The mother of a toddler found alive in an Arizona hospital morgue in February more than five hours after he was pronounced dead said Wednesday she thought she heard him breathing when she hugged him goodbye.
But instead of listening to her gut, Alexus Fiordilino said, she believed the doctor who told her those were 18-month-old Vincent’s last gasps and that any further attempts to save him would just prolong his agony.
“As a mom you don’t want to hear that,” Fiordilino, 30, said in an interview. “I didn’t want him to suffer. It seemed to be they’d done everything they could. And then he called it.”
Fiordilino was referring to Dr. Aryan Toosi, who pronounced Vincent dead at 6:20 p.m. on Super Bowl Sunday at Mercy Gilbert Medical Center in Gilbert, Arizona.
A little over five hours later, Fiordilino said, police were questioning her and her husband, Angelo, when a detective burst into the room and told them that a medical examiner’s employee who had come to collect Vincent’s body had discovered he was still alive.
“My husband and I just screamed in relief,” she said. “We were praising the Lord. We were crying. To go from hearing he was gone and then finding out he isn’t gone, it’s an unexplainable feeling.”
Fiordilino spoke out more than eight months after her son’s remarkable story of survival after he nearly drowned in the family swimming pool made national headlines and sparked multiple investigations into what happened on Feb. 8.
The Gilbert Police Department had recommended filing child abuse charges against both parents for losing track of Vincent while a Super Bowl party was going on at their residence.
“Both admitted to smoking marijuana the morning of the drowning,” the police report said.
But Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell announced in July that the Fiordilinos would not be charged.
Fiordilino’s lawyer, John Brewer, said he plans to file a formal complaint this week against Toosi and the hospital. He said a review of Vincent’s medical records shows that critical test results that Toosi cited to justify ending efforts to save the child were not completed until after the toddler was declared dead.
“The parents were faced with having to decide whether to keep trying to revive their son, and the doctor provided them with false information,” Brewer said. “That’s beyond a conscious disregard for human life.”
Brewer’s office turned its records over to the Gilbert Police Department, which said it forwarded everything to the state attorney general’s office for review. The AG’s office said Wednesday that it has not made a decision to review this case.
Toosi’s lawyer, Scott Holden, released a statement in response.
“Dr. Toosi’s thoughts are with the young patient and family, and he wishes the child continued healing and recovery,” it said. “His commitment to delivering high-quality care has always been rooted in a desire to provide healing, safety and comfort to his community.”
Meanwhile, the hospital called the situation “heartbreaking” in a statement.
“Out of respect for the patient’s privacy, we cannot share any information and we are unable to comment on those involved in patient care,” it said. “Patient safety and exceptional care are our highest priorities.”
Asked how Vincent is doing now, Fiordilino said, “He’s getting better.”
Brewer said that while the boy is home with his family, he has many health challenges.
“Vincent is severely brain-injured,” he said. “He can’t swallow. He seizes up. He can’t sit up on his own or crawl.”
The tragic turn of events began around 5:38 p.m. Feb. 8 with a 911 call for help after Vincent was found floating face down in the family pool and a relative tried to revive him by performing CPR, according to a police report obtained by NBC affiliate KPNX of Phoenix.
Vincent was rushed to the emergency room at Mercy Gilbert Medical Center, where an ER team that included Toosi took over the effort to save him.
At 6:13 p.m., according to the report, Toosi went out to deliver bad news to the boy’s parents.
“As long as there are no objections, I’d like to call time of death,” Toosi said, according to the report.
Then, “at approximately 18:20 hours, Dr. Toosi called the time of death and requested a moment of silence.”
Just as Fiordilino told NBC News, police officers who had been in the ER said in the report that the child still appeared to be gasping for breath after he was declared dead.
A detective reported then hearing “another audible gasp” at around 7:18 p.m. as the ER workers were preparing to move Vincent from the trauma room to the “cold room” that serves as the hospital’s morgue and where the temperature is set at 36 to 39 degrees.
The same detective said that when he returned to photograph the body an hour later, he “again observed what appeared to be a gasp or air release.”
“The nurse again stated it was agonal breathing and explained it was due to compressions, oxygen, and possible pressure applied by family members while saying goodbye,” the report says.
And at 7:23 p.m., “the cold room door was closed,” the report says.
More than four hours later, when the medical examiner’s team arrived at 11:52 p.m. to retrieve the boy, “he was found breathing,” the report says.
“The family was notified immediately,” and the boy was airlifted to Phoenix Children’s Hospital.
Fiordilino said that when she saw her son again in the pediatric intensive care unit, “he was hooked up to all kinds of monitors and things.”
“He looked like a different baby,” she said. “It’s something I hope no other parent has to live through.”