Man, 86, accused of shooting wife because medication was too expensive

[RockaFowler]

I just want to cry

http://www.wptv.com/news/region-st-lucie-county/port-st-lucie/port-st-lucie-man-accused-of-shooting-wife-because-she-was-in-pain-he-couldnt-afford-medications

An 86-year-old Port St. Lucie man said he killed his wife while she slept because she was in poor health and he could no longer afford her medications, according to an arrest affidavit.

William J. Hager said he had been thinking about killing his wife Carolyn for several days because she was in pain, the arrest report said.

After Hager shot his wife, he went to his kitchen and drank coffee, called his daughters and later dialed 911, the affidavit said.

[bahrbearian]

1. I quit going to the doctors and taking my medication because I can't afford it.

My wife has a tumor in her head and is getting reading for surgery, the bills are just now coming in and we can't afford them. "never ever" , "pie in the sky" Next I'll be dropping out of the ACA, cant afford that on SS.

[KamaAina]

6. SS? What about Medicaid or Medicare?

[bahrbearian]

7. Yea we have Medicaid with a $400 month co-pay

[jwirr]

28. Okay, there is some confusion here. If you have Social

Security you are entitled to MEDICARE. If you are poor you may be eligible for MEDICAID. This last program usually pays for almost all costs for medical care.

If you are getting MEDICARE and still cannot pay for medical care then go to the welfare office in your county and apply for MEDICAID. All that can happen is that they say you are too rich for that program.

Most states require that people spend down their savings to be eligible for MEDICAID. You get to keep your home until both of you die and your car and tools to run your business etc.

All too many people assume that they cannot be helped and never even ask what other programs are available. MEDICAID of course depends on which state you live in but even then their are federal rules that make it worthwhile to find out about it.

MEDICAID also has a pay back clause which means when you die the bill will be sent to your estate but IMO that is not a drawback. It is just like paying any other bills from your estate.

[dembotoz]

31. perhaps not to you....my mom was a depression era child and she wanted to die before house payback

i know cause we HAD that conversation

when it comes to that for me i will do the one single copay at cabela's


it just is really that simple

[jwirr]

38. I think you must be talking to someone else. I am a depression

era child and I am talking in my post about what kind of help exists for people today. And I know because I am both a social worker and a user of those two programs.

[dembotoz]

40. here in wisconsin they are very much into cost recovery....

she would not do period
death would be preferred

[jwirr]

43. Here in MN we also do cost recovery. But you cannot recover

costs for something that is not used. So while she is alive she would have help - it is only upon the death of the spouse or other dependent that they go after the money. If I am not mistaken all states do that.

When my grandmother went into the nursing home we sold her house and all the money went to cover her care. But if my grandfather had been alive he would have had the use of the house until he died.

I am sorry I think that debt recovery is a good thing. That is what we work for - to be able to pay our bills when we get old.

[dembotoz]

49. what is amusing is the wealthy part of the family did the trust thing and avoided the problem

and maybe that is why this pisses me off

fairness only goes as far as you lawyer can push it

[jwirr]

59. On that I agree with you totally. And that is why cost

recovery was started.

When I was younger I lived in Iowa where there a many land rich families. Grandpa would give his farm to his grandson - skipping one generation to be safe - and go into the what was then called a retirement home (called nursing homes now) and live there at the cost of MEDICAID (taxpayers because he was now poor) for the rest of his life. I know a woman who didn't want to take care of her home anymore and lived in a retirement home for 45 years. It was a very abused system back then.

For that reason the cost recovery law was started to make these retirement homes into health care facilities like they were meant to be. No one just went there to retire anymore - they had to pay for it.

My original point was to let the poster know what was available because there are soooooo many people who do not know.

[ExtraGriz]

19. so sorry you're going through this....

i too have a head tumor and had surgery last fall, the tumor caused me to have a rare disease and each monthly injection cost $5500.00, and i need it for life....i have private insurance now through my partner and am eligible for medicare in july...urgh, the future is so uncertain.

so sorry about your wife's illness, and also to you for having to endure all of this.

[Orrex]

2. Is there any indication that she consented to this?

I'm sympathetic to his sense of helplessness, but this seems a pretty clear case of premeditated murder.

[Liberal_in_LA]

45. My question also.

[FLPanhandle]

3. No age exemption for murder

But I would hate to be on a jury convened to convict the guy.

[djean111]

4. He is being charged with first degree murder.

The real crime is that they could not afford the medicine. Who goes to jail for that?

[malaise]

5. +1,000

Way too sad

[Orrex]

8. No, the crime is that he killed his wife with premeditation

Absent some clear indication that she consented to be killed, then we're left with the fact that he shot her for reasons of finance after days of thinking about it.

