnect her feeding tube. It cited new allegations of neglect and challenges Schiavo's diagnosis as being in a persistent vegetative state. The request is based on the opinion of a neurologist working for the state who observed Schiavo at her bedside but did not conduct an examination of her.
The neurologist, William Cheshire of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, is a bioethicist who is also an active member in Christian organizations, including two whose leaders have spoken out against the tube's removal.
Ronald Cranford of the University of Minnesota, a neurologist who was among those who made a previous diagnosis of Schiavo, said "there isn't a reputable, credible neurologist in the world who won't find her in a vegetative state."
The Florida Legislature also jumped back into the fray, but senators rejected a bill Wednesday that would have prohibited patients like Schiavo from being denied food and water if they did not express their wishes in writing. The measure was rejected 21-18.
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