Important Right-to-Die Court Decision in the UK
30 Jul2009
Debbie Purdy wins ‘significant legal victory’ on assisted suicide
Afua Hirsch, The Guardian (July 30, 2009)
An important turn today for UK Assisted Dying supporters (which is about 62% of the public…).
I will let The Guardian newspaper explain:
Debbie Purdy has won a significant legal victory in the House of Lords which lawyers are describing as a turning point for the law on assisted suicide.
Purdy, 46, from Bradford, West Yorkshire, who has primary progressive multiple sclerosis, succeeded in arguing that it is a breach of her human rights not to know whether her husband, Cuban jazz violinist Omar Puente, will be prosecuted if he accompanies her to Swiss clinic Dignitas where she wishes to die if her condition worsens.
The decision – the last ever by the law lords before they recommence work as justices of the new supreme court in October – went further than expected in Purdy’s favour, lawyers say.
Ordering the director of public prosecutions to issue a policy setting out when those in Puente’s position can expect to face prosecution, the court ruled that the current lack of clarity is a violation of the right to a private and family life.
The Purdy case is important and it will presumably force a change in UK law. As it currently stands, the UK’s 1961 Suicide Act decriminalizes suicide if you kill yourself. But any person whom:
aids, abets, counsels or procures the suicide of another, or an attempt by another to commit suicide, shall be liable on conviction on indictment to imprisonment for a term not exceeding fourteen years.
What that aiding, abetting, counseling, and procuring entails is really ambiguous. It is all so unclear that UK Prosecutors have been declining to press charges against families that accompany, say, a loved one to die in the Dignitas Clinic.
For an extremely thorough history on the Assisted Dying debate in the UK, see the Guardian’s Assisted Suicide page.
I discussed much of this information a few weeks ago in a Death Reference Desk post about the recent deaths of Edward and Joan Downes.
Since the Downes’ deaths and that discussion, I came across the following article: ‘Romantic’ death may idealize suicide: critics. Maybe. But I’m not so convinced. If anything, what Edward and Joan Downes chose to do was die and to die together. It was an act of love, to be sure, but I’m not ready to call it romance.
They chose death over a biological life neither one of them wanted to live.
It is absolutely acceptable to choose death. And family members and/or friends who want to assist in that choice should be able to do so without fear of the law.
But LOOK OUT: Scotland might beat England to the punch. Scottish MPs are discussing a change to Scotland’s own assisted suicide laws.
And Scottish MP Margo MacDonald is leading a fierce charge.
2 Responses to Important Right-to-Die Court Decision in the UK
» The Right to Die Free in Montana Death Reference Desk
September 4th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
[...] Edward and Joan Downes (who traveled together to the Dignitas Clinic in Switzerland to die) and Debbie Purdy who successfully fought a campaign to have England’s Assisted Suicide law [...]
» New Assisted Dying Guidelines in England Death Reference Desk
October 6th, 2009 at 6:03 pm
[...] Last week in England, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, released new guidelines on assisted dying. The goal of these new guidelines is to give family members a clearer understanding of what is acceptable before the law when assisting a loved one to die. As the law currently stands in England and Wales, assisting another person’s suicide is against the law. I discussed what caused these new guidelines here. [...]