At around 4 a.m. on March 2, 2014, a Sunday, Deanna Leblanc screamed out for her husband Michael.

Her face was grey and she was covered in sweat.

“She told me she was dying and for me to help her,” Michael would tell a jury three years later. He called 911 and “sat there and held her while I talked to the operator.”

Deanna’s heart failed as paramedics took her out of the home and she was admitted to the hospital with no vital signs. It took two and a half hours to resuscitate her though she remained unresponsive.

Sixteen hours later Deanna was taken off life support at the Georgian Bay General Hospital in Midland, Ont. while Michael held her hand and wept, wishing it were him the ventilator was breathing for instead of her.

He didn’t know then that a criminal investigation would soon begin and that almost exactly one year later Joanna Flynn, the nurse who took Deanna off life support would be charged with manslaughter and criminal negligence causing death.

On Thursday, on the third day of deliberating, a jury found Flynn not guilty on both counts.

Flynn wept in the courtroom after hearing the verdict. Her lawyer Samantha Peeris held her arm while she stood as the jury and judge left the courtroom.

In the gallery, the family of Deanna sat in silence. On his way out of the courthouse, Michael Leblanc said he needed time to digest the outcome.

Some members of Flynn's family wiped tears from their eyes after the verdict. They greeted Flynn with hugs as she exited the courtroom, holding her up by her arm.

More than an hour after the verdict, Flynn exited the courthouse with her lawyer. Flynn said she was feeling “relief” and “nervousness.”

“Right now I would really not rather say anything,” she said. “I just want to spend some time with my family and friends and kind of relax a little bit, I guess.”

Flynn declined to say whether she would return to nursing now that she's been cleared of criminal charges.

“Joanna Flynn is a well-respected, diligent registered nurse who has spent her entire professional career advocating for her patients,” Peeris said. “As a health care professional she was devastated by the accusations made against her . . . The criminal charges are now behind her and hopefully she can move forward. This was a tragic case for all concerned. The jury followed her honour's instructions and came to the right result.”

Deanna's mother Darlene Smith said she was surprised by the verdict.

“It's just very disappointing. It doesn't seem fair,” she said outside the courthouse.

Smith said she believed the jury did the best they could but she didn't understand how they came to the unanimous verdict on both charges. She recalled her son-in-law not having time to think or consult with other family members when Deanna was taken off life support.

“It's just like reliving it every day,” Smith said, describing her feelings during the trial. “It's not the best thing in the world to go through.”

Her daughter was “awesome” and “talented,” Smith said.

“We were pretty close our whole lives,” she said. “Out of all my kids, she was my girl. And she left two really beautiful boys.”

At issue in the trial was whether Flynn obtained informed and voluntary consent from Michael before taking Deanna off life support, whether she sufficiently involved the most responsible physician and whether her conduct was a “marked departure” from what a reasonable nurse would do.

The Crown alleged Flynn coerced a fatigued, overwhelmed Michael into consenting by misrepresenting Deanna’s condition as brain-dead after she suffered irreversible brain damage.

Michael testified Flynn was the first person to inform him that his wife was not going to recover. Before that, he said, he knew she had brain damage but that the doctors and nurses had said not to give up hope.

He said Flynn told him he could either let his wife go peacefully or wait for her heart to rupture.

“My wife had no hope and I was going to sit there and hold her hand and watch her heart explode,” he said of what he understood from Flynn. “It wasn’t going to be pretty.”

They had been at a Newmarket hospital just two days prior when Deanna, 39, had undergone a routine surgery Friday on her left knee — it “blew out on her” while playing baseball, Michael testified.

Deanna, his “cheerful, happy, smart and beautiful” wife of 20 years, stayed in bed on Saturday.

Early Sunday he was downstairs watching TV in their Midland home, his sons asleep, when she screamed for help as she went into distress.

Later that day, family and friends gathered at the hospital and said their goodbyes.

Then at 8:15 p.m., Flynn turned off the machines. It was admitted that she did so without a doctor’s order, but Flynn testified she didn’t think she needed one because she was following the directions of the substitute decision-maker, Michael.

The defence argued Flynn’s actions should be dealt with in her disciplinary hearing and labour arbitration with the hospital, not in criminal court.

Flynn told the jury it was Michael who brought up discontinuing life support when she approached him around 7 p.m. to ask about a do-not-resuscitate order out of concern that Deanna might have another heart attack soon.

Flynn said she had been told by the day nurse that the doctors had concluded Deanna was brain-dead and there was no chance of recovery.

Flynn said Michael was “clear and decisive” about his decision to stop life support and that she was confident he understood Deanna’s condition after being told by doctors and nurses throughout the day and was making an informed decision.

She testified that she repeatedly suggested he sleep on his decision, but he insisted that it should be done since the family was all present.

She said, at his request, she informed the family of his decision and answered their questions.

After she declared Deanna dead, Flynn said she hugged Michael and his mother and they thanked her for all she'd done. She said Michael told her, “I'm sorry but your job sucks,” and that she later broke down in tears.

