Keir Starmer, the head of the Crown Prosecution Service, is to clarify whether people should be prosecuted for aiding a suicide following a landmark ruling by the Law Lords last week. It had been assumed that this guidance would affect only cases in which friends or relatives helped people to die abroad, such as at the Dignitas clinic in Zurich. However, in an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Mr Starmer said the “broad principles” of his new guidelines would apply equally to acts of assisted suicide planned and carried out at home.
Amongst the latest, and ever-changing, pathways of death and dying, “suicide tourism” presents distinctive ethical, legal and practical challenges. The international media report that citizens from across the world are travelling or seeking to travel to Switzerland, where they hope to be helped to die. In this paper I aim to explore three issues associated with this phenomenon: how to define “suicide tourism” and “assisted suicide tourism”, in which the suicidal individual is helped to travel to take up the option of assisted dying; the (il)legality of assisted suicide tourism, particularly in the English legal system where there has been considerable recent activity; and the ethical dimensions of the practice. I will suggest that the suicide tourist—and specifically any accomplice thereof—risks springing a legal trap, but that there is good reason to prefer a more tolerant policy, premised on compromise and ethical pluralism.
The House of Lords in Purdy forced the DPP to issue offence-specific guidance on assisted suicide, but Jacqueline A Laing argues that the resulting interim policy adopted last September is unconstitutional, discriminatory and illegal. In July 2009, the law lords in R (on the application of Purdy) v Director of Public Prosecutions [2009] All ER (D) 335 required that the DPP publish guidelines for those contemplating assisting another to commit suicide. The DPP produced a consultation paper (23 September 2009) seeking to achieve a public consensus, albeit outside Parliament, on the factors to be taken into account in determining when not to prosecute assisted suicide. Although the consultation exercise is hailed by proponents of legislative change as a democratic, consensus-building and autonomy-enhancing initiative, there is much to suggest that, on the contrary, the guidance is unconstitutional, arbitrary and at odds with human rights law, properly understood.
The British Medical Association and the General Medical Council have already made it abundantly clear that they want no part in voluntary euthanasia becoming a clinical practice. Now the estimable Royal College of Physicians, the professional body representing over 20,000 physicians that “aims to improve the quality of patient care by continually raising medical standards”, has weighed in with a strongly worded letter to the DPP. “We would go so far as to say”, writes the College’s Registrar, Dr Rodney Burnham, “that any clinician who has been part, in any way, of assisting a suicide death should be subject to prosecution.” Dr Burnham continues: “The trust afforded doctors and nurses in particular gives their views considerable weight with their patients and the public. Clinicians’ duties of care entail active pursuit of alternative solutions to assisted suicide, not its facilitation.”
Sir Terry Pratchett has said he's ready to be a test case for assisted suicide "tribunals" which could give people legal permission to end their lives. The author, who has Alzheimer's, says he wants a tribunal set up to help those with incurable diseases end their lives with help from doctors. A poll for BBC One's Panorama suggests most people support assisted suicide for someone who is terminally ill.
Should those with incurable illnesses be allowed to choose how and when they die? In his Richard Dimbleby lecture, author Terry Pratchett, who has Alzheimer's disease, makes a plea for a common-sense solution. This is an edited extract of Terry Pratchett's Richard Dimbleby lecture, Shaking Hands With Death, which was broadcast on BBC1 on 1 February
The Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, has today called for final contributions to his public consultation on his interim policy for prosecutors in respect of cases of assisted suicide. He said: "I have already received over 2000 responses from both individuals and organisations since I published my interim policy in September, which I am sure is an indication of the strong views many people hold on this issue. I urge those who may still want to contribute to send their views to my assisted suicide policy team. All the responses will be considered when drafting the final policy." The consultation is due to close at 5:00pm on Wednesday 16 December with the final policy due for publication in spring 2010. Until the final policy is published, the interim policy will be applied to all cases.
Today I am publishing the Crown Prosecution Service’s policy on encouraging or assisting suicide. When it passed the Suicide Act 1961, Parliament specifically required discretion to be exercised in every case and my consent is needed before any prosecution for assisted suicide can be brought. In the case brought by Debbie Purdy last year, the House of Lords understood that. It did not question whether there should be a discretion to prosecute or not. But, accepting that discretion, it required me, as DPP, to “clarify what [my] position is as to the factors that [I] regard as relevant for and against prosecution”.
