Police who investigated the death of a young rugby player at the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland have called for clearer guidelines for doctors after revealing that his GP had known of his wish to kill himself six months before he died.
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The following report, in today’s Telegraph, is a clear illustration of why the current English prosecution guidelines respecting assisted dying/suicide are entirely inadequate and misdirected. Instead of clarifying, as they were required by the courts to do, the new guidelines instead further confuse the issue. Why should the police be involved before the event? Prosecution only applies to acts committed, not to acts about to be committed or in the process of commission. If the police are to be involved before an assisted suicide, wherever it takes place, then the law should be changed, assisted dying should be legalised, and a rationale should be given for involving the police at this stage of the process. I do not think a good reason can be given for involving the police before someone has chosen and has been assisted to die. Whatever provisions are required, involvement of as blunt an instrument as the police during preparation for assisted dying would be entirely out-of-place. It is a situation of the greatest intimacy and delicacy. The picture painted by Tim Ross in this article shows that the situation is now entirely confused. This is surely not what Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, had in mind. Tim Ross’s article follows:
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Detectives who worked on the case of Daniel James, who died aged 23 three years ago after a training accident left him paralysed, said his GP saw him several times in the months before he died.
The doctor also witnessed a formal declaration of Daniel’s intentions two weeks before he travelled to the centre in Zurich.
But police were only alerted on the day that Daniel flew to Switzerland with his parents, which was too late to attempt to convince him to change his plans, because the doctor wanted to preserve patient confidentiality.
Read more ….
This seems to be a grand opening for police abuse and forced isolation of those contemplating suicide. How could you feel comfortable discussing your plans with friends and family, if you thought they might be arrested for assisting in your suicide just for knowing about the plan?
Yes, indeed, it does. In fact, the idea that police should be involved in the process is ludicrous. Who on earth could think that reasonable? That police must ascertain, in the event of death, that laws have not been broken, goes without saying, but laws for assisted dying would provide for protocols governing such deaths, and it should be a simple matter to judge whether the protocols have been followed. But to summon the police to the bedside of a dying person, or someone suffering so much that they wish to be helped to die, is not only silly, it is menacing. Only a religious person could think this appropriate, since they believe that no sane person would choose to die before their “natural” death.
I’m not sure I understand why the fact that police were not told of his plans is a problem. Is this required by whatever laws were in place at the time he travelled to Switzerland (or in the laws enacted since)? If not, why on earth would anyone have told the police? Seems like it’s absolutely none of their business.
You’re darn right that it would be menacing to summon the cops to the bedside of the dying would be menacing — so, too, would be having to alert the police of one’s intentions to travel to Switzerland to die. Can you imagine? I would be terrified that, if I told the police of my plans, I’d be kept from leaving for one red-tape-y (or other) reason or another. Think if, for example, someone like Alex Schadenburg got wind of one’s plans!
Elizabeth was so concerned about the possibility that someone might stop her, that no one was told when she was leaving or where she was leaving from, and she only relaxed when the pilot said that we had left Canadian airspace off Newfoundland. The Telegraph is often a silly conservative rag, but the article by Tim Ross is deeply confused. There is no reason why the police should have been notified, and every reason why the police should not be involved at any stage leading up to an assisted death.
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