Woman found guilty of involuntary manslaughter in text/ suicide case

[Locrian]

@SlackerInc

This looks like a straw man. What I am arguing–and I don’t see anyone else disagreeing with the verdict but contradicting my argument–is the following:

(1) She was not joking or speaking off the cuff without thinking.
(2) She knew her words could make it substantially more likely that he would go through with the suicide.
(3) This was her heartfelt desire, that he take his own life.
(4) She should have the legal right to say what she did to him, just as neo-Nazis should have the right to march through Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods, swastikas unfurled. Again, many reprehensible acts should not be illegal. Social reprobation must needs suffice.

And this all happened because he convinced her that this was the best solution for him.

By Conrad convincing her to go pro on suicide, she felt SHE was helping HIM.

[SlackerInc]

True.

[Locrian]

@SlackerInc

True.

I should also point out that Michelle needs some mental care too. And to grow up. I hardly see how jailing this person would help her do either.

[SlackerInc]

Also true.

[Trinopus]

@asahi

Okay, suppose someone sees a curious five-year old child picking up a bottle of toxic solvent or oil. And he says “Go ahead, drink it.” And then the child proceeds to drink the toxin, and he gets sick and dies. Are you saying that there’s no criminal liability here? . . .

The victim was not a child.

You could make the same scenario regarding an adult…but you’d have to include the fact that the adult knows that the bottle contains poison.

Saying, “Go ahead, it’s just water,” while knowing it’s poison – and the victim does not know this – is committing a deadly misrepresentation.

But if I’m holding a bottle of poison, and you say, “Go ahead, drink it,” and I do – that is not your act, it’s mine.

This case may not involve a child but it nevertheless involves someone with clearly diminished capacity to make healthy adult choices, and we have someone is knowingly communicating with that person in such a way that may cause that person to harm himself. The circumstances are indeed rare but its certainly reasonable to conclude that the defendant’s communication with the victim factored significantly in his death.

I agree that it was a shitten action, the behavior of a total stinkard. But I just can’t buy “manslaughter.” The victim committed suicide; the jerk in question egged him on, but I just can’t buy making that a crime.

[Trinopus]

@UltraVires

Of course we employ judges. We employ Clarence Thomas and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. They will come to different decisions in many cases. To disagree with a judge, or judges, is absolutely appropriate in Great Debates. . . .

Quoted for truth, also for wisdom. Courts and judges make mistakes all the time; it’s perfectly valid for us to believe that this might be one of those times.

(Also makes me glad I’m not a judge.)

[UltraVires]

Let’s say that a man is 78 years old and is diagnosed with stage four cancer; told he has six months to live at best. He asks me if it wouldn’t be best just to go get his shotgun and end it all.

Suppose I, not a doctor, but in good faith, actually believe that he would be better off and would suffer less, if he actually did shoot himself.

What can I say to him, in Massachusetts, that won’t land me in jail? Keep in mind, if you can’t answer this question with more than an “I’ll know it when I see it” argument, the law is unconstitutionally vague.

[SlackerInc]

@UltraVires

Let’s say that a man is 78 years old and is diagnosed with stage four cancer; told he has six months to live at best. He asks me if it wouldn’t be best just to go get his shotgun and end it all.

Suppose I, not a doctor, but in good faith, actually believe that he would be better off and would suffer less, if he actually did shoot himself.

What can I say to him, in Massachusetts, that won’t land me in jail? Keep in mind, if you can’t answer this question with more than an “I’ll know it when I see it” argument, the law is unconstitutionally vague.

UltraVires, you make me think of the movie Still Alice. Specifically:

As Alice’s memory begins to fade, she daydreams of her mother and sister, who died in a car crash when she was a teenager. She memorizes words and sets a series of personal questions on her phone, which she answers every morning. She hides sleeping pills in her room, and records a video message instructing her future self to swallow the pills when she can no longer answer the questions.

Alice begins to have difficulty answering the questions on her phone. She becomes distressed after losing the phone,; John finds it a month later in the freezer, but Alice thinks it had only been missing for a day.

