Fulton woman's family sues after she suffocates in
ambulance
By John O'Brien / The Post-Standard
February 03, 2010, 6:09AM
Dick Blume / The PostStandardCrystal Blake, whose mother Dorothy Caniff died from positional asphyxia while being
transported in an ambulance, meets with her lawyer, Michael Kenny. Blake is suing the ambulance
company.
Fulton, NY -- Oswego County sheriff’s deputies handcuffed a combative, hallucinating woman behind
her back to protect her from herself when they responded to a suicide attempt at her home in 2006.
Dorothy Caniff, 42, of Fulton, was strapped face down on a gurney after Menter Ambulance workers
arrived May 25, 2006, according to police reports.
In the ambulance, Caniff went into cardiac arrest and died at A.L. Lee Memorial Hospital, in Fulton.
A medical examiner ruled that she died because of the position she’d been placed in: prone, arms
behind her back and strapped onto the gurney.
It was months before Caniff’s family got the news that she’d died accidentally from positional
asphyxia, said her daughter, Crystal Blake, of Syracuse. “Positional asphyxia” describes deaths that
result from the victim being unable make her chest rise enough to take in air, either because of a
weight on her or because her body is severely contorted.
When Blake heard the words, she knew what they meant.
“Someone suffocated my mom,” said Blake, 25.
She’s suing Menter Ambulance Service, in Fulton, over the conduct of its two emergency medical
technicians, whose names are not listed in court papers. One of the EMTs has since died.
Blake’s lawyer, Michael Kenny, claims the EMTs placed Caniff prone on the gurney in violation of
state protocols for emergency medical technicians. Patients should be restrained on their backs or
sides to allow EMTs to monitor the airway, according to the state’s EMT protocols for basic life
support.
Menter’s owner, Zach Menter, said his workers were not the ones who placed Caniff face down.
“All I can say is that’s how she was placed — not by us,” Menter said.
He wouldn’t directly put the blame on the deputies.
Blake is not suing the Oswego County Sheriff’s Department. Kenny said the evidence indicates
deputies did nothing wrong. They had to restrain Caniff because she was combative, he said.
Caniff, a longtime smoker, suffered from emphysema and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, a
condition that makes it hard for the victim to breathe. She’d been on oxygen for about two years,
her daughter said. She was on medication because she was bipolar, police reports said.
Caniff had taken a large amount of ephedrine, prednisone and ibuprofen to get high the day she
died, her sister told investigators. Caniff started hallucinating, saying she was covered by bugs and
that they were in her mouth, the reports said. She was thrashing on the floor, clawing at her
mouth, when deputies arrived, the reports said.
After Deputy Jeremy Plyler placed Caniff in handcuffs face down on the living room floor, Menter
ambulance workers arrived, the reports said. Another deputy, Tracie Gage, held Caniff’s legs still on
the floor to keep her from hurting herself, the reports said. Caniff was placed face down on the
stretcher because she was combative, the reports said.
The reports do not specify whether it was the deputies or the EMTs who placed her on the gurney.
But Sheriff Reuel Todd said that is normally done by EMTs, not deputies.
The sheriff’s reports said Plyler removed the handcuffs once Caniff was in the ambulance and that
she was rolled onto her back. How she got back on her stomach when she went into cardiac arrest
is unclear, Kenny said.
“I would say there are some interesting questions they haven’t been real clear about answering,”
said Kenny, who has taken depositions from the remaining EMT and two of the deputies.
Onondaga County’s medical examiner at the time, Dr. Mary Jumbelic, performed an autopsy and
found that Caniff died because she was strapped into a prone position with her hands cuffed behind
her.
“Approximately 15+ minutes later, she became unresponsive and she was then uncuffed and CPR
begun,” Jumbelic wrote in her autopsy report.
Menter Ambulance’s lawyer, Steven Shahan, said the agency was not negligent.
“No one’s alleging that she was strapped to a gurney with her face in a pillow,” Shahan said. “Face
down is a way of saying prone, on her stomach. You can sleep on your stomach without
asphyxiating yourself. You just turn your head to the side. That’s what we believed happened in this
case.”
Shahan said he expects to hire a medical expert who will say that Caniff went into cardiac arrest
because of something other than positional asphyxia.
“The issue of how and why she died or went into cardiac arrest will be explored in great depth at the
trial,” Shahan said.
The death was reported to the state Department of Health, as the law requires, a spokesman said.
The agency made no findings of misconduct by Menter Ambulance, he said.
“I don’t believe there’s anything that we did wrong.” Menter said.
Over the past four years, 19 people in Onondaga County and four in Oswego County have died from
positional asphyxia, according to Onondaga County Medical Examiner Dr. Robert Stoppacher. The
deaths result when someone ends up in a position that hampers their ability to either breathe or to
deliver oxygenated blood to the brain and heart, he said.
Intoxication sometimes contributes to the victim’s contorted position, as do obesity and restraints,
said Stoppacher, who was speaking in general and not about Caniff’s case.
Blake said her mother was 5-foot-2, 180 pounds and had trouble breathing. She questioned why
Caniff needed to be strapped onto the gurney.
“You got a little woman like that who’s been on oxygen, and she can’t breathe,” Blake said. “So
there’s no way she’s giving you a run for your money.”
The lawsuit, filed in Oswego County state Supreme Court, claims Menter’s negligence caused
Caniff’s death.
Caniff worked as a truck driver for 15 years and traveled with a pet ball python named Sampson
curled up next to her, Blake said. She had a tattoo of Winnie the Pooh with the words, “Always MisBee-Havin,” according to the autopsy report.
Caniff was always helping people, often pulling over to see what she could do for a stranded
motorist, Blake said.
“She’d give people food if they were hungry,” Blake said. “She helped other people more than she
helped herself.”
--John O’Brien can be reached at jobrien@syracuse.com or 470-2187.