Update on the Ruthie Webster Right to Live case

Many people have contacted us regarding Ms. Webster and wanting an update on the case.

Last week Ms. Webster was moved to a long term care facility in Illinois that has the capability to do in-patient dialysis. This facility was located through the tireless work of her family.

Since Ms. Webster was moved, the injunction will now be dissolved as it served its purpose, this time, and allowed us to prevent the doctors from killing her until we could get her moved.

However, our fight still continues. In our lawsuit we sued the State of Texas through the office of the Attorney General and are continuing our quest to have this law declared unconstitutional and void. That battle is still ahead of us.

We have been gratified to see the amount of interest in this case from across the globe and would urge everyone to continue talking about it and spreading the word. While Ms. Webster is out of danger for right now, there are many other people in Texas who are or will be facing similar situations in the future.

Please contact your state or federal representative and let them know you disapprove of this law. Contact your local news media, television and print, and let them know this topic is of interest to you.

Last, contact the Attorney General's office in Austin, Texas and let them know how the public feels about this law.

Criminal Law - Court Appointed Lawyers

The Sixth Amendment to the Unites States Constitution guarantees anyone accused of a crime for which they can be imprisoned the right to an attorney. This right has been repeatedly confirmed in a series of Supreme Court cases including the most famous, Gideon v. Wainwright.

Crimes for which the punishment is a fine only (for example traffic tickets) do not carry this guarantee.

If you're reading this then it is likely either you or a loved one have been accused of a crime, and the question you have is "Do I get a Court Appointed attorney?"

For purposes of this blawg entry I am going to assume it is you who have been accused.

There are two misconceptions I want to clear up right away. The first is, court appointed doesn't necessarily mean free. In order to qualify for a court appointed attorney a judge must make a decision that you are indigent and unable to afford an attorney. It is common practice for a judge to look at your finances and decide that, no, you don't have the money to afford an attorney right away but at the same time you are financially capable of making payments to the county which will be applied against your appointed attorney's fees. If you can't afford to do this, then the judge will likely give you an attorney and not require you to make payments yet. That yet is important because if you plead guilty or are found guilty after trial and placed on probation, as a part of that probation you will be required to reimburse the county for the money they paid your attorney. Typically, the amount which was paid to the attorney was significantly lower than what you would have been charged if you had hired them.

Another misconception that people have is that court appointed attorneys are not good attorneys. Most of the attorneys that agree to handle these cases do so because they like to do criminal law. It is fun, is not as paperwork intensive as civil law, and is often resolved much faster so there is no time for the case to become stale and uninteresting.

On the other end of the spectrum there are some attorneys who take these kind of cases because they are "easy money". Their only thought is to plead you out quickly so they can make the most money for as little effort as possible. Unfortunately, this is often condoned by the prosecutor, who wants his conviction record to look as good as possible, and the judge, who wants to keep their docket moving. In these type of cases the Defendant is not represented correctly and is often convinced to take a plea bargain that is not in their best interest.

The main disadvantage to the court appointed attorney system is that the attorney you are given is a gamble. You do not get to pick who your attorney is, therefore you may end up with a great one or you may end up with a bad one. The second disadvantage is that you often will not receive the same "hand holding" as a client who has paid for their lawyer. In my opinion, lawyers don't do a worse job for the people to whom they have been court appointed clients, it's just that these clients do not get all the frills and personal attention as those who have paid thousands of dollars for the lawyer's services.

If you are facing this decision and have the financial capabilities to hire an attorney then you should do so. First for ethical reasons, the system was designed for those who truly cannot afford an attorney. The second reason you should retain counsel is so that you can choose who will represent you.

We will discuss the factors to look at in choosing an attorney in a later blawg article.

Written by Robert D. Bennett. For more information please visit the Bennett Law Office website.

The Basics of Divorce

Start with the proposition that a divorce is a lawsuit.

One person versus another person.

The Basics

A divorce is started by filing a petition.

This petition should be filed in the county in which either party has resided for a period of 90 days prior to the filing. At least one of the parties is also required to have lived in Texas for at least 180 days prior to filing.

This is a legal document, filed with the District Clerk, which tells the judge why you want a divorce and what all is involved.

The District Clerk will charge a filing fee for the right to file the petition. These fees are set by the legislature with some discretion left to the District Clerk. The usual fee for filing a divorce is around $200.00. If a party is unable to afford the filing fee you can file an “Affidavit of Inability to Pay Court Costs”, which may enable these fees to be waived.

After the divorce is filed, the soon to be ex needs to be formally notified either by “serving” them with a copy of the divorce petition or by simply handing them a copy of the petition and having them “waive service”.

A divorce may not be granted until the petition had been filed at least 60 days.

After the time limit has expired, a final hearing can be set, at which all issues pending in the divorce are heard. The issues may include a division of the property, if there are children, where the children will reside (with the “custodial” parent), the amount of child support to be paid, the visitation schedule for the non-custodial parent, and any other issues on which an agreement cannot be reached. This final hearing can be as brief as a few minutes and as long as weeks, if a jury trial is required.

Following the final hearing, the judge will enter a decree of divorce which divides the property and sets forth the rules concerning the children.

Children fight to prevent doctors from killing their mother

What's right is right and what's wrong is wrong.

A doctor and hospital are trying to take the life of a 61 year old woman against the wishes of her family.

If you read this blog, please support us by calling your state senator or representative and let them know how you feel about this issue. Contact us to let us know what you've done so we can follow up.

The law in Texas is atrocious, and allows health care providers to overrule a patient and family's decisions on right to live.

This is the first article in the news media to address a case we are working on now. Stay tuned for more information.

To help in this fight, contact us through our website and call your State Senator or Representative and ask them to join with us in this fight to save a life.


