Florida Governor Jeb Bush announced on Thursday that he was ending his inquiry into the collapse of Terri Schiavo which occurred in 1990.
After Schiavo's autopsy results were released last month, Bush had demanded that State Attorney Bernie McCabe investigate what Bush called a possible discrepancy between the time Michael Schiavo remembered his wife collapsing and the time he called 911.
Bush wrote a brief, letter to McCabe saying the state was now ending its involvement in the Schiavo case.
'Based on your conclusions, I will follow your recommendation that the inquiry by the state be closed,' Bush wrote.
McCabe's letter to Bush was dated June 30 but was just made public late Thursday. The cover letter to the report said that Michael Schiavo's accounts of the day his wife collapsed were consistent.
'This consistency, coupled with the varying recollections of the precise time offered by other interested parties, lead me to the conclusion that such discrepancies are not indicative of criminal activity,' McCabe wrote.
David Gibbs, an attorney for Terri Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, indicated the family was disappointed by the state's inquiry. Gibbs indicated that the Schindlers felt the investigation was rushed telling the Associated Press, 'We had thought they would meet with the family,' was the reaction Gibbs told reporters the Schindlers had to the report.
The Schindlers fought to keep their daughter attached to a feeding tube despite the fact that she was in a persistent vegetative state, a fact that they denied.
This divisive right-to-die case touched many people on both sides of the political fence. Governor Bush, the U.S. Supreme Court, Congress and even President Bush all became involved in the case. Terri Schiavo died on March 31, approximately 13 days after the feeding tube was removed by a Florida judge's order.
Governor Bush's latest move to investigate the alleged discrepancy in the time of the 911 call two months after Schiavo's death and 15 years after the her collapse struck many critics as a purely political move done to pander to religious right.