I'm sympathetic, truly, and this is a tragic case, and there's a good chance that a jury will likewise be sympathetic, but he still killed his wife with premeditation, so he should be charged with first degree murder.

[djean111]

9. Where did I say he should not be charged?

And, I doubt if he cares, really. "Reasons of finance"? She was in pain and they could not afford the medicine. If he was just unwilling to spend the money, I am sure he would have not been so straightforward with what he did, and his reason.

But what led to this is also a crime, and with the TPP and other "trade" deals, this is only going to get worse.

[Act_of_Reparation]

10. You said "the real crime here"

And that necessarily implies that shooting someone in the head without their consent is not a "real crime". Poor choice of words, perhaps.

[djean111]

11. Yes, poor choice of words.

I guess where I am coming from is that the guy was driven to do this, and Pharma just sits back and laughs and counts the money.
This is not a civilized country.

[Human101948]

53. Yes, that is the real crime...

When you see these health care and pharma execs getting tens of millions for screwing over sick people.

[Orrex]

12. You're making assumptions based on nothing

She was in pain and they could not afford the medicine.

We have no indication that she consented to be shot, so we have a case of a husband killing his wife after days of planning. Sorry, but financial hardship is not an excuse for murder.

If he was just unwilling to spend the money, I am sure he would have not been so straightforward with what he did, and his reason.

Unless you've read something beyond the linked article, you have no basis for that analysis. I can think of at least one other explanation that fits the facts equally well, especially in light of the fact that we have no evidence that his wife consented to be killed.

But what led to this is also a crime, and with the TPP and other "trade" deals, this is only going to get worse.

Using this case as an excuse to sermonize about the TPP is nothing more than crass political opportunism.

[djean111]

27. I never said this was an excuse for murder. n/t

[Orrex]

34. You admitted to your poor choice of words

Yet you haven't edited them, so I'm responding to your post as written, the one in which you distinguished premeditated murder from "the real crime."

[djean111]

36. Well, I will just have to let it go at that.

They are both crimes.
Over and out.

[Orrex]

37. Well, no. They're not "both crimes," at least not in any legal sense.

High healthcare costs are morally reprehensible and perfectly legal.

Premeditated murder is crime.


There is no equivalence, and as noted above it is crass political opportunism to compare them.

[NJCher]

54. oh dog

Cher

[lame54]

62. no more meds...

she was in pain is his story

to simply say that he did it for finances only tells half the story

[Orrex]

63. Still premeditated murder.

[abelenkpe]

22. +1000 nt

[obamanut2012]

24. No, he planned her murder

It wasn't assisted suicide.

I am betting this is his excuse for killing her. It's happened before.

[jwirr]

29. Planning also goes into assisted suicide.

[Orrex]

35. As does informed consent

And there is no indication that the victim consented to be killed.

[valerief]

13. That sounds like American values. Fuck citizens' needs and all problems are solved with guns. nt

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

14. I'm curious as to why he didn't turn the gun on himself afterwards

That's how these things usually end.

[WinkyDink]

51. He said it was about the money. Suicides don't care about money.

[zalinda]

15. What about it being a mercy killing?

The medication he couldn't afford was pain meds. She may have been suffering terribly, and even moaning in her sleep. They had been married for 56 years. I can't assume that he killed her out of malice.

Z

[WinkyDink]

52. Well, we don't actually have that as a legal "out.'

[zalinda]

61. Yeah, we treat our animals with more dignity. eom

[snort]

16. Single payer? NO WAY!

We can't afford it! Well, one speech at Golden Sacks and I can cover mine. Now kindly fuck off and die.

[packman]

17. They both should have walked into a bank and held it up

got arrested and placed in jail. Yes, damn our medical system for forcing them into a corner.

Sounds heartless, but all their medical issues would have been placed on a society that seemingly could not help them.

An old George Burns movie, title escapes me, had this as a plot. Elderly man with no one to care for him facing many, many issues robs a store, get imprisoned and has the care he needs.

I have a great deal of sympathy for the man. I remember my own watch with my mother in a nursing home and a man weeping for hours sitting outside his wife's room as she moaned in pain. Heartbreaking.

[dynamo99]

20. jail?

Yeah, we all know about the top quality of medical treatment (and especially pain relief) that you get in jail.

[Javaman]

18. one day many of us will be in this exact same position.

and that's what makes u.s. health care the heartless pile of shit it is.

can't afford your meds, well screw you, there are plenty that can, in the mean time suffer!

we live in a Dickensian health care system.

and people in this thread squabble about the guy being charged with murder.

it's a damn good thing he didn't steal a loaf of bread, right?

christ in a handbag.

