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New CPS guidelines could lead to rise in assisted suicides in UK, admits Keir Starmer

By Christopher Hope and Kate Devlin

Mr Starmer on Wednesday published a list of factors which will help lawyers to decide whether to charge people for assisting suicide.

The dying are not so easily categorised

From: Times online

A deathly cabal threatens the sanctity of life

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 20/09/2009

From: Daily Telegraph

Assisted suicide could be excuse to kill burdensome elderly, says police chief

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 27/08/2009

From: Daily Telegraph

Guidelines on assisted suicide law will be published this week by Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, to clarify when people were likely to be prosecuted.

Baroness Campbell's speech on Lord Falconer

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 06/07/2009

Hospital doctor 'hastened the death of elderly patient' with painkillers

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 06/07/2009

From: Telegraph

Here Come the Assisted Suicide Bills

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 03/02/2009

Second Hand Smoke

Sunday, January 25, 2009

The Mental Capacity Act 2: Patient Advocacy and Ethics

Articles | Mental Capacity Act | Submitted on 11/11/2008

Lynch, T. (2008) The Mental Capacity Act 2: patient advocacy and ethics. Nursing Times; 104: 43, 26–27.

This article discusses possible ethical and legal dilemmas in the interpretation of both the act and its code of practice.

Assisted suicide law will apply to deaths in Britain and abroad

Assisted Dying Bill | News Items | Submitted on 03/08/2008

From: Telegraph

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.

Patients need proper care, not euthanasia

Debbie Purdey | News Items | Submitted on 13/06/2008

Daily Telegraph, 13 June 2008

By Melanie McDonagh

For someone contemplating death, Debbie Purdey seems radiantly alive. She is the multiple sclerosis sufferer who was allowed a judicial review this week to clarify what would happen if she were to travel to a Swiss or Belgian euthanasia clinic to end her life.

She wants to make sure that her husband, Omar, would not be prosecuted if he accompanied her. The Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald, has refused to publicise the official policy on assisted suicide. However, according to the pro-euthanasia organisation Dignity in Dying, which is backing her case, 100 Britons have travelled to suicide clinics abroad since 1992 - and none of their relatives has been prosecuted.