Unplanned Events

December 17, 2010.

“That body, Mr. Shadewell is beginning to show signs of decay”, noted the staffer. “It has a foul smell”. “Don’t worry about it, some of these bodies pass gas and even lose their bowels before they wake up, that’s probably what you smell”, said another worker. And so Sam was left for another day.

December 18, 2010.

Sam had not woken up. The doctors came in and checked his pulse and heart and respiration. No pulse, no respiration, no heartbeat. He was still dead and the body was clearly showing signs of decay. The man was REALLY dead. The doctors, opened up his chest and tried cardiac massage. Nothing happened. “Oh boy, we lost one, good thing they don’t permit lawsuits here in HERGOTIA.” the doctor noted dryly.

“Mrs. Shadewell, I’m afraid we have bad news for you. You’re husband never came out of his death. He’s dead well, he’s dead forever”, the police sergent noted. Shock hit her face, then tears. Then her emotions turned angry, “I’m going to sue this entire country”, she screamed. “Mrs. Shadewell, no need to get angry. Remember, your husband took out a $500,000,000 life insurance policy and you don’t want to be claiming fraud and jeopardize that do you?” added the policy chief.

December 18, 2010.

A reporter for NEWSY NEWS newspaper was nosing around the island seeking stories about people dying to save taxes. He thought it would be a great story about the rich and powerful, scamming the country out of estate taxes. It became an even better story when a policeman tipped him off about Sam Shadewell.

December 18, 2010.

Biff Brimfeld was lucky. He woke up. His date of death was December 13, 2010. He was worth $2 Billion from his tennis business holdings, the ten time grand slam winner was truly set for life and now his kids were set for life. The trusts he created were in the $1.8 Billion range and he had $200 Million left to spend how he wanted to. Death was good to Biff. Other than a little stiffness in his joints, he was fine.

Sam’s “Death”

The Chief Counsel of the IRS looked over the final budget bill that was passed and thought, “oh no, this can’t be”. He called Sammy Slingshot from the Joint Committee on Taxation. “Sammy, did you see this amendment to Section 7701, regarding death?” asked the Counsel. “Sure, it looked innocuous to me, after all it just codifies the law as I understand it which is that when a doctor says you’re dead, you’re dead”, answered Slingshot. “This could create a huge loophole” and he went on to describe the HERGOTIA voodoo thing. “Wow, I didn’t know”, said Slingshot. “Well at least you can argue that the law wasn’t that on people dying before the date the law was enacted”, added Slingshot. “Yeah, but people are planning to die in the next few days that are quite rich we understand, HERGOTIA is a veritable Cannes, this week, there are so many rich people there dying. Let’s hope one doesn’t wake up”, the Counsel added.

December 15, 2010.

Sam appeared for his voodoo death. A guy dressed up like a skeleton pranced around him spouting gibberish and blew some powder into his face and everything went black. He was taken to the hospital and pronounced dead at 4:15 p.m. from a heart attack. His body was shipped to a special refrigeration room until he woke up.

The Fix

This minister and Mr. Mitchell had a conference call. “Mr. Mitchell, we desperately seek your advice about a rather delicate matter. He went on to describe their program. “So, what you’re telling me is that they are clinically dead, but wake up two days later”, asked Mitchell. “Yes, our doctors will certify truthfully that they are clinically dead on the date of death. We just don’t schedule an autopsy because of the risk that they might rebound in two days”, said the Minister. “Well heck son, these good Christians in Congress ain’t gonna fight a good old fashioned resurrection. There is a budget reconciliation bill going through Congress right now, I’ll get Congressman Pockets to put a rider on the bill which amends 26 U.S.C. Section 7701 of the Internal Revenue Code to read as follows: “Death, solely for the purposes of this Title, shall be determined by a licensed physician at the location where the deceased person dies and cannot thereafter be questioned even if the physician made an error or the person recovers later.” After hanging up, he sent an email to Congressman Pockets to add this to the bill. The chief legislative aide to Congressman Pockets looked at the language. “Seems rather straight-forward to me”, said the aide. “If the guy is certified as dead, he’s dead”. He sent the language to the Budget Office for scoring and it received a budget score of zero since no one believed that it would impact the budget at all or if it did, it would be so minuscule that it would not be worth calculating. So, it was inserted into the budget resolution and signed into law by the President. On December 14, 2010.