posted
It looks like Canada media will be putting euthanasia in high profile for at least the next week or two. Aside from the Evelyn Martens trial, there was breaking news yesterday that a 59-year-old woman in Montreal claims to have "helped" her 36-year-old son commit suicide. He had multiple sclerosis.
Today on Montreal "Radio Noon" on CBC, a call-in and interview show, they'll be examing the question of whether or not it should be legal for people to help others commit suicide if they're ill (or similar wording).
The segment will feature a live interview with me (about 5 minutes long) as well as others on all sides of the related issues.
The show is easily accessed in Quebec on radio across the province.
It's not bad if you're accessing via internet either.
On the left there is a direct link to Radio Noon phone-in and you can listen live.
The segment of the show discussing assisted suicide will be from 1:00 to 2:00 pm Eastern Time. I'll be on, representing Not Dead Yet , sometime during that slot.
Do you have all the details of the case, Stephen? It sounds like the son was pretty (obsessed? is that too perjorative?) with disability, as he worked in a caretaker facility, had written a play about "illness and loss of control," etc. He was a gym-workout person, and he is posing half-nude in the Globe and Mail cover shot, which isn't to say anything more than he likely had an investment of some depth in body image.
It doesn't sound like he started from an objective perspective about disability, even if he did have some firsthand knowledge from working in the area.
[ September 28, 2004, 11:18 AM: Message edited by: Sara Sasse ]
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Unfortunately, the picture doesn't show up when I access the article.
We'll see what I can do in five minutes - there are some uniquely Canadian complications talking about this in Canada. For one thing, with Robert Latimer (he killed his 12-year-old daughter), Evelyn Martens on trial (for assisted suicide), and this case, the issue of a "compassionate homicide" statute inevitably comes up in Canada.
The proposed statute would be a lower homicide classification and would apply to both cases in which there was clear consent and in cases like the Latimer case in which there was no consent of the victim. (Once people begin to accept the appropriateness of one class of disabled person, there seems to be a willingness to expand the class and conditions.)
Context is my main point - it's one the MS society has been making too. The majority of people with the condition have no wish to die - even though many of them struggle with biologically-based depression as part of the disorder. Why should the law officially sanction what is an out of the ordinary reaction? Especially when the standard is a very different one when it's a nondisabled person who wants to commit suicide?
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posted
This sounds really interesting. I especially like this quote from your site:
quote:People already have theright to refuse unwanted treatment, and suicide is not illegal. What we oppose is a public policy that singles out individuals for legalized killing based on their health status.
I hadn't thought of this argument before, and it's pretty compelling.
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posted
The good news is that at least some of the media is seeking out input from the disability community right from the beginning of this particular story. For example, here's an article from today's Montreal Gazette: (quote from me at the end of article)
quote:Learn to deal with it, MS patient says; Canadians divided on ethics, legality Approving assisted suicide for only certain groups alarms disabled community
CATHERINE SOLYOM The Gazette
As a 58-year-old mother in Montreal joins the ranks of those who say they chose to kill their children rather than watch them suffer, North American society remains divided over the ethics of assisted suicide - and whether it should be legalized.
Polls have shown a consistent rise in the number of Canadians willing to allow doctors to help terminally ill patients commit suicide, up to 75 per cent in 1995.
In Quebec, the same Gallup poll showed 86 per cent were in favour, compared to 63 per cent in the Atlantic provinces.
But what about suicide for the "hopelessly ill" or the "desperately ill" who won't, however, die from their illnesses? And what about when it's family members, not doctors assisting them?
Marielle Houle was charged yesterday with assisting the suicide of her son Charles Fariala, 36, who had multiple sclerosis, which is not normally fatal. She faces up to 14 years in prison if found guilty.
"Most people with MS can and do live active and productive lives in their families and their communities," said Deanna Groetzinger of the Multiple Sclerosis Society of Canada. "So when something like this happens, it is a tragedy. But we have no way of knowing what led the family to take this action."
The issue is whether Fariala really wanted to commit suicide and was competent to request help, said Eike-Henner Kluge, a professor in biomedical ethics at the University of Victoria.
