Jahi McMath’s family wants her declared 'alive again’ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Photo: Uncredited, Associated Press Image 1 of / 16 Caption Close Image 1 of 16 This file photo provided by the McMath family and Omari Sealey shows Jahi McMath. McMath remains on life support after doctors declared her brain dead, following a supposedly routine tonsillectomy. This file photo provided by the McMath family and Omari Sealey shows Jahi McMath. McMath remains on life support after doctors declared her brain dead, following a supposedly routine tonsillectomy. Photo: Uncredited, Associated Press Image 2 of 16 The mother of Jahi McMath, Nailah Winkfield, (left) and Dr. DeTrice Rodgers, Jahi's 5th grade teacher, embrace after they stated that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to January 7th 2014. The statement was made by the family to the news media in front of Children's Hospital in Oakland, Ca. , on Monday Dec. 30, 2013. 13-year-old Jahi McMath is slated to be removed from a ventilator at 5pm this afternoon, after being declared brain-dead by the hospital. less The mother of Jahi McMath, Nailah Winkfield, (left) and Dr. DeTrice Rodgers, Jahi's 5th grade teacher, embrace after they stated that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to ... more Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 3 of 16 Martin Winkfield, stepfather of Jahi McMath, reacts to testimony at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to determine the condition of the 13-year-old in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. At right is Jahi's grandmother Sandra Chatman. McMath was determined to be clinically brain dead following complications from a routine tonsillectomy at Children's Hospital in Oakland. Dr. Paul Fisher, chief of pediatric neurology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, concluded that Jahi meets all the criteria of brain death. less Martin Winkfield, stepfather of Jahi McMath, reacts to testimony at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to determine the condition of the 13-year-old in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. At ... more Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 4 of 16 Attorney Christopher Dolan, left, representing the family of Jahi McMath, gestures beside Omari Sealey, Jahi's uncle, during a media conference Monday, Jan. 6, 2014, in San Francisco. 
 
 Attorney Christopher Dolan, left, representing the family of Jahi McMath, gestures beside Omari Sealey, Jahi's uncle, during a media conference Monday, Jan. 6, 2014, in San Francisco. Photo: Ben Margot, Associated Press Image 5 of 16 This undated photo provided by the McMath family and Omari Sealey shows Jahi McMath. This undated photo provided by the McMath family and Omari Sealey shows Jahi McMath. Photo: Associated Press Image 6 of 16 
 
 less Marvin Winkfield, stepfather of 13-year-old Jahi McMath, waits outside a courtroom Friday, Jan. 3, 2014, in Oakland, Calif. A federal magistrate was expected to meet Friday with lawyers to try to resolve a dispute over the care of Jahi McMath, a 13-year-old girl who was declared brain dead after tonsil surgery. Marvin Winkfield, stepfather of 13-year-old Jahi McMath, waits outside a courtroom Friday, Jan. 3, 2014, in Oakland, Calif. A federal magistrate was expected to meet Friday with lawyers to try to resolve a ... more Photo: Ben Margot, Associated Press Image 7 of 16 Nailah Winkfield, mother of Jahi McMath, gets a hug from a well-wisher after a prayer vigil for her daughter at Paradise Baptist Church in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2013. McMath became brain dead after a tonsil surgery that was followed by bleeding and a heart attack while recovering in the hospital. less Nailah Winkfield, mother of Jahi McMath, gets a hug from a well-wisher after a prayer vigil for her daughter at Paradise Baptist Church in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 18, 2013. McMath became brain dead ... more Photo: Mathew Sumner, Special To The Chronicle Image 8 of 16 Omari Sealey (left), Jahi McMath's uncle, walks back into Children's Hospital with attorney Christopher Dolan after a news conference in Oakland, Calif. on Thursday, Dec. 19, 2013. 
 
