by Kandiss Edwards
September 12, 2025
A 22-year-old St. Louis man almost had his organs removed before he was declared brain-dead.
In 2019, Larry Black Jr. was on the operating room table at SSM Health Saint Louis University Hospital due to a gunshot wound. The injury was sustained in the back of Black’s head. Consequently, he was placed in a medically induced coma. A week later, Black was being prepped for organ retrieval. His chest and abdomen were already being cleaned for organ retrieval when a neurosurgeon intervened.
Though Blacks family gave consent for the organ removal, they say they were still unsure after speaking to hospital staff, CNN reported. Black’s neurosurgeon, a 34-year-old first-year resident, interrupted the process.
“I don’t care if we have consent,” Zohny Zohny said. “I haven’t spoken to the family, and I don’t agree with this. Get him off the table.”
His actions saved the young man’s life. Black says that, though he was nonresponsive on the outside, he could hear his family. They gathered in support of their young loved one to pray and honor his life. Black attempted to get their attention to no avail.
“I heard my mama yelling,” he told CNN. “Everybody was there yelling my name, crying, playing my favorite songs, sending prayers up.”
Black’s family and doctors are now navigating uncertainty about legal, medical, and ethical implications. The case is drawing attention from bioethicists, patient advocates, and legal scholars who say it raises fundamental questions about how brain death is determined, and whether protocols in hospitals give sufficient voice to patients and families before irreversible decisions are made.
Experts have noted that current guidelines rely on specific neurological tests, imaging, and sometimes set waiting periods before organ harvesting can occur. However, growing concern persists that differences in hospital practice or interpretation might lead to errors.
Civil litigation in other states has resulted from similar cases. Courts have occasionally examined whether hospitals followed accepted medical standards, whether patients’ or their families’ objections were adequately heard, and whether consent for organ donation was legally valid under the circumstances.
Black is now a 28-year-old father of multiple children. Luckily, Black’s practitioner followed his training and did not allow the impulsive actions of the hospital staff to prevail.
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