[dynamo99]

23. one day many of us will be in this exact same position.

I'm banking on being able to turn my own clock off. Of course, that does require that I'm mentally and physically able to. I'm not too worried about the mental part, in my family the mind lasts pretty well (aside from one cousin who supports Trump). But who can predict physically? I suspect if I got put in a nursing home they wouldn't let me take firearms with me.

[hughee99]

39. Perhaps we could implement some sort of Affordable Care legislation to fix this

Last edited Wed May 18, 2016, 08:51 PM - Edit history (1)

Dickensian, heartless pile of shit.

[Javaman]

47. perhaps, but don't count on it.

the repukes and the corporations make more off of suffering that helping.

[FLPanhandle]

21. If she wanted to die, why not leave the gun with her and go for a walk?

She could choose to commit suicide and he wouldn't be going to jail.

He waited until she was asleep and shot her.

[obamanut2012]

25. Yup, premeditated murder

And, only his word that she was in pain. He certainly doesn't say this was assisted suicide.

tbh not convinced -- this has happened before: spousal murder cum fake mercy killing.

[NJCher]

55. that assumes she could do it herself

Might not be able to either psychologically or physically.

Cher

[TIME TO PANIC]

26. Too tragic for words.

[Helen Borg]

30. Sounds to me...

It should have been her choice. Not his.

[Ilsa]

32. I also wonder if she asked him to help her

Commit suicide. Maybe she was too weak to hold the gun and fire it.

But sadly, he'll go to prison for 1st degree murder.

[dembotoz]

33. how many of you have watched a spouse slowly die? i have it is not fun

she did not want to die most days....we had an infant.....long sad story

but some days she did want to just die and get it over with.
in fact we kept her drugs in a lockbox that i would at times take with me when i left the house to prevent that.

it wears on you when the person you are devoting your life to is in pain and you can not stop it.
it eats at your soul.
it really does

i will not judge or condemn this man
hell i know folks who have been in this situation for years and years.

my wife lived only 2 1/2 years after diagnosis

i really do not know what i would have done if i was in his shoes.
i really don't

[DawgHouse]

42. I am sorry for your loss.

[NJCher]

56. thanks for writing out your perspective

I'm sorry that to do so, you had to re-visit that pain.

Cher

[DawgHouse]

41. How awful for the family of this couple.

The price of medication should not be a consideration at all for anyone when they need help.

[tavernier]

44. If she was ill and in so much pain

she might have been a good candidate for hospice. They would have been able to control the pain.
Lots of unknowns here... Did husband discuss their lack of funds with her doctor? There are agencies that provide assistance.
Was husbands mental stability such that he could care for the wife or should someone in family have taken over this responsibility sooner?

[Democat]

46. Everyone has an excuse for murder

Do you believe all of them?

[dembotoz]

48. so it is only ok if both die?

http://www.jsonline.com/news/health/heartbreak-exhaustion--and-then-an-end-driven-by-despair-b99724849z1-379820661.html



well that really sucks

[Brickbat]

50. I do hope that as the baby boomers age, their money and influence (as a cohort) will change the way

we approach aging and death. Many of them have had good lives, and feel they deserve good deaths. I hope it changes the way we talk about the end of our lives, and what we expect the end of our lives to look like. I had a relative who would say, "If I ever get like that, take me out back and shoot me" -- and meant it. The end came before ever "getting like that," but when people say it and mean it, what do we do?

[NJCher]

57. I think about that a lot

I once devised a plot for a book. It would go like this:

There is a company you sign up with who will kill you once you start getting decrepit. The beauty of the company's plan is that you don't know when your death is coming.

You pay premiums for the hit man, and once you notify the company that you're ready to go, the plan can go into effect. It's like "insurance," only you're buying a hit man to off you when the time comes. You don't know when the hit man/woman is coming, so that takes the pain and decision out of actually killing yourself.

That's as far as I got with the plot.

However, I think a service like this would be really great. I have no desire to live in an incapacitated state, but I don't think I could actually off myself. I could, however, sign up for a plan like this.

Cher

[Brickbat]

58. Part of the problem is that humans are bad at imagining the future, and we're also bad at managing

incremental change. We know we don't want to live "like that," but what does halfway to "like that" look like? What's the tipping point -- and if you get "like that" and find you're OK with it, what's the next step? It's different for different people, and there need to be a lot of safeguards. But I think having an option for a quick and painless death can even help people live longer by taking despair out of the equation. We don't fear death; we fear the loss of autonomy and sense of self that happens before death. If we know we can control it, it can take a lot of the uncertainty and fear out of the whole process.

[NJCher]

60. excellent points, all

But esp'ly the last three sentences.

Cher