< Back to front page Text size – +

Worcester judge's ruling will remove beaten boy from life support

E-mail|Link|Comments () June 24, 2009 07:33 PM

(Telegram & Gazette)

By Matt Collette, Globe Correspondent

WORCESTER – A juvenile court judge today issued a ruling that ended life support for a 7-year-old boy who was declared brain-dead after allegedly being severely beaten by his own father on Father's Day.

Nathaniel Turner had been treated at UMass Memorial Medical Center in Worcester. He was declared brain-dead as of 4:10 p.m. Tuesday.

Juvenile Court Judge Carol A. Erskine agreed with doctors today that the boy was already dead, a ruling that meant he could be removed from life support.

Worcester District Attorney Joseph D. Early Jr. said prosecutors would now charge the boy's father, Leslie Schuler of Worcester, with homicide. Schuler and his girlfriend, Tiffany Hyman, had pleaded not guilty in Worcester District Court on Tuesday to multiple assault charges.

"What we do have now is we go from a case of assault and battery and serious bodily injury to a child to a homicide investigation," Early said.

Dr. Scot Bateman, chief of pediatric critical care at the hospital, had outlined his medical conclusions earlier to the judge as attorneys for the boy, the boy’s mother, the Department of Children and Families, and the boy’s father pressed the judge to settle the boy’s fate.

Only Schuler's attorney urged Erskine to pursue every possible medical avenue to keep the boy breathing. The other parties told the judge they agreed with Bateman’s conclusion that Turner was brain-dead and they asked that life support be ended.

The doctor explained that because the child's brain injuries were so traumatic, there was no way for blood to enter and deliver oxygen to brain cells. The child was on a ventilator and was being given medication to increase his blood pressure so that his heart would continue to pump

"I declared this patient dead at 16:10 [4:10 p.m.] last night, and my position has not changed since then," the doctor said in court.

Schuler is alleged to have regularly beaten the boy since taking custody of him this spring from his maternal grandmother, who was raising him in Alabama. The unresponsive Turner was brought to the Worcester hospital Monday.