- PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (Reuters)
- The husband of brain-damaged Florida woman Terri Schiavo has ordered
an autopsy after she dies to silence allegations his plan to cremate her
body is aimed at hiding something, his lawyer said on Monday.
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- As supporters of Schiavo's parents took their fight to
prolong her life to Washington 10 days after her feeding was stopped, Michael
Schiavo's lawyer, George Felos, said her pulse had become "thready"
and she had not passed urine for a while -- a possible sign of approaching
death.
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- He said Michael Schiavo, who has been pitted against
the parents in a seven-year legal conflict over whether to allow Schiavo
to die, requested an official autopsy to show the "massive" extent
of the brain damage she suffered in 1990.
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- "We didn't think it was appropriate to talk about
an autopsy prior to Mrs. Schiavo's death," Felos told reporters outside
his law office in Dunedin, Florida.
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- "But because claims have been made by, I guess,
opponents of carrying out her wishes that there was some motive behind
the cremation of Mrs. Schiavo we felt it was necessary to make that announcement
today."
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- Disagreement over the planned cremation rather than the
full burial demanded by Schiavo's Roman Catholic parents has been a subplot
to the long legal battle.
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- The fate of the woman, who has been in a persistent vegetative
state since suffering cardiac arrest, has become a cause for Christian
conservatives and drawn in Congress, President Bush and his brother, Florida
Gov. Jeb Bush.
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- State courts have accepted testimony from Michael Schiavo
and others that she did not want to be kept alive artificially, but her
parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, disagree, and maintain she tries to communicate
with them.
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- Pressured by the Christian right, Congress passed a special
law that allowed the Schindlers to take their case to federal court, and
President Bush cut short a vacation to sign it.
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- The effort proved in vain as court after court -- all
the way to the U.S. Supreme Court -- rejected a flurry of petitions since
the feeding tube was disconnected on March 18.
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- Nevertheless, supporters of Bob and Mary Schindler again
appealed for federal or state intervention.
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- "This is about the soul of our nation, the soul
of our church," said Michael McMonagle, spokesman for the Pro-Life
Union of Southeastern Pennsylvania, as around two dozen protesters gathered
in a park across from the White House.
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- Outside the hospice in Pinellas Park, Florida, where
Schiavo is being cared for, the protesters were dismissive of Michael Schiavo's
plans for an autopsy.
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- "It's a way to cover his behind," said Randall
Terry, an anti-abortion activist speaking for the Schindlers.
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- Bob Schindler, who has at times asserted his daughter
was in her final hours and at others maintained that it was not too late
to intervene, said earlier she was "fighting like hell."
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- Doctors said when the feeding tube was disconnected that
she would likely last for up to two weeks without sustenance.
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- Schindler said Schiavo was beginning to look like a Nazi
"concentration camp" survivor and voiced a fear that hospice
staff might try to hasten her end by giving her an overdose of morphine.
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- "We do not hasten death in any way, nor do we prolong
life. That is not our role," said Louise Cleary, a spokeswoman for
the Hospice of the Florida Suncoast.
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- Felos said Schindler's fears were misplaced. He said
Schiavo was not on a morphine drip but had received two "minuscule"
5 milligram doses of the opiate since March 18.
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- He said he visited her on Monday and she looked peaceful
and calm.
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- "Mrs. Schiavo's pulse is described by the nursing
staff as thready. Also she has had no urine output since last night,"
Felos said. Doctors say a lack of urine would be an early indication that
Schiavo's kidneys are shutting down.
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- "I saw no evidence of any bodily discomfort whatsoever.
It doesn't appear from at least me seeing her, and you know I'm not a doctor
by any means, but it doesn't appear her death is imminent but it's just
impossible to say," Felos said.
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- - Additional reporting by JoAnne Allen and Tabassum Zakaria
in Washington, and Robert Green in Pinellas Park
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