"We can't simply take the word of his mother," said Kluge, who helped prepare the case of Sue Rodriguez, whose request to have a doctor legally assist her suicide was ultimately rejected by the Supreme Court of Canada. "We require more evidence - ideally an explicit statement in advance to other individuals."
An investigation will probably centre on Fariala's lifestyle and intentions prior to his death Sunday, Kluge added.
That said, assisted suicide is the one issue that has gained widespread support, yet Parliament refuses to make changes to the law, Kluge said.
He compares assisted suicide to abortion: no one has the right to examine why a woman wants an abortion, "so why is the right to take my life not beyond examination by other parties? Abortion also involves two people."
It's legalizing the right to assist only certain people's suicides that raises concern in the disabled community, however.
"Suicide is an individual action, and not something we're necessarily opposed to," said Stephen Drake of Not Dead Yet, a U.S.-based group, adding that prosecutors in the U.S. and Canada have the discretion to not prosecute or lessen the charges.
"But the idea that the state would sanction, aid and abet the suicide of a certain group of people based on their health status is very alarming."
The perpetrators of most family killings say they did it out of compassion, Drake said - "but we don't believe those parents unless the victim happens to be like Tracy Latimer."
posted
I saw that story on the news last night and it just made me sick. Of course, there are two sides to every story, but somehow committing homicide and being motivated by compassion just doesn't work.
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posted
Unfortunately, Polio, both the press and the public seem more than willing to by "compassion" as an explanation for a murder - as long as the victim is ill, old or disabled.
Just got my second call from the CBC. They'll be calling sometime within the next hour, but didn't say exactly when.
If this goes like other experiences, some of my time will be spent deconstructing a ridiculous question so I can get to make a point I really want to make. Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
Hrm...just got the chance to check in. Have I missed you? The current woman (from Right to Die) doesn't seem to be making much of an intellectual case, sadly.
I hope I made sense - I had lousy reception and could barely hear the interviewer. She might have gotten annoyed with me, but I hope I made my simple main points effectively.
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The pro-euthanasia movement tends to rely on emotional arguments. And it works for them. So this comes as no surprise.
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posted
You cut her off onceearly on, but I think she seemed rather pleased with your response. You definitely made sense! You couldn't have annoyed her more than the last lawyer whom she rebuked! *laugh*
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posted
I'm in class, so I can't listen, unfortunately.
quote:The proposed statute would be a lower homicide classification and would apply to both cases in which there was clear consent and in cases like the Latimer case in which there was no consent of the victim. (Once people begin to accept the appropriateness of one class of disabled person, there seems to be a willingness to expand the class and conditions.)
Here is as clear an example of trying to value some lives more than others as I've ever seen.
Allowing or reducing the sentence for "homicide with consent" is an entirely different proposition than homicide with no consent but a "lesser" victim.
I happen to oppose both, but for very different reasons. The first brings up all kinds of issues of proof, coercion, informed consent, etc. All thorny issues that are dealt with in other places in the law, but too ephemeral for me to trust in life and death matters. So my objections here aren't based on a violation of inherent rights of the victim, but rather on practical and ethical concerns about the legitimacy of suicide. This part of it could legitimately be couched as a "right to die" issue, and it can be argued on such grounds.
The second aspect of the statute, downgrading the crime because of an attribute of the victim, has an ugly history in our country. In the South, the rape of a black female had a significantly less penalty than rape of a white woman (in some cases, one was a misdemeanor, the other a capital crime). This was on top of the fact that a white committing a crime against a black would probably be acquitted anyway, and a black accused of committing a crime against a white would almost never be acquitted and might be lynched.
There is no difference whatsover between these examples and what happens with unconsented homicide of a disabled victim. None.
It sends a clear message that they aren't "worth" as much as "normal" people. This message will be heard and acted on in a thousand little ways, in a thousand forums, with effects we can't predict.
posted
Christy, Sara (I assume you both heard it),
Thanks!
As frustrating as it is, I prefer live interviews like this over anything else. It's the most control you ever have over your own message in the media.
