A prolonged legal battle in California ended with the death of a brain-dead toddler after being taken off life support, Fox News reports.
Advertisement
The child had passed through several hospitals and his case has passed through several courts since he was declared brain dead at David Medical Center, University of California, after cardiac arrest following an apparent asthma attack in April.
In Guatemala, a pediatric neurologist said Israel was not brain dead based on an EEG that showed some brain activity, according to Fonseca and Snyder.
Israel Stinson was taken off of life support following a court decision overturning a temporary restraining order placed on Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles.
The boy is believed to have died around 3:15 pm on Thursday. He stopped breathing nearly immediately. The most famous was that of Terri Schiavo, a woman with brain damage whose parents fought for years to keep her alive until a judge ultimately granted her husband’s wish to have her feeding tube removed.
Israel has already been declared brain dead by three doctors – at UC Davis in Sacramento and at Kaiser Permanente in Roseville.
“It was a complete shock … a complete turnaround from last week”, family attorney Alexandra Snyder told the Sacramento Bee.
“These doctors (are) telling you there’s no hope, but then you go and see your son and he moves to your voice and it brings you back up”, Jonee Fonseca, the boy’s mother, told CBS2.
Until Thursday’s ruling, Snyder said she and Fonseca were in the midst of lining up an appointment for an outside doctor to evaluate Israel, who has never opened his eyes or communicated since his initial hospitalization.
The family remained in Guatemala until about two weeks ago, when Stinson was accepted to the LA Children’s Hospital. But doctors later said they were going to take Israel off life support.
CBS Los Angeles reached out to Children’s Hospital Los Angeles for comment but a spokesperson had no comment at this time. “He was not brain dead”, Snider said.
Spokesman Lorenzo Benet for Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles provided this statement to FOX 40: “Due to health privacy concerns of which we are bound, we can not comment”.
Advertisement
“There are people who have recovered, and if that happens even once, you have to revisit it”, she said.