 Omari Sealey (left), Jahi McMath's uncle, walks back into Children's Hospital with attorney Christopher Dolan after a news conference in Oakland, Calif. on Thursday, Dec. 19, 2013. Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 9 of 16 Dr. Paul Fisher (front), chief of pediatric neurology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, emreges from a closed door session in Judge Evilio Grillo's chambers at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to determine the condition of 13-year-old Jahi McMath in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. McMath was determined to be clinically brain dead following complications from a routine tonsillectomy at Children's Hospital in Oakland. Dr. Fisher concluded that Jahi meets all the criteria of brain death. less Dr. Paul Fisher (front), chief of pediatric neurology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, emreges from a closed door session in Judge Evilio Grillo's chambers at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to ... more Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 10 of 16 Alameda County Superior Court judge Evilio Grillo convenes a hearing to determine the condition of 13-year-old Jahi McMath in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. McMath was determined to be clinically brain dead following complications from a routine tonsillectomy at Children's Hospital in Oakland. Dr. Paul Fisher, chief of pediatric neurology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, concurred that Jahi meets all the criteria of brain death. less Alameda County Superior Court judge Evilio Grillo convenes a hearing to determine the condition of 13-year-old Jahi McMath in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. McMath was determined to be clinically ... more Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 11 of 16 Martin Winkfield, stepfather of Jahi McMath, reacts to testimony at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to determine the condition of the 13-year-old in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. At right is Jahi's grandmother Sandra Chatman. McMath was determined to be clinically brain dead following complications from a routine tonsillectomy at Children's Hospital in Oakland. Dr. Paul Fisher, chief of pediatric neurology at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, concluded that Jahi meets all the criteria of brain death. less Martin Winkfield, stepfather of Jahi McMath, reacts to testimony at a hearing in Alameda County Superior Court to determine the condition of the 13-year-old in Oakland, Calif. on Tuesday, Dec. 24, 2013. At ... more Photo: Paul Chinn, The Chronicle Image 12 of 16 Sam Singer, the spokesperson for the hospital makes a statement to the news media in front of Children's Hospital in Oakland, Ca., on Monday Dec. 30, 2013. 
 
 Sam Singer, the spokesperson for the hospital makes a statement to the news media in front of Children's Hospital in Oakland, Ca., on Monday Dec. 30, 2013. Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 13 of 16 The Uncle of Jahi McMath, Omari Sealey states that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to January 7th 2014. The statement was made by the family to the news media in front of Children's Hospital in Oakland, Ca. , on Monday Dec. 30, 2013. 13-year-old Jahi McMath was slated to be removed from a ventilator, after being declared brain-dead by the hospital. less The Uncle of Jahi McMath, Omari Sealey states that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to January 7th 2014. The statement was made by the family to the news media in front of ... more Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 14 of 16 The mother of Jahi McMath, Nailah Winkfield embraces her brother Omari Sealey, after they stated that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to January 7th 2014. The statement was made by the family to the news media in front of Children's Hospital in Oakland, Ca. , on Monday Dec. 30, 2013. 13-year-old Jahi McMath was slated to be removed from a ventilator, after being declared brain-dead by the hospital. less The mother of Jahi McMath, Nailah Winkfield embraces her brother Omari Sealey, after they stated that the court order to remove Jahi from a ventilator has been extended to January 7th 2014. The statement was ... more Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 15 of 16 Family members of 13-year-old Oakland teen Jahi McMath are holding out hope for a miracle recovery after a routine procedure has left the girl brain dead. Family members of 13-year-old Oakland teen Jahi McMath are holding out hope for a miracle recovery after a routine procedure has left the girl brain dead. Photo: CBS San Francisco Image 16 of 16 Jahi McMath’s family wants her declared 'alive again’ 1 / 16 Back to Gallery 
 
 Nearly 10 months after doctors found that Oakland teenager Jahi McMath was brain-dead, an attorney for her family has petitioned an Alameda County judge to have her declared “alive again.” 
 
 “I have medical experts, including world-class experts on brain death, who will testify she is not brain-dead,” attorney Chris Dolan said Wednesday, calling a judge’s refusal last year to compel a hospital to care for her “a grave injustice.” 
 
 If a judge sides with the family, it could lead to Jahi being cared for at state taxpayers’ expense — though Dolan insists that’s not the reason for his filing Tuesday in Alameda County Superior Court. 
 
 The filing sets up the next chapter in the drama over 13-year-old Jahi, who has reportedly spent the past several months being looked after at a Roman Catholic hospital in New Jersey, at private expense. 
 