You can do a taped interview or talk to a reporter, and you never know just what little snippet they'll use and what context they'll leave out.
In a live set-up, if I am not effective, the only place to really lay any blame is at my own doorstep.
It's the closest I get to understanding the urge that athletes have to put themselves on the line in individual sports competition.
Dag - thanks for your comments on the compassionate homicide statute. A couple months ago, a highly respected bioethicist at the University of Toronto published an opinion piece raising and promoting the "compassionate homicide" statute once again. He's what I refer to as "the other Peter Singer" - literally. He's got the same name as the Princeton prof of ill repute but it's a completely different bioethicist, farther down on the iceberg.
I don't know if there will be anything saved of this show. Some of their shows seem to be archived, but it will probably be at least a week before it would show up at the site, judging from my earlier perusal of the site. In which case, though, there still wouldn't be a transcript until someone with really good transcription skills and time on their hands stepped up and volunteered to do it.
posted
It is telling that the suicide of a physically vigorous person is seen as a tragedy but the suicide of an ailing and perhaps burdensome dependent is seen as a blessing. And for the mother to assist the suicide is completely unconscionable.
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posted
Ah, here it is. A defense of a new statute for the killing of disabled people by Peter A. Singer, director of the University of Toronto Joint Centre for Bioethics - again, not to be confused with the Princeton Peter Singer (ugly tip of the bioethics iceberg).
quote:'Compassionate homicide' is a crime like no other National Post Tuesday, August 10, 2004 Page: A15 Section: Editorials Byline: Peter A. Singer Source: National Post
David Carmichael wasn't at his 11-year old son Ian's funeral last week. He was in a London, Ont., jail charged with Ian's murder.
At the funeral, Ian's uncle said: "To the media and the curious, we have so much to say -- but not now." As reports circulated that Ian had suffered a brain aneurysm or brain tumour, speculation arose that Ian's death was a "mercy killing."
If this speculation turns out to be correct, Canada will once again be engulfed in the debate that arose in the case of Tracy Latimer, a 12-year-old cerebral palsy patient whose father, Robert, is currently serving a life sentence for her 1993 murder.
The main lesson in these cases? Don't expect the punishment to fit the crime.
The problem is that the Canadian legal system cannot distinguish between Robert Latimer and Karla Homolka.
A murder conviction carries a sentence of life imprisonment, with a mandatory minimum before eligibility for parole of 25 years in jail in the case of first-degree murder (the charge against Carmichael) and 10 years for second-degree murder (Latimer's conviction).
Parents who kill their children to alleviate suffering have committed a crime, a serious crime that deserves to be punished. There are other legal ways to alleviate suffering. Even advocates of legalizing euthanasia won't want to argue that killing disabled children is the best case to promote their cause. But people will disagree on the appropriate punishment to fit the crime.
Disability advocates will argue that there should be no lesser sentence for Robert Latimer (and possibly David Carmichael) than for anyone else convicted of murder. To do so devalues the lives of the disabled and may put other disabled children at risk.
But many others will feel that mercy killers should be convicted of a crime, but not go to jail for a decade or more.
As our legal system now stands, there are several ways that the punishment could be made to fit the crime. Unfortunately, they are either unlikely to succeed or unsatisfactory.
The Crown could reduce the charge to manslaughter, which doesn't carry a mandatory minimum sentence (unless committed with a firearm). Murder may be reduced to manslaughter "if the person who committed it did so in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation." But the Crown is unlikely to reduce the charge if the facts better fit the definition of murder because of planning or deliberation (elements that are typically present in the case of mercy killing).
***
To deal with such cases in a more systematic way, a better approach would be for Parliament to change the criminal code to recognize the crime of "compassionate homicide" with no mandatory minimum sentence. Although this was suggested over a decade ago, it hasn't happened.
Everyone believes the punishment should fit the crime. Cases like Latimer's and possibly Carmichael's, if the speculation is true, remind us that the principle doesn't apply in the case of mercy killings. One hopes the attention on the current case will encourage Parliament to change that.