Flynn said she tried multiple times to involve the doctor in charge, Dr. Josef Dolezel, but that he dismissed her and told her it should wait until the next day when another doctor would be in charge.

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Flynn, a nurse at the hospital for 10 years and in the ICU for two years, said she did not know the hospital policy on end-of-life care and looked for it unsuccessfully. She also said she did not find out what Dolezel’s future orders for Deanna’s care were — they included providing antibiotics to treat an infection — but that she believed this was not necessary for obtaining informed consent from Michael.

She said that she understood she was legally bound to follow the wishes of the substitute decision-maker and that she did not think she needed a doctor’s order to stop life support.

She did not tell Dolezel or the supervisor that she was going to terminate life support, she said.

She told the court she intended to file a complaint about Dolezel’s behaviour the next day, particularly about the way she says Dolezel interacted with Michael after Deanna had died. She says he went into the room, measured Deanna’s leg, and left without saying anything to the family. She said she told him: “Didn’t you know she was dead?”

Dolezel testified Flynn did tell him Michael “wanted to stop everything” and replied that this was “new information” and they would have to have a family meeting. Dolezel did not take part in any family meeting, which he said would have included a doctor, a respiratory therapist, nurse and the substitute decision-maker, Michael. He also did not recall telling her to wait until tomorrow.

He said he was “dumbfounded” when he came to Deanna’s room to measure her leg and found she was dead. He did not know then that Flynn had stopped life support.

While the doctor who treated Deanna in the emergency room and the doctor who treated her in the ICU until mid-afternoon both testified they concluded she was brain-dead, Dolezel said he had not yet made that diagnosis. Deanna was never formally declared brain dead. Dolezel testified that her condition was likely irreversible and that she had clearly suffered severe brain damage but added he did not think they were at a stage to remove life support.

“I never give up on anybody who has a flicker of life within,” he said.

The Crown’s expert witness Dr. Neil Lazar, a surgeon who served as ICU director at the Toronto General Hospital for 12 years until 2016 and is an authority on end-of-life procedures, testified 24 hours is the minimum time to observe someone like Deanna who suffered a severe lack of blood flow to the brain.

He said that in cases like Deanna’s there is a 50-50 chance there would be some return of neurological function after 24 hours or 48 hours. However, the majority of those patients who do show some brain activity would still never emerge from a coma. One or two of 100 people might recover with a moderate to mild disability, he said.

At the time she was taken off life support, there was a “great deal of uncertainty about the outcome,” he said. “Things don’t look good but it’s too early to say this was an irreversible or irremediable process.”

Flynn's defence lawyer Samantha Peeris argued Flynn was entitled to rely on what the doctors said about Deanna's condition, even if the diagnosis of brain-dead was premature. “She can't be convicted of a criminal offence if the doctors get it wrong,” Peeris argued. She also argued there is no law that says Flynn was required to have a doctor's order to terminate life support, or that clearly sets out how involved a doctor must be in the process.

The legal battles surrounding Deanna’s death aren’t over.

Flynn faces a disciplinary hearing at the College of Nurses and a labour arbitration with the hospital. Then there are the civil cases.

Michael and his two sons, now 21 and 18, are suing Georgian Bay General Hospital and Joanna Flynn for $1.8 million, alleging Flynn shut off Deanna's life support without informed consent or "medical authorization" and that the hospital is liable for her actions.

In her statement of defence Flynn maintains she followed Michael's direction to discontinue life support after obtaining informed consent.

"Flynn denies improper conduct . . . and asks that this action be dismissed," the statement of defence says. "In the alternative, if it is found Ms. Flynn did not act with lawful authorization she maintains her actions in no way caused or materially contributed to Ms. Leblanc's death which was inevitable by the time she was admitted (to the hospital)."

Flynn has filed a cross-claim against the hospital for $750,000 for the “intentional infliction of mental suffering and malicious prosecution.”

The hospital “was fully aware that Ms. Flynn received informed instructions from Mr. Leblanc to discontinue all medical treatment and life support to Ms. Leblanc,” the claim alleges. It also says the hospital’s end of life policies were outdated and insufficient.

Flynn alleges the hospital fired her without speaking to the Leblanc family or conducting an investigation after she complained about Dr. Dolezel failing to be responsive to the family’s directions.

She also alleges the police did not lay charges against anyone after an initial investigation but that the hospital repeatedly and “aggressively” urged police to charge her in order to “achieve an advantage” in the labour arbitration and to shield itself from liability.

Flynn was charged by police almost a year after Deanna died.

The hospital’s statement of defence alleges Flynn was “acting outside the scope of her employment and her scope of practice as a registered nurse” when she took Deanna off life support. As a result, it claims the hospital is not liable for her conduct and denies her allegations.

The hospital also disputes the damages the Leblanc family claims to have suffered from Deanna’s death and argues that if any damages were sustained the hospital is not responsible.

The hospital asks for the lawsuit to be dismissed. It has also filed a cross-claim against Flynn, asking that if the hospital is found liable that Flynn be responsible for any damages and costs awarded.

None of the allegations in the civil case have been proven in court.