Murderer argued his life sentence in prison was complete after he ‘died’ and was resuscitated
Joe Yates
Featured Image Credit: Iowa Department of Corrections / Getty Stock
An inmate who 'died' while serving a life sentence before later being resuscitated has argued he should not have been returned to prison.
Well, if you don't know all the facts and you disregard his heinous crimes, he kind of has a point?
But when you take into account how he brutally murdered John Terry with the blunt handle of a pickaxe - something, by the way he had plotted - then maybe his heart encountering a minor hiccup isn't a 'get out of jail free' card.
That happened in 1996, and a year later Benjamin Schreiber was sent to a detention facility Iowa for life.
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Charged and convicted with first-degree murder, it emerged that he wickedly conspired with the victim’s girlfriend to kill him before leaving the body outside of a trailer.
On July 27, 1996, Schreiber, Terry and Terry's girlfriend Evelyn Tangie, all drank together at their friend's house. The trio left the house together in the murderer's car, and later Tangie and Schreiber returned without Terry.
Court documents state that when the couple faced questions of his whereabouts, Schreiber said he had 'beaten the crap out of John Terry' and 'Evelyn Tangie's boyfriend would not be hurting anyone else'.
Terry's body was later found in a vacant trailer in rural Wapello County.
Fast forward almost two decades, in 2015 Schreiber developed kidney stones and started suffering from septic poisoning - he was eventually hospitalised after losing consciousness.
Upon being moved to a hospital, his heart stopped briefly and he was resuscitated five times.
Once he stabilized, he was treated and then sent back to prison.
According to the Des Moines Register, he tried to argue that his ‘life sentence’ had now been served, claiming that he was resuscitated against his will having previously signed a ‘do not resuscitate’ order.
While Schreiber’s brother also reportedly told medical staff: “If he is in pain, you may give him something to ease the pain, but otherwise you are to let him pass.”
But the courts didn't agree with Schreiber, calling the murderer’s argument ‘unpersuasive and without merit’, and so Schreiber took the case to the Iowa Court of Appeals.
He told the court that he was 'imprisoned illegally and should be immediately released', but three judges deliberated over the case and eventually decided against him.
Regarding their decision, Justice Amanda Potterfield said: “We do not believe the legislature intended this provision, which defines the sentences for the most serious class of felonies under Iowa law and imposes its ‘harshest penalty’... to set criminal defendants free whenever medical procedures during their incarceration lead to their resuscitation by medical professionals.”
She added: “Schreiber is either still alive, in which case he must remain in prison, or he is actually dead, in which case this appeal is moot."
Schreiber did eventually die last year, at Unity Point Medical Center in Fort Dodge ‘due to natural causes’.