A man with "locked-in syndrome" has begun legal action, asking the director of public prosecutions to clarify the law on so-called mercy killing. Tony Nicklinson, 56, wants his wife to be allowed to help him die without the risk of being prosecuted for murder. Mr Nicklinson, of Chippenham, Wiltshire, communicates by blinking or nodding his head at letters on a board. His lawyers say he is "fed up with life" and does not wish to spend the next 20 years in this condition. According to his legal team, his only lawful means of ending his life is by starvation - refusing food and liquids. His wife Jane says she is prepared to inject him with a lethal dose of drugs, but this would leave her liable to be charged with murder.
A GREAT-grandmother has condemned her treatment at the hands of Surrey Police as ‘grotesque and incompetent’. Dr Libby Wilson, an 83-year-old family planning pioneer, has been on bail for ‘aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring a suicide’ since September last year in relation to the death of Cari Loder, a 48-year-old Godalming woman who had Multiple Sclerosis.
Fergus Walsh | 20:30 UK time, Monday, 19 July 2010 The case of Tony Nicklinson will re-open the debate on assisted dying and so-called "mercy killing". He has locked-in syndrome, following a stroke. Unable to talk, he communicates by blinking or nodding his head. He also has a specially adapted computer with a push-button control. Mr Nicklinson wants his wife to be allowed to inject him with a lethal drugs dose without the fear of her being prosecuted for murder or manslaughter. As the law stands, that seems a vain hope because actively taking a life, even with consent, has always been treated as a crime, leading to a jury trial.
Marlisa Tiedemann Dominique Valiquet Law and Government Division Revised 17 July 2008 PRB 07-03E PARLIAMENTARY INFORMATION AND RESEARCH SERVICE SERVICE D’INFORMATION ET DE RECHERCHEPARLEMENTAIRES
A retired GP arrested on suspicion of advising a seriously ill woman on how to die will not be charged even though there was enough evidence to prosecute, the Crown Prosecution Service has announced. Dr Libby Wilson allegedly spoke to Cari Loder, a multiple sclerosis sufferer, in the days before she took her own life at home last year. Although the CPS said charges could be brought against Dr Wilson, an 83-year-old who founded the right-to-die lobby group Friends to the End (Fate), it decided it was “not in the public interest”. The decision adds further fuel to the ongoing debate over assisted suicide, making increasingly unlikely that anyone will ever be charged. Dr Wilson became the first person to be arrested in connection with an assisted suicide after the new guidelines were published by Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions. Mrs Loder, 48, killed herself at her home in Surrey after inhaling gas which she ordered over the internet.
The CPS has decided that charges will not be brought against Dr Elisabeth Wilson and two individuals following the death of Caroline Loder at her home in Surrey on 8 June 2009. A spokesperson said: "We have thoroughly reviewed a file of evidence in relation to a woman and 2 men suspected of committing an offence of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring the suicide of another contrary to s2 of the Suicide Act 1961. We have decided that there is not sufficient evidence to prosecute one of the men. The assistance he gave to the deceased was not of a kind that could be said to have assisted the act of suicide. "We have further decided that although there is sufficient evidence to prosecute one of the men and the woman, after considering the public interest factors tending in favour and against prosecution, as outlined in the Policy for Prosecutors in respect of cases of encouraging or assisting suicide, it is not in the public interest to bring a prosecution against either of them."
The Society for Old Age Rational Suicide was established in Brighton and Hove, by several right-to-die activists and humanists, in 2009. Presently, the main objective of SOARS is to begin a campaign to get the law eventually changed in the UK so that very elderly, mentally competent individuals, who are suffering unbearably from various health problems (although none of them is “terminal”) are allowed to receive a doctor’s assistance to die, if this is their persistent choice. Surely the decision to decide, at an advanced age, that enough is enough and, avoiding further suffering, to have a dignified death is the ultimate human right for a very elderly person. Although there is much public support for this to become lawful in the UK, it is unlikely that Parliament (either at Westminster or in Edinburgh) will change the law, to help those who are terminally ill, for at least five to ten years.
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.
Two people have been arrested on suspicion of assisting the suicide of a disabled man from South Tyneside. Retired engineer Douglas Sinclair, 76, had been suffering from the debilitating disorder multiple system atrophy, his solicitor said. Christopher Potts said Mr Sinclair died in Zurich on 28 July. He arranged his death through the Swiss assisted-suicide organisation Dignitas. The woman and man who were arrested have been bailed as inquiries continue. Mr Sinclair, a father-of-one, had had the condition for two years. He was being cared for at a care home in Jarrow, South Tyneside, when his conditioned worsened earlier this year.
Following the House of Lords' decision in Purdy, the Director of Public Prosecutions issued an interim policy for prosecutors setting out the factors to be considered when deciding whether a prosecution in an assisted suicide case is in the public interest. This paper considers the interim policy, the subsequent public consultation and the resulting final policy. Key aspects of the policy are examined, including the condition of the victim, the decision to commit suicide and the role of organised or professional assistance. The inclusion of assisted suicides which take place within England and Wales makes the informal legal change realised by the policy more significant than was originally anticipated.
A public policy think tank, which aims to promote “rational, evidence-based and measured debate” on the subject of assisted dying, has been launched by two members of the House of Lords. Lord Alex Carlile and Baroness Ilora Finlay, co-chairs of Living and Dying Well, have both fervently opposed any change in the law on this issue. Their new organisation is neither “neutral” nor “a campaigning pressure group,” instead, they want to present “hard evidence” to parliament and the public in an objective and informative manner.
This End of life guidance covers three main issues: contemporaneous and advance refusal of treatment; withholding and withdrawing life-prolonging medical treatment; assisted dying - euthanasia and assisted suicide.
UK doctors have set up a new group for health professionals to challenge the BMA and a number of royal colleges in their stance against assisted dying for terminally ill people and to push for a change in the law. The group, called Dignity in Dying: Healthcare Professionals for Change, was set up by Ann McPherson, who is dying of pancreatic cancer, after an article she wrote in the BMJ last year generated interest in giving people who are dying the option of help to end their lives when they chose (BMJ 2009;339:b2827 doi:10.1136/bmj.b2827). Dr McPherson, who is a fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners, said she wants the royal colleges to have a more informed debate about assisted suicide.
Assisted dying should form part of a good palliative care service for terminally ill people in the United Kingdom, said Ann McPherson, a GP and founder of a new group of medical professionals called Dignity in Dying: Healthcare Professionals for Change (BMJ 2010;341:c5498, doi:10.1136/bmj.c5498). Speaking at a debate hosted by the Medical Journalists’ Association last week on assisted dying and whether the law should be changed, Dr McPherson, who is herself dying from pancreatic cancer, called for the law on assisted dying to be changed in a “narrow way” so that people who are dying and who are able to make the decision on how and when they would like to end their life can do so. “Without a change in the law it will make it much more difficult for some people to have a dignified death, which is what everybody is entitled to,” she said.
Sir Terry Pratchett, the author, believes doctors should be able to prescribe a take-home suicide kit which would be “close to the ideal” way for terminally ill people to end their lives.