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CWA Holds Out Hope for Terri after Supreme Court Rejection 3/24/2005 Washington, D.C. – Concerned Women for America (CWA) denounced the U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection of the Schindler family’s appeal to reinsert Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube so that the Court can then review whether her constitutional and statutory rights have been violated.
“It’s tragic that the Supreme Court’s ‘evolving standards of decency’ haven’t evolved enough to protect Terri Schiavo,” said Jan LaRue, CWA’s chief counsel. “You’d think that a Court that prohibits states from executing retarded, convicted murderers would prohibit the state ordered death of an innocent woman when there’s so little evidence of her wishes. You couldn’t establish probable cause for a search warrant based on the stale and highly suspect hearsay statements in this case. How could any court find it clear and convincing evidence sufficient to order a woman’s death by starvation? If this satisfies constitutional due process, God help us.”
“While this case has been in many courts, it has only been fully examined by one judge who consistently rules against anyone except Terri’s adulterous husband,” said Wendy Wright, CWA’s senior policy director. “That is why Congress and the President went to such lengths to pass Terri’s Law – to get a full review of the facts. But the federal courts have shunned this duty and by doing so sentenced an innocent woman to die based on suspicious and contended claims. We hope that Gov. Bush will do everything in his power to protect Terri from a merciless judiciary.”
“In 1984, the New Hampshire Supreme Court upheld a trial court order that authorized a prison warden to feed and nourish a prison inmate over his objection, even though he was mentally competent and wanted to die by starvation. Here we have a judge ordering the removal of food and water to cause starvation. Even if we knew that’s what Terri wanted, Florida law makes aiding and abetting a suicide a felony, and there’s no black-robed exemption,” said LaRue.
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Concerned Women for America 1015 Fifteenth St. N.W., Suite 1100 Washington, D.C. 20005 Phone: (202) 488-7000 Fax: (202) 488-0806 |
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