Judge: Florida woman's feeding tube can be removed

Friday, November 22nd 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

CLEARWATER, Fla. (AP) _ The husband of a woman who has been in a vegetative state for 12 years can disconnect her feeding tube and allow her to die, a judge ruled Friday in a long-running case that pitted the man against his in-laws.

Circuit Judge George W. Greer said the tube supplying nourishment to 38-year-old Terri Schiavo would be removed on Jan. 3.

``This is about Terri's wishes,'' said her husband, Michael Schiavo.

The woman's parents said they will appeal.

Terri Schiavo fell into a vegetative state in 1990 after her heart stopped and oxygen to her brain was temporarily cut off.

Her husband claimed that she once told him that she would not want to be kept on life support. And a court-appointed doctor testified that her condition is irreversible.

But Bob and Mary Schindler said that their daughter reacts to them during visits and that her condition might improve if their son-in-law allowed some of what remains of a $700,000 trust fund to be spent on tests and treatments.

A video presented in court by a doctor selected by the Schindlers shows their daughter's eyes open and appearing to track movement.

The judge, who first heard the case two years ago, reheard medical testimony after an appeals court overturned his decision to remove the feeding tube last year. The tube was removed for more than two days, but another judge ordered it reconnected.

Terri Schiavo collapsed at her St. Petersburg home from what doctors believed was a potassium imbalance. She is now in a hospice.

Michael Schiavo, who recently had a baby with his longtime girlfriend, once lived with his in-laws, but now they accuse each other of wanting control of what is left from the $700,000 Terri Schiavo received from a 1992 malpractice award.