After a video call with Lydia, Alice inadvertently opens the video with the suicide instructions. With some difficulty, she finds the pills and is about to swallow them, but when she is interrupted by the arrival of her caregiver she drops the pills on the floor and then forgets what she was doing.

When she lost her phone, and then later when she got interrupted, I was heartbroken for her.

The issues here are somewhat different and rather ethically complex in their own right, but it’s scary to think I was at least brushing up against the same kinds of feelings and impulses that can lead to a manslaughter conviction.

[Muffin]

Rather than throw the baby out with the bath water by trying to change your longstanding laws that protect psychologically fragile people from being suicided by garden variety psycho killers using murder/manslaughter by proxy, what you should do is use your skills as a lawyer to run a test case to carve out an exception for medically assisted dying, while also helping organize a popular push directing your politicians to legistlate medically assisted dying. Here’s an example of just that (albeit a bit too tight in the constraints in my personal opinion):

https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/laws/stat/rsc-1985-c-c-46/latest/rsc-1985-c-c-46.html?searchUrlHash=AAAAAQAHc3VpY2lkZQAAAAAB&offset=341.3333435058594#Suicide__1043129

Suicide

Counselling or aiding suicide

241 (1) Everyone is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term of not more than 14 years who, whether suicide ensues or not,

(a) counsels a person to die by suicide or abets a person in dying by suicide; or

(b) aids a person to die by suicide.

Exemption for medical assistance in dying

(2) No medical practitioner or nurse practitioner commits an offence under paragraph (1)(b) if they provide a person with medical assistance in dying in accordance with section 241.2.

Exemption for person aiding practitioner

(3) No person is a party to an offence under paragraph (1)(b) if they do anything for the purpose of aiding a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner to provide a person with medical assistance in dying in accordance with section 241.2.

Exemption for pharmacist

(4) No pharmacist who dispenses a substance to a person other than a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner commits an offence under paragraph (1)(b) if the pharmacist dispenses the substance further to a prescription that is written by such a practitioner in providing medical assistance in dying in accordance with section 241.2.

Exemption for person aiding patient

(5) No person commits an offence under paragraph (1)(b) if they do anything, at another person’s explicit request, for the purpose of aiding that other person to self-administer a substance that has been prescribed for that other person as part of the provision of medical assistance in dying in accordance with section 241.2.

Clarification

(5.1) For greater certainty, no social worker, psychologist, psychiatrist, therapist, medical practitioner, nurse practitioner or other health care professional commits an offence if they provide information to a person on the lawful provision of medical assistance in dying.

Reasonable but mistaken belief

(6) For greater certainty, the exemption set out in any of subsections (2) to (5) applies even if the person invoking the exemption has a reasonable but mistaken belief about any fact that is an element of the exemption.

Definitions

(7) In this section, medical assistance in dying, medical practitioner, nurse practitioner and pharmacist have the same meanings as in section 241.1.

R.S., 1985, c. C-46, s. 241; R.S., 1985, c. 27 (1st Supp.), s. 7; 2016, c. 3, s. 3.
Medical Assistance in Dying

Definitions

241.1 The following definitions apply in this section and in sections 241.2 to 241.4.

medical assistance in dying means

(a) the administering by a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner of a substance to a person, at their request, that causes their death; or

(b) the prescribing or providing by a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner of a substance to a person, at their request, so that they may self-administer the substance and in doing so cause their own death. (aide médicale à mourir)

medical practitioner means a person who is entitled to practise medicine under the laws of a province. (médecin)

nurse practitioner means a registered nurse who, under the laws of a province, is entitled to practise as a nurse practitioner — or under an equivalent designation — and to autonomously make diagnoses, order and interpret diagnostic tests, prescribe substances and treat patients. (infirmier praticien)

pharmacist means a person who is entitled to practise pharmacy under the laws of a province. (pharmacien)

2016, c. 3, s. 3.
Eligibility for medical assistance in dying

241.2 (1) A person may receive medical assistance in dying only if they meet all of the following criteria:

(a) they are eligible — or, but for any applicable minimum period of residence or waiting period, would be eligible — for health services funded by a government in Canada;

(b) they are at least 18 years of age and capable of making decisions with respect to their health;

(c) they have a grievous and irremediable medical condition;

(d) they have made a voluntary request for medical assistance in dying that, in particular, was not made as a result of external pressure; and

(e) they give informed consent to receive medical assistance in dying after having been informed of the means that are available to relieve their suffering, including palliative care.