 Jahi suffered cardiac arrest and was declared brain-dead by her doctors at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland in December after what was supposed to be a routine operation to deal with her sleep apnea. The girl’s family said she seemed fine coming out of surgery, but that blood soon started pouring from her nose and mouth, and she went into cardiac arrest. 
 
 The Alameda County coroner signed her death certificate Dec. 12. Her family, however, insisted Jahi was still alive. Her mother said God might “spark her brain awake” and that she should have control over all medical decisions involving her daughter — including having Jahi kept on a ventilator. 
 
 Judge Evelio Grillo of Alameda County Superior Court refused to order Children’s Hospital to do so, concluding Dec. 24 that there was “clear and convincing evidence that Jahi had suffered brain death.” Dolan, however, eventually won a court order allowing the family to take possession of the girl. 
 
 In March, her uncle said Jahi was still unconscious and on a ventilator, but that she looked healthy and regularly moved her head, legs and arms. 
 
 The uncle would not reveal Jahi’s location. Dolan said he would neither confirm nor deny published reports that she is in the pediatric intensive care unit at St. Peter’s University Hospital in New Brunswick, N.J. 
 
 Nor would Dolan say who is paying for Jahi’s stay. He says the latest legal maneuver is not about money, but he acknowledged that “she would be eligible for the same state benefits as every other person not brain-dead on a ventilator, and who gets full medical care.” 
 
 He added that the family wanted Jahi to be looked after in California “and not have somebody pull the ventilator on her if she is in the hospital.” 
 
 If Jahi is declared alive, UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland could be responsible for her medical costs. 
 
 In a statement, hospital Senior Vice President David Durand said only that Children’s “extends it heartfelt sympathy” to Jahi’s family and that it would await a court ruling. 
 
 In a filing with the court, attorneys for Children’s said Grillo’s ruling upholding the death declaration was “well-supported in fact and law.” 
 
 What’s more, they said, Dolan missed the deadline to request a rehearing by seven months, and therefore the court no longer has jurisdiction to hear it. 
 
 Dolan argues that the court does have the legal authority to rule “in the interests of justice, which are literally those of life and death.” 

 OAKLAND -- An attorney for the family of Jahi McMath says new tests show the 13-year-old girl has regained brain activity, and he is asking a Bay Area court to take the unprecedented step of reversing its finding that she is dead. 
 
 In court documents filed Tuesday, attorney Christopher Dolan challenges long-standing medical and legal definitions of death on behalf of the Oakland girl, who has been kept on machines that feed her and keep her organs functioning since a medical mishap in December. 
 
 Experts say Jahi's recovery would be nothing short of a miracle. Unlike a coma, brain death is the loss of all brain function, an irreversible and universally accepted form of death. Jahi would be the first known person to regain consciousness after a declaration of brain death, experts say. 
 
 Jahi McMath (Omari Sealey) 
 
 "It's the only case of its kind ever," Dolan said by phone Wednesday. "Jahi is 'Patient 1.' This is a real person we are talking about, a live person who feels pain. She isn't suffering." 
 
 In his court filing, Dolan said an MRI, a brain test that records electrical activity of the brain, and Jahi's response to commands from her mother, Nailah Winkfield, are evidence that her brain death was not "irreversible." A test last year performed by a court-appointed physician from Stanford showed no brain activity because of the swelling of her brain, according to the court papers. The swelling has receded, Dolan says, and the new tests show something different. 
 
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 Arthur Caplan, director of the division of medical ethics at New York University's School of Medicine, said any recovery from brain death would be a first and in this case "miraculous since she was declared dead three times." 
 
 "This would force us to re-examine the whole nature of death in America," Caplan said. "But I don't believe it." 
 
 Dolan said his experts who have evaluated Jahi and will testify in court are "certified neurologists, pediatric neurologists and a prominent world expert on brain death." He wouldn't name the experts and they aren't named in court papers, though Dolan said he plans to file the experts' declarations in court Friday. He is asking Alameda County Superior Court Judge Evelio Grillo to hear the petition to reconsider earlier determinations that Jahi has no brain function. 
 
