Terri Schiavo dies in hospice

PINELLAS PARK, Fla. -- Terri Schiavo, the severely brain-damaged woman who spent 15 years connected to a feeding tube in an epic legal and medical battle that went all the way to the White House and Congress, died Thursday, 13 days after the tube was removed. She was 41.\nSchiavo died about 9 a.m. at the Pinellas Park hospice where she lay for years while her husband and her parents fought over her in what was easily the longest, most bitter -- and most heavily litigated -- right-to-die dispute in U.S. history.\nMichael Schiavo was at his wife's bedside, cradling her, when she died a "calm, peaceful and gentle" death, a stuffed animal under her arm, and flowers arranged around the room, said his attorney, George Felos. Her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, were not at the hospice at the time, he said.\n"Mr. Schiavo's overriding concern here was to provide for Terri a peaceful death with dignity," Felos said. "This death was not for the siblings, and not for the spouse and not for the parents. This was for Terri."\nThe feud between the parents and their son-in-law continued even after her death: The Schindlers' advisers complained that Schiavo's brother and sister had been at her bedside a few minutes before the end came, but were not there at the moment of her death because Michael Schiavo would not let them in the room.\n"And so his heartless cruelty continues until this very last moment," said the Rev. Frank Pavone, a Roman Catholic priest. He added: "This is not only a death, with all the sadness that brings, but this is a killing, and for that we not only grieve that Terri has passed but we grieve that our nation has allowed such an atrocity as this and we pray that it will never happen again."\nFelos disputed the Schindler family's account. He said that Terri Schiavo's siblings had been asked to leave the room so that the hospice staff could examine her, and the brother started arguing with a law enforcement official. Michael Schiavo feared a "potentially explosive" situation and would not allow the brother in the room, because he wanted his wife's death to take place in a calm and peaceful surroundings, Felos said.\n"She's got all of her dignity back. She's now in heaven, she's now with God, and she's walking with grace," Michael Schiavo's brother, Scott Schiavo, said at his Levittown, Pa., home.\nHouse Republican Leader Tom DeLay condemned the judges who at both the state and federal level declined to order that Schiavo be kept alive artificially.\n"I never thought I'd see the day when a U.S. judge stopped feeding a living American so that they took 14 days to die," he said.\nOutside the hospice, a small group of activists sang hymns, raising their hands to the sky and closing their eyes. After the tube that supplied a nutrient solution was disconnected, protesters had streamed into Pinellas Park to keep vigil outside her hospice, with many arrested as they tried to bring her food and water.\nSchiavo suffered severe brain damage in 1990 after her heart stopped because of a chemical imbalance that was believed to have been brought on by an eating disorder. Court-appointed doctors ruled she was in a persistent vegetative state, with no real consciousness or chance of recovery.\nShe left no written instructions, but her husband argued that his wife told him long ago she would not want to be kept alive artificially. His in-laws disputed that, saying that would have gone against her Roman Catholic faith, and they contended she could get better with treatment. They said she laughed, cried, responded to them and tried to talk.\nOver and over, Pinellas County Circuit Judge George W. Greer said that Michael Schiavo had convinced him that Terri Schiavo would not have wanted to be kept alive under such conditions. The feeding tube was removed with the judge's approval March 18 -- the third time food and water were cut off during the seven-year legal battle.\nFlorida lawmakers, Congress, President Bush and his brother Gov. Jeb Bush tried to intervene on behalf of her parents, but state and federal courts at all levels repeatedly ruled in favor of her husband.