Thaindian News

New York, Oct 19 (THAINDIAN NEWS) It is a common knowledge that police always check the pulse of people they think is dead.

That might actually not be the whole truth because an incident at Severna Park in the United States reveals that some people are declared dead by the police without checking for pulse.

An 89-year-old woman, Ruth Shillinglaw Johnson was declared dead by the police on Oct. 1. One officer said he heard something like the smell of a “decomposing body” and concluded that the woman who was then lying unconscious on her bathroom floor was dead.

However what the officers failed to do was to check her pulse. They rather called the woman’s oldest son to inform him that his mother was dead.

The son in turn called the State Anatomy Board in the United States to come for her mother’s body because the woman had earlier in life indicated that she wants to donate her body to science.

When an employee of the board arrived at Ruth’s home, then he heard Ruth take a deep breath and move her arm. Ruth was then rushed to the hospital and was released on Wednesday. She was however moved to the hospice where she died “again” on Saturday.

A neighbor described the initial death pronouncement as “unfortunate”.