US Prisoner Briefly Dies, Then Claims He Served Life Sentence

A convicted murderer serving a life sentence in an Iowa prison argued in 2018 that his sentence expired after his heart briefly stopped, saying he was technically “dead.” Benjamin Schreiber, convicted of first-degree murder in the mid-1990s for bludgeoning a man to death with the handle of a pickaxe, argued that he had served his life sentence when he momentarily died in hospital, but was later resuscitated.

Schreiber developed kidney stones and septic poisoning according to CNN. He lost consciousness and was transferred from the Iowa State Penitentiary to a nearby hospital. After his heart stopped briefly, the man was resurrected five times. Doctors used epinephrine and adrenaline to revive him. Once he stabilized, they treated his sepsis and he was sent back to prison.

After the incident, the prisoner asked the three judges to let him continue his life.

However, the justices rejected his argument this week, ruling that a lower court was correct in rejecting his request, the New York Times reported.

“Either Schreiber is still alive, in which case he must remain in prison, or he is dead, in which case this appeal is moot,” Judge Amanda Potterfield wrote for the court.

According to The Monks RegisterSchreiber was sentenced to life without parole after being convicted of murder for killing a man with the handle of an ax in 1996.

In 2018, he claimed that he had been resuscitated against his will and that because he had done so, his “sentence had expired”.

“We do not find his argument compelling,” Justice Potterfield wrote, adding that the justices found it unlikely that the legislature intended “to release criminal defendants whenever medical procedures during their incarceration lead to their resuscitation by health professionals”.