From the Dallas Morning News

Children fight to save mom

Carrollton: Hospital seeks to end care of woman with brain injury

08:14 AM CDT on Friday, August 18, 2006

By EMILY RAMSHAW / The Dallas Morning News

The children of a North Texas woman with a severe brain injury are fighting to keep her alive, after a Carrollton hospital ruled it would discontinue life-saving treatments.

And the family's attorneys are waging a legal battle to prove that a Texas statute allowing hospitals to end treatment against the family's will is unconstitutional.

Lacresia Webster and her siblings say their mother, Ruthie Webster, is deeply religious and believes only God should give and take life. While Ruthie Webster has been largely unresponsive since early this summer, when a bad reaction to a kidney dialysis treatment sent her into seizures, her kids say she has shown signs of improvement. The 61-year-old is now breathing without a ventilator.

"My mom spent her life in the church. She always felt like, 'Who are we to decide? God decides,' " Lacresia Webster said Thursday. "If this is the way she's going to be, she's still my mom. I'm not giving up on her."

But documents signed by officials at Regency Hospital of North Dallas, where Ruthie Webster has been since late June, indicate that Mrs. Webster is not expected to recover and that continuing the treatments would be futile.

Mrs. Webster has not been declared brain dead, and hospital officials wouldn't say whether she's in a vegetative state. But family members said she appears to be in a coma: She opens her eyes and moves her feet and hands slightly but doesn't speak.

'No appreciable change'

Last week, the hospital's bioethics committee unanimously decided to end Mrs. Webster's dialysis treatments "for compassionate reasons." In a letter to Mrs. Webster's children, Twila Loudder, the hospital's director of quality management, wrote that Mrs. Webster's physician "has seen no appreciable change in your mother's medical condition."

Kay Peck, the hospital's chief operating officer, acknowledged that the Webster family has disagreed with physicians about whether to discontinue treatments. She declined to comment on the case, citing privacy concerns.

"We've been trying to follow the processes that are in place," she said. "We cannot discuss any of the actions of the ethics committee."

Under Texas' Health and Safety Code, if a physician and a family disagree about whether to continue a patient's care, the decision goes before the hospital's ethics committee. If the ethics committee decides treatment should be ended, the family has 10 days to find another medical facility that will continue caring for the patient.

Restraining order

On Aug. 8, just days after Mrs. Webster's insurance stopped fully covering her long-term care, Regency's ethics committee notified Lacresia Webster that they'd be taking her mother off her dialysis treatments within 10 days, Mrs. Webster's daughter said.

On Wednesday, attorneys working pro bono with the Webster family were granted a temporary restraining order by a judge to keep their mother alive at Regency. The next hearing on Mrs. Webster's treatment is scheduled for Aug. 28 in Bowie County, Mrs. Webster's home.

Meanwhile, the Webster children and their attorneys have filed another lawsuit – against Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott – that challenges the state's end-of-life law as unconstitutional.

"It allows a doctor to completely ignore what I've told them I wanted to do, my living will," said Robert Bennett, the Websters' attorney. "Mrs. Webster was a Baptist. She told her daughters very clearly that God would take her when it's her time to go. This statute violates her freedom of religion."

Hospital offers to help

Mr. Bennett said that so far, Regency has taken great care of Mrs. Webster. All of her bedsores healed, he said. And in letters to family members since the decision to remove Mrs. Webster's treatment, hospital officials offered to help them seek another facility for her. The hospital has informally agreed to cover the costs of the move, Mr. Bennett said.

But for the Webster children, who are considering moving their mother to facilities in Atlanta or Indiana, it's the principle that matters. They don't want to be forced to move their mother. And they certainly don't want anyone outside of the family deciding when it's time to end treatments.

"My mother, she's breathing on her own, just like you and I are today," said Helena Webster Hill, who lives in Atlanta. "As long as she's fighting to live, we believe we ought to stand with her and fight with her."

E-mail eramshaw@dallasnews.com

Who should have the right to determine if a patient lives or dies? The doctor or the patient's family?

When the Terri Schiavo case was raging last year many people missed a very important point. While George W. Bush was Governor of Texas a law was enacted which allowed doctors to override the wishes of the patient and the family and discontinue life sustaining medical treatment.
Texas Health and Safety Code Sec. 166.046 sets forth the procedures to be undergone to prevent the physician from imposing his will on the patient. The procedure is weighted heavily in favor of the physician and is very time sensitive which will make it expensive to retain attorneys.
The statute also restricts the relief available from the court even when suit is filed.
There have been very few cases challenging this law yet, but that is likely to change as more people are made aware of this abomination in our law.
Posted by Robert D. Bennett of http://www.bennettlawoffice.com/.

Advice for the absent/divorced parent

The main problem absentee parents (known in legal parlance as non-custodial) have is remaining a part of their child's life on a regular basis. There are several small things the parent can do to prevent this:

1) Make it easy for your child to call you. Get a toll free number or give them a calling card;

2) Start a photo album with your child, and take photos when you're together, then send them photos when they're not with you;

3) Use emails and instant messages to stay in touch daily. This not only shows you care but also allows you to visit in a way that doesn't intrude on your ex's daily life;

4) Start a "you and them" webpage at a site like MySpace. Both of you, when you're apart and when you're together, add items that are important to you;

5) Have nighttime story hour every night. You can do this by recording yourself on tape or a digital file reading a bedtime story to them;

6) Use a video camera or a web cam to record important events in your life and to chat back and forth;

7) Watch the same television shows while you're apart and discuss while watching them or later; and

8) Send self addressed and stamped envelopes so the child can write you conveniently.

Remember, it's the little things that make a difference.

Posted by Robert D. Bennett from www.bennettlawoffice.com