Twelve years ago on this day, Terri Schindler Schiavo died from starvation and dehydration after her feeding tube was removed by order of a judge at the request of her husband.
The media and her husband, Michael Schiavo, asserted Terri was in a "persistent vegetative state," but her parents and brother, Bobby Schindler, insisted otherwise, claiming she was able to swallow, laugh and express love for her family.
"If you go back and look at her records, she was starting to form words," her brother told WND in a 2015 interview on the 10th anniversary of her death. "It was really encouraging to our family, and to Michael right at first."
WND has been reporting on the Terri Schiavo story since 2002. Read WND's unparalleled, in-depth coverage of Terri Schindler Schiavo's life-and-death fight, including more than 150 original stories and columns.
Later, however, it was Michael who went to court against the Schindlers, ultimately winning an order to withhold her food and water, and generating a national controversy.
Bobby Schindler noted in column Thursday for LifeNews.com that he writes each year to honor his sister on the anniversary of her death.
His column this year is titled "12 Years After They Starved My Sister to Death, We Must Never Forget Terri Schiavo."
Schindler and his devout Catholic family commemorate "Terri's Day" each spring to honor his sister's memory and "pray for all of our medically vulnerable brothers and sisters."
'Terri's day' televised Mass
In response to Terri’s death, his family established the Terri Schiavo Life & Hope Network to advocate for medically vulnerable persons. Since its founding, the network has helped more than 2,500 patients and families.
Schindler's mother, Mary Schindler, and his sister, Suzanne Schindler Vitadamo, work with the foundation. Robert Schindler Sr. died in 2009.
This year, the Catholic broadcaster EWTN is commemorating “Terri’s Day” on April 7 through an internationally televised Mass with Philadelphia Archbishop Charles J. Chaput. It will be followed by a special interview with the archbishop, Fr. Mitch Pacwa and Schindler.
"Despite widespread characterizations that suggested she was near death in the years after her injury, Terri was not dying, and did not suffer from any life-threatening disease. She was neither on machines, nor was she 'brain dead,'” Schindler writes.
Jeb Bush intervened
Then-Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, a candidate for president in 2016, Jeb Bush, filed several documents on behalf of Terri, including a motion to bring the case under federal jurisdiction, but eventually concluded the outcome was "in the court's hands."
During the 2016 campaign, Michael Schiavo slammed a pro-Jeb Bush super PAC for invoking Terri in an ad touting the former Florida governor's record as a social conservative.
The ad by Right to Rise USA highlighted Bush’s record with the National Rifle Association before shifting to his faith: “He’s a man of deep faith who fought time and again for the right to life.
The ad then shows an image of Terri Schiavo.
“It is simply disgusting that Jeb Bush and his super PAC would exploit my wife’s tragedy for his crude political gain,” Schiavo said in a statement. “Shame on Jeb Bush.”
In an interview with Politico, Schiavo said Bush undertook "a last-ditch effort to get the right-wing constituents."
“Using his disgraceful intervention in our family’s private trauma to advance his political career shows that he has learned nothing,” Michael Schiavo continued in the statement. “He’s proud of the fact that he used the machinery of government to keep a person alive through extraordinary artificial means — contrary to the orders of the court that were based on the court's determination, made over six years of litigation, that doing so would be against her wishes.
"What the campaign video shows is that if he ever got his hands on the power of government again, he would do the same thing again, maybe next time to your family.”
In an interview with Politico in 2015, Michael Schiavo blamed Jeb Bush for causing a "living hell" for him, describing the governor as vindictive and untrustworthy.
"He should be ashamed. And I think people really need to know what type of person he is. To bring as much pain as he did, to me and my family, that should be an issue."
Michael Schiavo created a political action committee, TerriPAC, in December 2005 to raise money to support right-to-die candidates and oppose candidates who favored intervention in the Schiavo case. The PAC was shut down in 2007 after it paid a $1,350 fine to the Federal Election Commission for failing to file complete and timely records.
'This was all calculated'
In 1990, Terri, at age 26, collapsed in her St. Petersburg, Florida home for a reason that still hasn't been explained and was taken to a hospital by first responders who feared she was dead. She was comatose for a time, then started responding and was moved to a care center. Her family members say she was getting better.
Then her condition deteriorated. Bobby Schindler says it was after Michael started dating another woman that he cut off Terri's therapy and eventually petitioned the court to withdraw treatment, which included food and water.
"If you look at the timeline, and you see Michael's actions, you can see that this was all calculated," Schindler alleged in his 2015 interview with WND.
He believes Michael warehoused Terri after he lost interest in her life.
"It was just a tragedy what he did. He violated so many laws, and he got away with every one of them, because he had this judge protecting him," Schindler claimed.
The case spotlighted the plight of the seriously brain injured, their rights and whether or not they are cognizant of their surroundings. The case generated four requests to the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene, and all were rejected.
Get the book that powerfully and comprehensively tells "Terri's Story," or "Fighting for Dear Life," both available at the WND Superstore.
Crisis lifeline
In his column Thursday, Schindler spoke of the work his charity does for "medically vulnerable persons" who face having their basic care denied "as rising health care costs" and a “'quality of life' mentality continue to influence the care they receive."
He said that every year since the charity's founding, calls to its 24/7 Crisis Lifeline have increased.
He cited the recent case of Tabetha Long, a young woman who experienced cardiac arrest that resulted in an anoxic brain injury. Tabetha’s doctors were optimistic after her initial test results showed some responsiveness.
"Incredibly -- and what is still difficult to explain -- her mother, who was making her medical treatment decisions, admitted her daughter into hospice where, subsequently, her food and water were stopped," Schindler writes.
But Tabetha’s boyfriend began asking questions, "and we were able to identify a supportive attorney for Tabetha who convinced courts to intervene, remove Tabetha from hospice, and restore her food and water," Schindler says.
Since then, Long has been discharged and is now living at home.
Several similar cases have developed since Terri's death in which patients in a coma suddenly awakened, sometimes telling of having been able to hear people talking about them while comatose.
WND reported in 2015 the case of Martin Pistorius, who was in a "vegetative state" for 12 years. He now talks, uses a computer and is mobile in a wheelchair. During those 12 years, he was aware of his surroundings and remembers conversations, including when his mother said, "I hope you die."
A few years ago, a woman was in a short coma due to a medical condition, and her husband decided after several days to halt her life support. She immediately became restless, woke up and said, "Get me out of here. … Take me to Ted's and take me to the Melting Pot," naming two Mexican restaurants.
ABC News reported a college student horribly injured in a car pileup lapsed into a coma and was being reviewed as an organ donor after months of unconsciousness. Suddenly, one night, he wiggled his fingers, and soon he was moving around in a wheelchair and talking.
A study by researchers at Northwestern University in Chicago found patients in comas "recovered consciousness significantly faster and had an improved recover" when they heard their family members telling familiar stories.
Some have compared Terri's case to the highly publicized cases of Karen Ann Quinlan and Nancy Cruzan. Unlike, Schiavo, however, Quinlan was on a respirator, and Cruzan was on full life support.
Cruzan's family fought to have her life support removed. That is what distinguished the Schiavo case in the mind of many. Terri required only food and water to live.
But since food and water were determined by a court to be "medical treatments," they ultimately were withdrawn on a court order March 18, 2005, and Terri died two weeks later, March 31.
WND has been reporting on the Terri Schiavo story since 2002 – far longer than most other national news organizations – and exposing the many troubling, scandalous and possibly criminal aspects of the case that to this day rarely surface in news reports.