Grievous and irremediable medical condition

(2) A person has a grievous and irremediable medical condition only if they meet all of the following criteria:

(a) they have a serious and incurable illness, disease or disability;

(b) they are in an advanced state of irreversible decline in capability;

(c) that illness, disease or disability or that state of decline causes them enduring physical or psychological suffering that is intolerable to them and that cannot be relieved under conditions that they consider acceptable; and

(d) their natural death has become reasonably foreseeable, taking into account all of their medical circumstances, without a prognosis necessarily having been made as to the specific length of time that they have remaining.

Safeguards

(3) Before a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner provides a person with medical assistance in dying, the medical practitioner or nurse practitioner must

(a) be of the opinion that the person meets all of the criteria set out in subsection (1);

(b) ensure that the person’s request for medical assistance in dying was

(i) made in writing and signed and dated by the person or by another person under subsection (4), and

(ii) signed and dated after the person was informed by a medical practitioner or nurse practitioner that the person has a grievous and irremediable medical condition;

(c) be satisfied that the request was signed and dated by the person — or by another person under subsection (4) — before two independent witnesses who then also signed and dated the request;

(d) ensure that the person has been informed that they may, at any time and in any manner, withdraw their request;

(e) ensure that another medical practitioner or nurse practitioner has provided a written opinion confirming that the person meets all of the criteria set out in subsection (1);

(f) be satisfied that they and the other medical practitioner or nurse practitioner referred to in paragraph (e) are independent;

(g) ensure that there are at least 10 clear days between the day on which the request was signed by or on behalf of the person and the day on which the medical assistance in dying is provided or — if they and the other medical practitioner or nurse practitioner referred to in paragraph (e) are both of the opinion that the person’s death, or the loss of their capacity to provide informed consent, is imminent — any shorter period that the first medical practitioner or nurse practitioner considers appropriate in the circumstances;

(h) immediately before providing the medical assistance in dying, give the person an opportunity to withdraw their request and ensure that the person gives express consent to receive medical assistance in dying; and

(i) if the person has difficulty communicating, take all necessary measures to provide a reliable means by which the person may understand the information that is provided to them and communicate their decision.

Unable to sign

(4) If the person requesting medical assistance in dying is unable to sign and date the request, another person — who is at least 18 years of age, who understands the nature of the request for medical assistance in dying and who does not know or believe that they are a beneficiary under the will of the person making the request, or a recipient, in any other way, of a financial or other material benefit resulting from that person’s death — may do so in the person’s presence, on the person’s behalf and under the person’s express direction.

Independent witness

(5) Any person who is at least 18 years of age and who understands the nature of the request for medical assistance in dying may act as an independent witness, except if they

(a) know or believe that they are a beneficiary under the will of the person making the request, or a recipient, in any other way, of a financial or other material benefit resulting from that person’s death;

(b) are an owner or operator of any health care facility at which the person making the request is being treated or any facility in which that person resides;

(c) are directly involved in providing health care services to the person making the request; or

(d) directly provide personal care to the person making the request.

Independence — medical practitioners and nurse practitioners

(6) The medical practitioner or nurse practitioner providing medical assistance in dying and the medical practitioner or nurse practitioner who provides the opinion referred to in paragraph (3)(e) are independent if they

(a) are not a mentor to the other practitioner or responsible for supervising their work;

(b) do not know or believe that they are a beneficiary under the will of the person making the request, or a recipient, in any other way, of a financial or other material benefit resulting from that person’s death, other than standard compensation for their services relating to the request; or

(c) do not know or believe that they are connected to the other practitioner or to the person making the request in any other way that would affect their objectivity.

