Jahi McMath: Donations Surge to Help Move Brain Dead California Teenager to New Facility
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Family Fights for Daughter on Life Support1:31
- Jahi McMath: Brain Dead Girl's …
The hospital where Jahi McMath is being kept on life support filed a motion today arguing the girl's family had plenty of time to find a new facility to take her and that she should be unhooked from her ventilator because she is legally dead.
The filing in federal court was the latest in the battle over Jahi, 13, who was declared brain dead on Dec. 12 following tonsil surgery.
One hour before a court order was set to expire and Children's Hospital Oakland planned to unhook the 13-year-old from a ventilator, a judge extended Jahi's life support to Jan. 7.
Jahi will remain hooked up to a ventilator for at least another week as her family plots the logistics of moving her to a facility willing to treat her. The family is considering potential options in New York and Arizona, according to court documents.
Jahi's mother, Latasha Winkfield, has said she believes her daughter is alive and has vowed to not give up the fight.
Donations to a fundraiser Winfield started surged past $32,000 Monday night, according to gofundme.com, after the judge's decision. The family has said it plans to use the money toward the cost of transferring Jahi to a new facility. But when reached by ABCNews.com Monday night, Jahi's uncle, Omari Sealy, declined to share specifics of the family's next move.
"We're just grateful," he said. "We want to thank God and everybody out there who prays for us. Keep praying, it's working."
Christopher Dolan, an attorney for the family, filed complaints in superior and federal courts on Monday to stop the hospital from unhooking Jahi when the previous court order expired at 5 p.m. PT Monday.
Also included in the federal complaint was a request that Children's Hospital Oakland perform a tracheotomy and to insert a feeding tube, which are necessary procedures before Jahi can be transferred.
Children's Hospital Oakland "does not believe that performing surgical procedures on the body of a deceased person is an appropriate medical practice," the hospital said in a statement posted on its website last week.
An attorney for the hospital wrote in today's court filing that administrators had not heard from any potential facilities the family has reportedly claimed are willing to take Jahi.
The hospital said any facility that takes Jahi would be accepting a dead body and would have to get a coroner's approval.
The hospital reiterated in a statement that it has continued "to support the family of Jahi McMath in this time of grief and loss over her death."
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