Judge won’t rule if brain dead means legally dead in case of Jewish man
TORONTO — The demise of an Orthodox Jewish man has made it unnecessary to rule on the validity of the death certificate issued when he was declared brain dead, a judge has decided in a case that pitted medical practice against religious values and went to the heart of what constitutes being legally dead.
The decision by Ontario Superior Court Justice Glenn Hainey that the case had become moot upset relatives of Shalom Ouanounou, who had found themselves at odds with the doctors caring for him.
“The case was one of fundamental importance to the Orthodox Jewish community,” said Hugh Scher, the Ouanounou family lawyer. “By declaring the case to be moot despite an ongoing conflict between death certificates, the court has let down members of the Orthodox Jewish, Muslim and Christian communities whose religious beliefs are violated by the application of neurological death rather than biological death as death.”
Scher said on Wednesday he had no instructions on whether to try to appeal.