Terri Schiavo
Follow events in the case of Terri Schiavo, who has been at the center of a protracted legal battle between her husband and parents over the husband's attempts to remove her feeding tube.
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Theresa Marie Schindler is born. She's the oldest of three children from a well-to-do Philadelphia family.
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Terri marries Michael Schiavo, whom she'd met about a year earlier at Bucks County Community College.
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Terri and Michael Schiavo move to Florida. Michael manages restaurants and Terri works as a clerk at an insurance agency.
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A chemical imbalance apparently brought on by an eating disorder causes Terri Schiavo's heart to stop beating for a few minutes. Courts have ruled her to be in a "persistent vegetative state," needing a feeding tube to live. She leaves no written wishes to guide the situation.
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Michael Schiavo wins more than $1 million in a malpractice suit accusing doctors of misdiagnosing his wife.
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Upset over Terri Schiavo's care and the lawsuit money, her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, try to have her husband removed as her guardian. The case is later dismissed.
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Michael Schiavo files his first petition to have his wife's feeding tube removed, setting off a legal battle with her parents. He argues that Terri would not want to remain in her present state, while her parents insist she would want to live, and that she can be helped with therapy.
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Circuit Judge George W. Greer approves Michael Schiavo's request to have Terri's feeding tube removed.
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State and U.S. supreme courts refuse to intervene in the case. Terri Schiavo's tube is removed, but another judge orders it reinserted two days later.
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Mediation attempts fail, and Michael Schiavo again seeks permission to remove his wife's feeding tube.
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After hearing medical testimony, Judge Greer finds no evidence that Terri Schiavo has any hope of recovery and again orders her feeing tube removed.
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Circuit Court Judge George Greer orders the feeding tube must be removed Oct. 15. He also rejects Terri's parents' request for therapy to show her how to eat without it. Court-appointed doctors testified that her brain damage is so severe she cannot be rehabilitated.
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For the second time, Terri Schiavo's feeding tube is removed.
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Florida Gov. Jeb Bush signs "Terri's Law," a hastily passed bill allowing him to intervene, then orders the tube be reinserted.
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An independent guardian finds "no reasonable medical hope" that Terri Schiavo will improve.
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The Florida Supreme Court strikes down "Terri's Law" as unconstitutional. It upholds Circuit Judge W. Douglas Baird's ruling that the law wrongly allowed Bush to intervene in a matter of personal privacy and was improperly used to override a decision with which he did not agree.
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After declining to give the Schindlers more time to pursue other legal and medical options, Judge Greer gives permission for the tube's removal on March 18.
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A San Diego man offers to pay Michael Schiavo $1 million if he transfers the legal right to decide his wife's treatment to her parents. Schiavo rejects the offer, which his lawyer says is not the first.
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Michael Schiavo tells a television interviewer he will not receive any life insurance money upon Terri's death.
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The U.S. House passes a bill aimed at keeping Terri Schiavo alive.
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The Florida House passes a bill intended to keep Terri Schiavo alive; meanwhile, the U.S. Senate passes a bill different from the U.S. House version.
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Schiavo's feeding tube is removed again. Judge Greer rules against congressional Republicans who had tried to put off its removal by seeking her appearance at hearings.
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The U.S. House, following a move by the Senate, passes a bill overnight to let Terri's parents ask a federal judge to order the reinsertion of her feeding tube. President Bush rushes back to the White House from his Texas ranch to sign the measure less than an hour later.
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A federal judge refuses to order the reinsertion of the feeding tube, denying an emergency request from her parents. Lawyers immediately appeal to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals, which already is considering an appeal on whether Schiavo's right to due process has been violated.
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In its 2-1 ruling, a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta refuses to order the reinsertion of her feeding tube, denying an emergency request by the parents. Ten hours later, the Schindler's ask the full court to review the panel's decision.
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In a 10-2 decision, the appeals court refuses the Schindlers' request for a full court rehearing. Later in the day they appeal to the Supreme Court, the fifth time they've asked the high court to get involved in the case. The Florida Senate, meanwhile, rejects a bill to re-insert her tube.
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The Supreme Court rejects the Schindlers' request to get involved in the case. The justices give no reason for their decision, which comes down in a terse one-page order.
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A Florida judge refuses to hear Gov. Jeb Bush's request to take custody of Terri. Bush had cited new allegations of neglect and challenged her diagnoses as being in a persistent vegetative state. Circuit Judge George Greer's decision leaves the Schindlers with almost no remaining options.
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Federal Judge James Whittemore rules against the Schindlers again, refusing to order the reinsertion of her feeding tube while he considers their new lawsuit. A subsequent appeal to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is denied, with the court saying it already has ruled on the issues.
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Pinellas Circuit Judge George Greer and the state's high court both reject the family's latest motion, which claimed Terri tried to say "I want to live" hours before her tube was removed. Following the decisions, the Schindlers say they will stop asking courts to intervene in the case.
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The Schindlers' attorney tells CBS' "Face the Nation" that Terri has "passed where physically she would be able to recover." Meanwhile, she is given communion wine after her husband allows her to receive the sacrament in celebration of Easter Sunday.
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The 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agrees to consider the Schindler's motion for a new hearing. But the court then denies the appeal, which argued the federal judge in Tampa should have looked at the entire state court record. Later, a last appeal to the Supreme Court is also refused.
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The attorney for Terri Schiavo's husband announces that she has died. The news comes nearly two weeks after the brain-damaged woman was disconnected from the feeding tube that had kept her alive for years.
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An autopsy concludes Schiavo did not appear to have had a heart attack when she collapsed, and finds no evidence of harmful drugs or trauma, either. The medical examiner also says her brain was half its size when she died, and efforts to give her food or drink by mouth would have failed.
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Credits:
CBS News, Associated Press
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