Note: Peter A. Singer is professor of medicine and director of the University of Toronto Joint Centre for Bioethics.
quote:The Crown could reduce the charge to manslaughter, which doesn't carry a mandatory minimum sentence (unless committed with a firearm). Murder may be reduced to manslaughter "if the person who committed it did so in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation." But the Crown is unlikely to reduce the charge if the facts better fit the definition of murder because of planning or deliberation (elements that are typically present in the case of mercy killing).
In New York and many other states whose criminal code is influenced by the Model Penal Code, the emotional disturbance necessary to mitigate murder to manslaughter does not have to be a "sudden provocation," also called a "heat of passion."
At common law, there was no issue for the jury in provocation - it was a matter of law for the judge to decide. If there was time to cool off between the provocation and the crime, then manslaughter was not available as a mitigated charge. Traditionally, there were only four acceptable provocations for manslaughter:
1) Angry words followed by an assault. 2) Sight of a friend or relative being beaten. 3) Sight of a citizen being unlawfully deprived of his liberty. 4) Sight of man in adultery w/ accused’s wife.
Note the sexism inherent in #4. However, the entire construct was thought to be sexist by some commentators starting in the mid-late 20th century, because it was thought that the sudden heat of passion defense was based on a stereotypical male's temper, and did not account for other, equally violence-inducing emotional states. This is why most abuse victims who killed their abuser were convicted of murder, not manslaughter, while many abusers who killed their wives after losing their temper did get manslaughter convictions. The cumulative emotional effect of continued abuse was not taken into account, and there was almost always a cooling off period.
The Model Penal Code holds that provocation is sufficient to reduce murder to manslaughter if the provocation did create a severe emotional disturbance and it would have done so in a reasonable person. There's debate about how circumstances are taken into account when determining the reasonableness.
To slowly bring this back to topic, New York's criminal code already has a mechanism by which a defendant could put their emotional state at issue for possible mitigation, without enshrining an statutory declaration that some victims deserve lesser protection. It also leaves the individual expression of justice in each case up to the jury.
As a prosecutor, I could challenge such a law case-by-case. But if the law gives a statutory exception for "compassionate" murders, the case would be much harder to make.
The thing that really bothers me about the article is that he seems to blithely assume that "compassion" should limit culpability, and that it is "compassion" to kill a disabled person. To be the least bit intellectually honest, he would need to use the term "compassion-induced homicide." Even then it's execrable.
posted
Transcript: no transcript for this show, but there is a tape. I ordered it and they say I should have it in a couple weeks.
The next trick will be to get someone willing to transcribe it for me.
More later -- Dag, I really like your analysis of the "compassionate homicide" statute. I use elements of it in debunking it.
My shorthand way of dealing with it is to point out that it's a statute defined (as you said) by the nature of the "victim" - no one could cop to this unless their victim was old, ill or disabled.
I'd have to check, but as of a few years ago, according to FBI statistics, well over half of the homicides of children ages 0-11 years are committed by close family members. I haven't run into anyone in law enforcement who thinks a statute like this is a good idea - they've had too much experience with domestic violence and its aftermath.
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posted
Sara, Christy - it would be great if either of you could fill me in on what was said over the course of the show, including what I say. While I do pretty well in that kind of high-pressure, instant response situation, it's often hard to retain a coherent memory of what I actually said and in what order.
Here's what I think I remember:
I do recall she (the host) tried to frame the discussion to one of "assisted suicide" and the "terminally ill" and I reminded her that we were here today talking about a guy with multiple sclerosis, not a terminal illness - and fully capable of killing himself without help.
I also touched on the idea that framing the suicides of disabled people as "acts of courage" (as the person immediately before me did) while other suicides are described as "tragic" is offensive and discriminatory - and bigotry is a poor basis for public policy.
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quote:The next trick will be to get someone willing to transcribe it for me.
I have some history as a medical transcriptionist with primarily telephone-based communication (the company I worked for had a phone-based dictation system, no actual tape there) and now I'm a legal secretary spending about 60% of my day under headphones. If you'd like, I can take care of this part for you. Let me know if you're interested.
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