"There is ALWAYS SOME doubt."
Per the laws in place at the time, the standard of "clear &
convincing evidence" MUST be established. That is the highest
possible standard in a non-criminal case.
I believe that there was NOT "clear & convincing evidence"
established regarding Terri's wishes & her alleged PVS state.
If anything, it appears that Terri's parents simply got
out lawyered, albeit, they only managed to present a stronger
case, not one that established "clear & convincing evidence".
Due to that, I believe to err on the side of life, as the law
requires, would have been the correct decision.
JMHO
***
The court's obligation to discern objectively what Terri's wishes were and whether they were CLEAR--a question of fact--morphed into an inquiry as to whether she could ever get better, with the subjective assumption that life in her present condition was not meaningful life. The question became: Was she in a persistent vegetative state (PVS), and if so, can't we assume that Terri believed death to be preferable to life in such a state?
weeklystandard.com
****
In end-of-life cases, Florida law says a judge must follow the person's last wishes, if they can be established. If a judge finds "CLEAR and CONVINCING" evidence that a person would not want to be kept alive, the judge can order treatment stopped.
When Greer came to grapple with this question in the Schiavo case in 2000, he heard from five people who said they knew what TERRI wanted. Two supported TERRI's parents, Robert and Mary Schindler. On the other side were TERRI's brother-in-law Scott, her sister-in-law and friend Joan Schiavo, and her husband.
sptimes.com
***
Did Terri Schiavo say she wanted to die if she were in this condition? This is one of the primary points of contention in this case and with good reason.
Initially, as mentioned earlier, Michael did provide rehabilitation for his wife. Furthermore, in late 1992, Michael Schiavo said the following during testimony given in his medical malpractice suit:
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"I believe in the vows I took with my wife, through sickness, in health, for richer or poor. I married my wife because I love her and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I'm going to do that."
terrisfight.org
>>>
But, in 1993 (Note: this is after Michael Schiavo had already started dating other women and received over a million dollars from the settlement of the medical malpractice suit), his attitude changed rather dramatically.
Michael Schiavo admitted in a November of 1993 deposition that earlier in the year, he had requested that doctors not treat a urinary tract infection that was potentially fatal to Terri. The doctors were not able to comply with Michael's request because it would have been illegal.
terrisfight.org
According to the The Times Leader, Michael Schiavo first claimed that Terri had told him she wouldn't want to live at this point, but most other sources that I've seen point to that information first being revealed in 1998.
timesleader.com
In 1998, Michael said that while watching a movie, Terri had once opined that she wouldn't want to live if she were ever in a coma. Michael's older brother, Scott Schiavo, and Michael's sister-in-law, Joan Schiavo also claimed Terri had a similar conversation with them after a funeral.
On the other hand, one of Terri's friends, Diane Meyer, had a very different story to tell:
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"Diane Meyer can recall only one time that her best friend, Terri Schiavo, really got angry with her. It was in 1981, and it haunts her still.
The recent high school graduates had just seen a television movie about Karen Ann Quinlan, who had been in a coma since collapsing six years earlier and was the subject of a bitter court battle over her parents' decision to take her off a respirator. Meyer says she told a cruel joke about Quinlan, and it set Terri off.
"She went down my throat about this joke, that it was inappropriate," Meyer says. She remembers Terri saying she wondered how the doctors and lawyers could possibly know what Quinlan was really feeling or what she would want.
"Where there's life," Meyer recalls her saying, "there's hope."
edition.cnn.com
>>>
Added to that is the testimony of Terri's court appointed guardian, Richard Pearse:
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"Pearse said he was troubled by the fact that Michael waited until 1998 to petition to remove the feeding tube, even though he claims to have known her wishes all along, and that he waited until he won a malpractice suit based on a professed desire to take care of her into old age. As her husband, Michael would inherit what is left of her malpractice award, originally $700,000, which is held in a trust fund administered by the court. Accounting of the fund is sealed. But Michael's lawyer, George Felos, said most of it has been spent on legal fees associated with the custody dispute.
Pearse also said he did not find Joan and Scott Schiavo's testimony credible."
newsday.com
>>>
Believe it or not, there's even more:
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The Schindlers had contacted a woman Michael dated in 1991 who told them Michael had confessed to her he did not know what Terri would want. Although the woman refused to sign an affidavit, it bought the Schindlers some time. And with it, they found Trudy Capone.
A former co-worker of Michael's, Capone signed an affidavit on May 9, 2001, stating "Michael confided in me all the time about Terri ... He said to me many times that he had no idea what her wishes were."
>>>
Despite the rather large amount of conflicting evidence, Judge Greer ruled in Michael Schiavo's favor on the issue.
newsday.com
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Is Terri Schiavo in a persistent vegetative state? This is of course, the key issue in the case because if Terri Schiavo is judged to be in a PVS, she can be legally denied food and water. On the other hand, if the diagnosis is that she's minimally conscious, the law requires that she be given food and water no matter what the wishes of her guardian may be.
There's also quite a bit of controversy over what her condition actually is and with good reason.
According to the New York Times:
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"At least six neurologists have examined Ms. Schiavo, and in affidavits or testimony four of them agreed that she was in a persistent vegetative state and highly unlikely to recover."
>>>
nytimes.com
The flip side of this argument is that there are many qualified experts who disagree with that diagnosis. Florida neurologist William Hammesfahr & neurologist William Cheshire of the Mayo Clinic have gotten the most attention in the last week, but based on the videos that have been made public, 33 physicians (including 15 board-certified neurologists) have signed affidavits stating that Terri's condition should be reevaluated.
terrisfight.org
worldnetdaily.com
nationalreview.com
Combine those conflicting diagnoses with the fact that Terri Schiavo has never had a MRI or a PET and the fact that the error rate in diagnosing PVS has been reported to be as high as "43 percent," and it's clear that there is still more than a little room for doubt about her true condition.
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