 Attorneys for UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital Oakland, where Jahi was first treated, have filed documents asserting that "there are no substantive grounds and no available procedures for any challenge" to the court's finding that Jahi is brain dead. 
 
 David Durand, senior vice president and chief medical officer for the hospital, said in a statement Wednesday that while the hospital has had no contact with Jahi's family since she left in January, the staff "extends its heartfelt sympathy for the family." 
 
 "We trust that the California courts, the Alameda County coroner and the state of California will evaluate any claims made by the family's attorneys and decide them in a lawful and just manner," Durand said in the statement. 
 
 The new court filings are the first major development in Jahi's story in months. She was declared brain dead on Dec. 12, 2013 after a series of operations to remove her tonsils and tissue from her nose and throat at the Oakland hospital. She started bleeding shortly after surgery, eventually going into cardiac arrest. 
 
 Three brain activity tests -- including one by an independent physician -- found that Jahi had no brain function. Robert Heidersbach and Robin Shanahan of Children's Hospital Oakland and Paul Graham Fisher of Stanford Hospital -- the three doctors who declared Jahi brain dead -- could not be immediately reached for comment Wednesday. 
 
 Jahi continued to receive feeding and breathing support after the diagnosis as her family engaged hospital officials in a legal battle to keep her on organ support in hopes that she would one day wake up. 
 
 On Jan. 3, the family and hospital agreed, through a compromise forged in court, that Jahi's mother could remove her from the hospital as long as she took responsibility for the child's care. As part of the agreement, the Alameda County Coroner's Office issued a death certificate, allowing her to be released from the hospital on the condition that when her organs shut down, the family would have to notify the coroner and bring her body back to Oakland. 
 
 A request to amend Jahi's death certificate could be a first for the county, and by law would have to amended by the state, according to Alameda County Counsel Donna Ziegler. The California Department of Public Health, which oversees vital records, allows death records to be amended -- but only to correct spelling errors and add information that was not known at the time of death. Changes to the time, place and cause of death have to be performed by a physician or coroner. 
 
 Jahi left the Oakland hospital on Jan. 5. For three months, little was known about her whereabouts until reports emerged that the teen was taken to Saint Peter's Children's Hospital in New Brunswick, N.J. She likely went there because a 1991 state law gives patients and their families the right to reject a medical diagnosis of brain death on religious grounds and decide whether to continue organ support. 
 
 The family maintains that Jahi responds to voice commands and touch. The new court documents say the teen has entered into puberty and started her menstrual cycle. 
 
 An Oct. 9 hearing is set between attorneys for McMath, Children's Hospital and Alameda County. 
 
 Dolan called the upcoming court case "the greatest challenge of my legal career." 
 
 "I never gave up on this family," said Dolan, the family's attorney since December. "I wouldn't stick my neck out without concrete proof." 
 
 David DeBolt and Kristin J. Bender cover breaking news. Follow them at Twitter.com/daviddebolt and Twitter.com/kjbender.
– Jahi McMath, the 13-year-old girl declared brain-dead not long after having her tonsils removed in December, has been kept on feeding and breathing support at Saint Peter's University Hospital in New Brunswick, NJ. Now the Oakland, Calif., girl's family says Jahi is once again showing brain activity, and they're asking a Bay Area court to walk back its declaration that she is dead, reports the San Jose Mercury News. The newspaper notes that were this to happen, it would mark the first time an individual declared brain-dead was found to regain brain activity. One prominent physician says such a reversal would be miraculous and "would force us to re-examine the whole nature of death in America." Then he added, "But I don't believe it." The family's attorney, meanwhile, says he has "medical experts, including world-class experts on brain death, who will testify she is not brain-dead." In court documents filed Tuesday, Christopher Dolan also cited an MRI and claimed Jahi now responds to commands given by her mother. He says the determination of brain death occurred when there was swelling in her brain, and he says that swelling has subsided. While family members haven't disclosed who is privately paying for Jahi's care, they've acknowledged that by reversing her status as dead, she'd be eligible for state benefits just like others who are on ventilators and not brain-dead, reports the San Francisco Chronicle. A hearing is set for Thursday. (Back in March, Jahi's uncle said that not only was Jahi alive, but that she knew where she was.)