Assisted Suicide Appeal By Canadian Government Announced

No surprise that the Federal government will be appealing the assisted suicide decision recently rendered by the British Columbia Supreme Court in Carter v. Canada (Attorney General). As discussed in my previous postings on the issue, the Federal government, through the Minister of Justice Rob Nicholson, had thirty days from the handing down of the BC decision to appeal to the British Columbia Court of Appeal. The time deadline was today and true to form, the government squeezed within the time period by filing the Notice to Appeal today. The government will also seek a stay of the ruling of Madam Justice Lynn Smith, which permits Gloria Taylor, suffering from ALS, to seek an assisted suicide when she so chose to do so through a rarely used constitutional exemption.

In Rob Nicholson's statement announcing the appeal, he maintained that the laws surrounding assisted suicide "exist to protect all Canadians." This idea of safeguarding an individual's life, even if the individual wants to end that life, is very consistent with the Supreme Court of Canada ruling in the Rodriguez case from 1993. Whether or not this idea of "government-knows-best" is still consistent with present Canadian values will no doubtedly be at issue when the Taylor et al case is ultimately heard before the Supreme Court of Canada. Again, considering the make-up of the present day SCC, particularly with the presence of Chief Justice McLachlin, who disagreed with the Rodriguez majority ruling, this rather outmoded idea of government as ultimate protector may be an idea of the past. Stay tuned to this blog for more on this issue.

Whose Life Is This Anyway? Sue Rodriguez and the Supreme Court of Canada

Last posting, I gave some elementary definitions underpinning the controversy surrounding the right to die issue. I started and ended the posting with a reminder: that these issues might be political, philosophical, religious, and socio-economic, but they are also very personal issues as well. Sue Rodriguez is a reminder of this important factor in our discussions. She is also the moniker for the seminal right to die case heard in 1993 by the Supreme Court of Canada: Rodriguez v. British Columbia (Attorney General).

As most of us well know, the Supreme Court of Canada denied Sue the right to doctor-assisted suicide. Returning to the definitions given in my last posting, Sue’s case was not one of euthanasia, whereby a third party takes another’s life in order to ostensibly relieve the ill person’s suffering, but rather the right to legally take her own life, suicide, with the help of a physician. Recall that under section 241 of the Criminal Code of Canada, anyone who assists another person to commit suicide is guilty of an offence. Thus, Sue was seeking protection for the person, the doctor, who would be assisting her in ending her life at the time she appointed. She explained very poignantly why she so desperately wanted her case to be successful: She wanted her son, who was then nine years of age, to “respect the law and did not want her last act on earth to be illegal.” In her book, Uncommon Will, she explained further, "But if I can't obey the law in the end, I'll know at least I did all I could to change it. So will he [her son]." To Sue Rodriguez, her physicality was an integral part of her identity: "If I cannot move my own body I have no life."

As soon as Sue launched her legal battle, lines were drawn. Many right to life groups opposed her claim, likening her position to state approved euthanasia as practiced by the Nazi Germany regime. She also had her supporters, some who were with her until the very end and others who she could no longer trust. John Hofsess, an initial supporter, who was the organizer of the Right To Die Society, quickly became an insider and was heavily involved in Rodriguez’s bid until she learned he had, without her permission, penned a letter to the editor of the Vancouver Sun, under her signature, criticizing the ALS Society. In the end, it was Sue’s lawyer, Vancouver based human rights lawyer Chris Considine, and then NDP MP, Sven Robinson, who stayed the course. Indeed, Sven and an unnamed doctor were with Sue Rodriguez on February 12, 1994 when she passed away after she self-administered a fatal concoction through a straw.

Legally, the Rodriguez decision not permitting assisted suicides and finding section 241 constitutional, split the nine-member court with five justices upholding the section and four justices finding the section constitutionally flawed. The argument was primarily based on section 7 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, what is known as the right to life section, although the cruel and unusual punishment section pursuant to s. 12 of the Charter and equality section 15 were also invoked. In the end, the majority judgment, preferred the sanctity of life over the right to die and collective societal rights over an individual’s right to control his or her own life.

The four dissenting justices who sided with Rodriguez, which included then Chief Justice Antonio Lamer and present Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, wrote in the minority judgment that "the right to die with dignity should be well protected as is any other aspect of the right to life." In their view the Criminal Code prevents people like Rodriguez from exercising autonomy over their bodies available to other people.

What does this case bode for the future? Presently, as I will discuss more thoroughly in a future posting, the British Columbia Supreme Court has recently once again considered the right to die issue through three very different plaintiffs: Lee Carter, Hollis Johnson, and Gloria Taylor. Lee Carter, together with her husband Hollis Johnson, raised the issue on behalf of Lee’s mother, who was forced to end her life overseas instead in her home in Vancouver due to the ban on assisted suicide. Gloria Taylor, like Sue Rodriguez, suffers from ALS and wishes, like Sue, to end her life legally. On June 15, 2012, Madam Justice Lynn Smith found for the plaintiffs and struck down section 241, giving the Federal government a year to amend the Criminal Code accordingly. In the meantime, Justice Smith allowed Gloria Taylor, through a constitutional exemption, the conditional right to commit suicide with a physician’s assistance. A constitutional exemption is a rare power under s. 24(1) of the Charter, used by the court to exempt individuals from the effects of legislation on the basis that the legislation, for this particular individual, is constitutionally oppressive.

Considering the justices who compose the majority are no longer sitting on the Court and Chief Justice McLachlan, a member of the minority in favour of striking down the legislation, is still sitting with a much different court composition, I might add, the arguments raised and accepted in the Carter case may survive Supreme Court of Canada scrutiny. There have also been many more cases of assisted suicide since the Rodriguez case; cases in which the courts have been extremely reluctant to find guilt under s. 241.

