Maria de Jesus Arroyo was declared dead after suffering a cardiac arrest at her home in Boyle Heights, LA, but her family later claimed she was placed in a morgue freezer while still alive
A cherished grandmother’s apparently lifeless body was sealed in a body bag and placed into a freezer – but she was still very much alive.
Maria de Jesus Arroyo collapsed at her Boyle Heights residence in LA, California, following a cardiac arrest on July 26, 2010. She was transported to White Memorial Medical Center, where medics declared her dead.
According to legal documents, Maria’s body was stored in a refrigerated hospital mortuary. However, when funeral home workers collected her several days later, they found her positioned face-down in a partially opened bag, her nose fractured and her face battered.
The family’s legal action against the hospital claims that the 80-year-old woman was put into a morgue freezer whilst still breathing – and subsequently perished from the freezing temperatures.
The horrific mistake wasn’t uncovered until undertakers began preparing her remains for the service and discovered her lying face down in the half-opened body bag, reports the Mirror.
A pathologist employed by the family, Dr William Manion, subsequently determined she had been conscious when placed in the freezer and had suffered her wounds whilst attempting to break free from the body bag after awakening in the frigid conditions.
In legal filings, the pathologist maintained the woman had been “frozen alive, “eventually woke up” and “damaged her face and turned herself face down as she struggled unsuccessfully to escape her frozen tomb.”
Her family initially lodged a negligence claim in January 2011. Following receipt of Manion’s report in 2012, they pursued an additional wrongful death and medical malpractice lawsuit.
A lower court threw out the case on statute-of-limitations grounds, but in a crucial ruling, California’s Second District Court of Appeal revived the suit.
The court determined that “Plaintiffs had absolutely no reason to suspect that the decedent was alive rather than dead when placed in the hospital morgue,” concluding that the family could not reasonably have brought a wrongful-death claim sooner.
The hospital has repeatedly refuted any misconduct. White Memorial stated it adhered to correct procedures.
It said in a statement at the time: “We continue to disagree with the allegations being made. We followed all proper protocols in the matter, and are confident that once the facts of the case are reviewed we will prevail in court.”
Solicitor Scott Schutzman, who acted for the Arroyo family at the time, characterised the case as “your worst nightmare,” adding in an interview with the newspaper: “Can you imagine trying to get out of a zippered bag?”
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