With less than an hour before life support was due to be withdrawn, a judge in a California superior court extended a deadline to keep a 13-year-old on a ventilator as her family struggles to move her to a new facility.
The order, issued by Alameda County Superior Court Judge Evelio Grillo, nullifies a deadline set for Monday that would have removed Jahi McMath from life support, extending the order until Jan. 7.
"In essence, the court orders the respondent (Oakland Children's Hospital) to maintain the 'status quo,'" Grillo's order said.
Earlier Monday, Jahi McMath's uncle, Omari Sealey, said the family had filed a new complaint in federal court requesting an injunction against Grillo's deadline set last week that would have allowed the hospital to remove Jahi from life support at 5 p.m. PST Monday.
Sealey claimed that Jahi, who was declared brain dead earlier this month following a tonsillectomy at the hospital, is showing signs of movement and that an unnamed pediatrician has visited her and claims she is not dead.
"Jahi is moving when her mother speaks to her, and when her mother touches her," Sealey said in his brief statement. He did not take questions from reporters.
The family has located a licensed facility in New York that will take her and has contracted with an ambulance company that will transfer her, Sealey said.
Doctors at Oakland Children's Hospital and an independent pediatric neurologist from Stanford University have concluded the girl is brain dead. The hospital has refused to perform a tracheotomy for breathing and insert a feeding tube, necessary procedures in order to transfer Jahi, saying it's unethical to perform surgery on a person legally declared dead.
On Sunday, the hospital said it had not heard from the New York, or any other, facility about a transfer.
"We need to be able to talk to the other facility to understand what it is they are capable of doing," Cynthia Chiarappa, a hospital spokeswoman, said. "This is not transferring an individual in a vegetative state, but a dead body."
The hospital also said it would need to confirm there is "lawful transportation" included in any plan to transfer Jahi, and written permission from the coroner.
The hospital's lawyer, Douglas Straus, said in a letter to Jahi's family on Sunday that the hospital has required three conditions to transfer Jahi, including assurance from the new facility.
"Discussion about performing medical procedures upon a dead body presents unusual and complicated questions. Until there is a definite commitment by a facility to accept Jahi's body upon specified terms, I don't think I can tackle those issues," the hospital's lawyer, Straus wrote.
Straus also wrote that the hospital needs to be presented with a "lawful transportation plan" and written approval from the Alameda County coroner to send the teen's body out of state.
With the clock ticking, the family has raised more than $22,000 through the fundraising website in the chance of a possible transfer.
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