On 25 February, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, launched the Policy for Prosecutors in respect of cases of Encouraging or Assisting Suicide.
New guidelines over whether people would face prosecution over assisting suicide place closer scrutiny on a suspect's motivation. Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer, said whether a person acted "wholly compassionately" and not for financial reasons was important. But he made it clear the advice does not represent a change in the law and does not cover so-called mercy killing.
A doctor involved in the suicide of a terminally-ill cancer sufferer has had his bail extended for the fifth time in a year, Solicitors Journal has learned. Dr Irwin paid for Raymond Cutkelvin’s flight to Zurich, where the 58-year-old took his life at the Dignitas clinic in September 2007. His bail was last extended in November last year and expired in early January this year. He has now been asked to report to Haringey police station on 6 April. Mr Cutkelvin’s partner, Alan Rees, who travelled with him to Zurich, was also arrested and released on bail. He too was asked to report to Haringey police station later in the day on 6 April.
LONDON -- Prosecutors on Thursday said they would consider the issue of motive in cases of assisted suicide before deciding whether to bring charges, in an attempt to clarify how the judiciary will handle an issue that has generated intense controversy in Britain. The new rules do not change the law here -- assisted suicide is still illegal, punishable by up to 14 years in prison -- but they do provide the public with guidance on which cases are likely to be brought to court.
Doctors and healthcare professionals could face a higher risk of prosecution if they help patients take their own lives according to new guidelines published by the Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer QC last week. The ‘Policy for Prosecutors in respect of Cases of Encouraging or Assisting Suicide’ comes seven months after the House of Lords ruling in the Purdy case which required the DPP to clarify its approach to assisted dying. The new guidelines follow a consultation which attached 4,710 responses and replace the interim policy issued in September last year with a set of 16 factors in favour of prosecution and six against. The main thrust of the new policy is that individuals driven by compassion will be unlikely to be prosecuted if this was their guiding motive. Those motivated by gain would be.
The Crown Prosecution Service has decided that, while there is sufficient evidence to charge Caractacus Downes with an offence of assisting the suicide of his parents, Sir Edward and Lady Joan Downes, it is not in the public interest to do so. Sir Edward and Lady Downes died at the Dignitas Clinic, in Switzerland, on 10 July 2009. A short time later, solicitors acting on behalf of Mr Downes contacted the Metropolitan Police to report his parents' suicide. The police investigated the matter and a file of evidence was provided to the CPS for consideration.
Sir Edward and Lady Downes took their own lives at the Dignitas Clinic in Switzerland on 10 July 2009. Since there was information to suggest that one or both of their children, Mr Caractacus Downes and Ms Boudicca Downes, may have assisted their parents to commit suicide, a police investigation into their acts took place. After a careful review of all the evidence by senior prosecuting lawyers, it has been decided that there is no evidence to support a charge against Ms Downes and that, although there is enough evidence to charge Mr Downes with an offence under section 2(1) of the Suicide Act 1961, a prosecution is not required in the public interest. In relation to Ms Downes, there is no evidence that she undertook any act in England and Wales that could have assisted her parents in committing suicide. Accordingly, there is no evidence to support a prosecution under the Suicide Act 1961.
In a wallet on her kitchen table Debbie Purdy keeps the two pieces of plastic that will enable her to make her final journey. The Visa credit cards — one for her and one for her husband, Omar Puente — have a limit of £7,500. She has not spent a penny because she wants to keep them clear to pay for her death. “We don’t carry them with us because it’s only for use . . .” She stops short of referring specifically to the trip that she plans to make to the Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland. “We haven’t really talked about the cards but we both have copies because I am worried that he will need it to get home and stuff like that.” We would not be having this conversation if Ms Purdy, who has multiple sclerosis, had not won a landmark legal victory last year forcing the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) to clarify the law on assisted suicide. “I would probably have been dead for six months at this point. It’s terrifying. I love being alive.”
Elderly people should be allowed to end their lives with the help of a doctor even if they are not terminally ill, according to a new campaign group that claims to have widespread support. The Society for Old Age Rational Suicide, led by a former GP known as “Dr Death”, says that pensioners should have the human right to declare “enough is enough” and die with dignity.