In the next posting on this issue, I will discuss some of those cases and the impact they might have on a future Supreme Court of Canada decision. Whether or not there will be such a future SCC decision is dependent on the federal government, particularly Rob Nicholson, the Minister of Justice, who must decide whether or not to appeal the Carter case to the BC Court of Appeal. Such decision must be made within thirty days of the decision, making the deadline the end of next week. In anticipation of this decision, there are a number of websites with petitions asking the Minister to appeal such as the Council of Canadians with Disabilities. Yet, some opinion polls suggest Canadians are in favour of some form of doctor-assisted suicide. The issue therefore remains unresolved.

Whose Life Is This Anyway? The Canadian “Right To Die” Debate Part One – Definitions and A Story

Sue Rodriguez was an active and intelligent woman when she was diagnosed with the debilitating and ultimately fatal, Lou Gehrig’s disease or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in 1991. Indeed, it is her wit and poise many of us remember when we recall the headlines she generated. Her quote, “whose life is it anyway,” spoken in a slow drawl, her ability to speak being slowly taken away by disease, still resonates with Canadians today as once again our courts grapple with the most basic issues of life and death.

As with all controversial issues, the right to die has taken a “life” of its own as it extends over all areas of deeply held beliefs such as philosophy, science, law, religion, politics, and socio-economic concerns. The issue has been considered in all forms of media and in all manners of legal cases. It has been touted in Kevorkian-like advertisement and debated in the highest offices of the land and yet, it is a profoundly personal issue, which transcends nationality and ethnicity.

Throughout this vastness of ideas and beliefs, it is essential to keep in mind that at the very core of the issue, there is always an individual, a person who is suffering, a person who wants a choice where a choice is not legally given. Sue Rodriguez was such an individual those many years ago when she took her right to choose to the Senate and to the Supreme Court of Canada. In the end, it was Sue Rodriguez who choose to die “on her own terms” outside of the law, even though her last wish was to remain one who respected it.

Euthanasia and assisted suicide are actually two different concepts. Euthanasia is the deliberate act undertaken by one person with the intention of ending the life of another person in order to relieve that person’s suffering. There are three forms of euthanasia: voluntary, non-voluntary, and involuntary. Voluntary euthanasia occurs when the act is done in accordance with the wishes of a legally competent individual or on the basis of a valid medical directive prepared when the patient is competent to authorize the procedure. A competent individual is capable of understanding the nature and consequences of the decision to be made and capable of communicating this decision. Non-voluntary euthanasia occurs when the act is done without knowledge of the wishes of a competent individual or, with respect to an incompetent individual. This form of euthanasia may attract criminal sanctioning. The third and last form is involuntary euthanasia occurs when the act is done against the wishes of the individual. This act is indistinguishable from murder or manslaughter and should attract the full force of our criminal law.

The Criminal Code of Canada, pursuant to s.14, essentially prohibits euthanasia by stating: “No person is entitled to consent to have death inflicted on him.” It is a core traditional principle of our criminal law that an individual cannot consent to his or her death. Indeed, one cannot even consent to grievous injury, which explains why even in a consensual violent sport like hockey, Todd Bertuzzi was charged with assault causing bodily harm. Whether or not the sentence imposed, a conditional discharge, was appropriate is another matter for a later blog. In any event, even in the medical sense, a doctor who gives the patient a lethal injection would be criminally liable. Also in the Criminal Code are legal duties placed upon medical personnel, which require them to perform their duties with all due care, requirements contrary to taking a patient’s life.

Therefore, euthanasia is clearly contrary to Canadian criminal law, and should be prosecuted as first-degree murder, because there is an intent to cause death, which is the definition of murder, and the act is most often planned and deliberate, which is the definition of first-degree murder. However, the Canadian reaction to euthanasia scenarios have fallen short of first-degree murder charges and have tended toward lesser charges such as charges of second-degree murder, manslaughter, and administrating a noxious substance. The charge decisions have definitely been influenced by the circumstances surrounding the euthanasia as a response to human suffering and the desire to relieve the suffering, such as in the Robert Latimer case.

Another factor is the unpredictable nature of juries, who are required to make decisions according to the rule of law but can be swayed by emotional factors as well. Finally, it can be legally difficult to prove murder in euthanasia cases. The Crown prosecutor must prove a legal and factual casual connection between the accused’s actions and the death. Typically, medical evidence is required to make this required connection. In euthanasia cases, it may be medically difficult to prove the exact cause of death when a person is in any case close to death and taking considerable pain medication. 

Assisted suicide, on the other hand, is the act of intentionally killing oneself with the assistance of another who provides either the knowledge to do it or the means to do it, or both. Assisted suicide is specifically prohibited in our Criminal Code under s.241, in which counseling someone to commit suicide or aiding or abetting someone to commit suicide is contrary to the law. Even if the person in question does not die from the aid, the person so assisting may be guilty under the section.

The difference between euthanasia and assisted suicide is therefore dependent on the type of involvement of the third party: euthanasia is when the action of a third party intentionally causes the death of a patient such as through the administration of a lethal injection and assisted suicide is when a third party provides the means and/or information necessary but the actual act causing death is carried out by the patient herself.

My next posting will continue outlining the legal background to this debate with a survey of the legal decisions made on the issue. However, to start and end this posting with Sue Rodriguez is essential: she was a real person suffering from the effects of a debilitating disease and her choice, to end her life when she saw fit, not when it was beyond her control, was her truest wish.