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Scott Horn suffered a massive brain hemorrhage and was admitted to Highline Community Hospital's Rehabilitation Center in Seattle in 1992. Horn's parents, who served as his guardians, decided life support should be withdrawn; Highline's ethics committee concurred. Nutrition and hydration were discontinued in late 1993. Horn's ex-wife, Karen Kaemerle, believed that he had been communicating, through eye-blinks, that he wanted to live. She obtained an emergency order requiring the hospital to provide artificial nutrition and hydration. Eventually, a complex guardianship agreement was worked out between Kaemerle and the Horns, but Kaemerle also filed a medical malpractice suit against physicians at the hospital. A King County jury found for Highline physicians on March 31, 1995. See Ostrom, Carol, “Eye Motion is Key in Case Over Life-Support Cut—His Ex-Wife Claims Patient ‘Left to Die’,” Seattle Times, Mar. 15, 1995, at B1; and Ostrom, Carol, “Life Death, and the Blink of An Eye—Loved Ones Battle Over Whether to Let Man Die, and If He is Able to Have a Say,” Seattle Times, Aug. 15, 1994, at A1.Google Scholar

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