Girl's changed condition leads state agency to maintain life support

Published: 2006-01-25

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (CNS) -- The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court had ruled that the state Department of Social Services can withdraw life support from 11-year-old Haleigh Poutre. But shortly after the ruling the department reconsidered its position as signs indicated that the girl could be emerging from a vegetative state. Poutre's case provoked wide public attention in January, and Gov. Mitt Romney announced Jan. 23 he would appoint an independent panel to review it. The girl was allegedly beaten Sept. 11 by her adoptive mother, Holli A. Strickland. Media reports said she was hospitalized in a "semi-comatose state" with severe brain damage. Two days later, after being brought to Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, she was placed in the custody of the Department of Social Services. By Sept. 19, three days before her adoptive mother and the mother's grandmother were found dead in what police have described as an apparent murder-suicide or double suicide, the government agency had tried to remove Poutre's ventilator and feeding tube.

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