The Massillon man charged in the suspected mercy killing of his wife at a hospital intensive care unit in Akron asked the doctor who confronted him, “Please tell me she’s dead,” the doctor said Monday.
In his first interview about the shooting at Akron General Medical Center, Dr. Michael A. Passero Jr. said he repeatedly asked John Wise, 66, to give up his weapon after the shooting.
The discussion was interrupted when the victim, 65-year-old Barbara Wise, gasped for air.
According to Passero, John Wise then said: “Oh, God, she’s still alive. How can she still be alive?”
After checking the monitors, “I said quietly, she’s not dead’,” Passero said he told the husband.
According to Passero, Wise sat in a chair to his wife’s left, with Passero on the other side asking for the weapon.
“He had the gun in his hand but he wasn’t threatening anyone,” Passero said.
Passero, 37, rushed to the scene from several rooms away when he heard a popping sound, thinking it might be an equipment problem.
Wise was charged with aggravated murder in the Aug. 4 shooting. His wife died one day later.
A friend said Barbara Wise had been disabled by a stroke and Wise’s attorney said his client had always acted toward his wife with love.
