Fight to save brain dead boy heads to D.C. court

WASHINGTON - The future surrounding a 12-year-old boy with brain cancer could be determined in a local courtroom.

Motl Brody of Brooklyn, N.Y., was pronounced brain dead last week after a half-year fight against a brain tumor, and doctors at Children's National Medical Center in the District say the seventh-grader's brain has ceased functioning entirely.

In D.C., and most states, death is defined by either the cessation of brain activity or heart and lung activity. And for the past week, a machine has continued to inflate and deflate his lungs. As of late Friday afternoon, his heart was still beating with the help of a cocktail of intravenous drugs and adrenaline.

Attorney Jeffrey Zuckerman, who represents Brody and his parents, are fighting the hospital's request to take him off life support, despite having no brain activity for months. The Brodys are Orthodox Jews.

"His lungs and heart are functioning; and therefore, we say he's alive," Zuckerman says. "We would like the hospital to continue medical treatment."

MaryAnne Hilliard with Children's Hospital says scarcity of ICU resources is the main reason the hospital asked the family to transfer the boy to a hospice.

"I believe this is very hard on everyone involved. We did take care of this child until the time that he died, but this child is no longer with us."

A judge will hear evidence and testimony on Thursday.

Under some interpretations of Jewish religious law, including the one accepted by the family's Hasidic sect, death occurs only when the heart and lungs stop functioning.

That means Motl "is alive, and his family has a religious obligation to secure all necessary and appropriate medical treatment to keep him alive," Zuckerman wrote in a court filing last week.

The family has asked the hospital to leave the breathing machine on and keep administering drugs until the boy's heart and lungs no longer respond.

Disagreements between families and medical providers over when to end care for terminally ill patients are common, experts say, but this case wound up in court with unusual speed.

Unlike Terri Schiavo or Karen Ann Quinlan, who became the subjects of right-to-die battles when they suffered brain damage and became unconscious, Motl's condition has deteriorated beyond a persistent vegetative state, his physicians say.

The hospital said it would help the family move what it called the boy's "earthly remains" to another medical facility, but has found none willing to accept a brain-dead child.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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