WASHINGTON -- The Children's National Medical Center is seeking a court order that would allow the hospital to disconnect a 12-year-old boy from a ventilator and end the medications that keep his heart beating.
The hospital says the boy is brain dead. However, the boy's parents are Orthodox Jews, and their attorney says the concept of brain death is not recognized by Jewish law. Attorney Jeffrey Zuckerman says the family's beliefs should be respected.
The boy, Motl Brody of Brooklyn, N.Y., was diagnosed with severe brain cancer and has been at the hospital for six months. Doctors pronounced him dead Tuesday after tests found no brain activity.
In documents filed at D.C. Superior Court, the hospital says its "scarce resources are being used for the preservation of a deceased body."
