Schiavo nearing death in Florida after legal battle

PINELLAS PARK, Florida - A wrenching dispute over the fate of Terri Schiavo is nearing its end as the brain-damaged Florida woman moved closer to death and her parents gave up their long and bitter legal battle to prolong her life.

"I'm not saying we wouldn't be open to any idea that comes up. But at this point, it appears that time has finally run out," David Gibbs, an attorney for Schiavo's parents, said late on Saturday, the St Petersburg Times reported on Sunday.

The tube feeding that has sustained Schiavo for 15 years was halted on March 18 under a state court order, setting off a flurry of efforts by Bob and Mary Schindler to get their daughter's feeding restored.

Their effort drew in the US Congress, President George W Bush and his brother, Florida governor Jeb Bush.

But a string of judicial rebuffs, including from the US Supreme Court and the Florida Supreme Court, effectively ended the Schindlers' seven-year legal dispute with Schiavo's husband and legal guardian, Michael Schiavo, over whether she should live or die.

Gibbs said Schiavo, 41, was declining rapidly. "They've begun to give her morphine drip for the pain. And at this point, we would say Terri has passed the point of no return," he told CBS television.

Doctors have said Schiavo, who is being cared for at a Florida hospice, would live for up to two weeks without the feeding tube. They say patients in her condition appear to feel little or no discomfort when deprived of nutrition and water.

A state court first ruled in 2000 Schiavo should be allowed to die.

It declared she was in a "persistent vegetative state" since suffering a heart attack that deprived her brain of oxygen in 1990 and sided with her husband in ruling she would not have wanted to live in that condition.

The Schindlers, who are practicing Roman Catholics, have attracted passionate support from an array of conservative Christians, right-to-life and anti-abortion activists.

Passions boiled over on Sunday among the crowd of about 100 protesters holding vigil in front of the hospice in Pinellas Park, with the first two violent arrests.

One of those was Don McBurney, a member of the Denver Bible Church, who grabbed a paper cup of water and rushed the police lines standing guard in the driveway.

Three policemen wrestled him to the ground, cuffed his hands and forced him into the police van. He struggled, screaming, "Bring her water".

McBurney was charged with trespassing. There have been 38 arrests in the past 10 days, including three others on Sunday, but so far they had been peaceful.

Some in the crowd suggested militias should form to storm the hospice. Others prayed quietly and sang hymns.

Ardith Cooper of Morris, Illinois, stood sketching a chalk drawing of Terri Schiavo nailed to a crucifix. Christians mark Easter Sunday as the day they believe Jesus Christ was resurrected after being crucified.

In a protest lasting about an hour, seven people in wheelchairs rolled to the driveway, hoisted themselves out their chairs and sat on the ground, screaming, "We're not dead yet, let Terri live".

Michael Schiavo and the parents were alternating time at Schiavo's bedside -- having long ago stopped speaking to each other in a bitter family feud that escalated into a highly politicised dispute.

Lobbied by evangelical Christians who have felt emboldened since Bush's re-election last November, the Republican-controlled Congress raced through a special law to push the case into federal courts, and the president interrupted a vacation to sign it into law.

But federal courts, up to the Supreme Court, turned down the Schindlers' request for an order to resume feeding.

Fresh efforts in state courts also failed and Governor Bush was rebuffed in a move to get the state welfare agency to take custody of Schiavo.

Jeb Bush told CNN on Sunday he had done everything within his powers and could not violate a court order.

Congress' effort was assailed by critics as meddling in a family affair that had already been decided by state courts.

Opinion polls showed most Americans disapproved of the congressional move and felt Schiavo should be allowed to die.

A Time Magazine poll released on Sunday found a majority of Americans surveyed who called themselves born again Christians or evangelicals agreed with the decision to remove Schiavo's feeding tube.

The poll was conducted March 22-24.

- REUTERS