Judge: 14-year-old Jehovah's Witness can refuse blood transfusion

MOUNT VERNON — A 14-year-old Jehovah's Witness sick with leukemia has the right to refuse a blood transfusion, even though doing so might kill him, a judge ruled today.

Skagit County Superior Court Judge John Meyer denied a motion by the state to force Dennis Lindberg, of Mount Vernon, to have a blood transfusion. The judge said the eighth-grader knows "he's basically giving himself a death sentence."

Doctors diagnosed the boy with leukemia on Nov. 6 and began treating him with chemotherapy at Children's Hospital in Seattle, but stopped a week ago because his blood count was too low, the Skagit Valley Herald reported. The boy refused the transfusion on religious grounds.

However, his birth parents, who do not have custody and flew from Idaho to be at the hearing, believe their son should have the transfusion and suggested he has been unduly influenced by his legal guardian, his aunt, who is also a Jehovah's Witness.

Several friends of Lindberg and of his parents attended today's hearing, and some ran out crying when the judge announced his decision.

"Dennis does present himself as a very mature man. But he really is just a child trying to please the adults around him," said Jan Curry, whose daughter, Morgan, is his friend.

On Tuesday, Lindberg's doctor told the judge that the boy's blood was hypoxic, or deficient in oxygen, and that he would not be surprised if the boy died overnight.