Reasonable knowledge, care and skill

(7) Medical assistance in dying must be provided with reasonable knowledge, care and skill and in accordance with any applicable provincial laws, rules or standards.

Informing pharmacist

(8) The medical practitioner or nurse practitioner who, in providing medical assistance in dying, prescribes or obtains a substance for that purpose must, before any pharmacist dispenses the substance, inform the pharmacist that the substance is intended for that purpose.

Clarification

(9) For greater certainty, nothing in this section compels an individual to provide or assist in providing medical assistance in dying.

2016, c. 3, s. 3.
Failure to comply with safeguards

241.3 A medical practitioner or nurse practitioner who, in providing medical assistance in dying, knowingly fails to comply with all of the requirements set out in paragraphs 241.2(3)(b) to (i) and subsection 241.2(8) is guilty of an offence and is liable

(a) on conviction on indictment, to a term of imprisonment of not more than five years; or

(b) on summary conviction, to a term of imprisonment of not more than 18 months.

2016, c. 3, s. 3.
Forgery

241.4 (1) Everyone commits an offence who commits forgery in relation to a request for medical assistance in dying.

Destruction of documents

(2) Everyone commits an offence who destroys a document that relates to a request for medical assistance in dying with intent to interfere with

(a) another person’s access to medical assistance in dying;

(b) the lawful assessment of a request for medical assistance in dying; or

(c) another person invoking an exemption under any of subsections 227(1) or (2), 241(2) to (5) or 245(2).

Punishment

(3) Everyone who commits an offence under subsection (1) or (2) is liable

(a) on conviction on indictment, to a term of imprisonment of not more than five years; or

(b) on summary conviction, to a term of imprisonment of not more than 18 months.

Definition of document
(4) In subsection (2), document has the same meaning as in section 321.

[Locrian]

This case has absolutely nothing to do with medical disease nor elderly people.

[Shagnasty]

@Locrian

This case has absolutely nothing to do with medical disease nor elderly people.

Clinical depression is a very serious medical condition. It doesn’t mean that someone is simply sad about something. It can shut down basic life functions and even make someone appear to be comatose. You can’t simply talk someone out of it. Sometimes ECT shock treatments work but it as real as cancer or pneumonia. You can’t prey on someone that has real clinical depression anymore than you can make someone with terminal cancer sign over all of their finances over to you.

[Locrian]

@Shagnasty

Clinical depression is a very serious medical condition…

Okay, agreed. I meant diseases like mentioned for an elderly suicide, cancer mainly.

My fault.

[Lemur866]

The idea that she didn’t do anything, she just talked to him, and since we have freedom of speech that doesn’t count, is ludicrous.

If I tell my trusted friend Paulie Walnuts to go and kill Jimmy Two Times, and Paulie goes and gets his gun and shoots Jimmy in the face, how do you think the judge is going to handle my argument that it was just words, it’s freedom of speech, Paulie pulled the trigger and I committed no crime because I took no actions, just words.

Obvious that’s bull. Paulie pulled the trigger, but I’m guilty of murder just like him. The judge isn’t going to be distracted by my First Amendment argument.

Or another example. I’ve got a big lever set up in my house connected to a 10,000 volt current. A visitor comes over and asks what the lever is for. I say “pull the lever and a chocolate cake appears”. They pull the lever and are electrocuted.

But I didn’t do anything! I just said words! I took no actions! Freedom of speech!

[SlackerInc]

Lemur, given my high respect for your contributions to the “robots peacefully take over” thread, I’m stunned that you are the author of such a facile, poorly reasoned post. :eek:

[Saint_Cad]

She should claim the affluenza defense. She’ll serve 4 hours.

[Apollyon]

@Muffin

Commonwealth v. Dennis, 105 Mass. 162, Mass. Supreme Court (1870) – the highest Massachusetts court
https://www.ravellaw.com/opinions/d904ff8113615fca1a9134f343ec99d1

That’s two-hundred years of the highest court in Massachusetts directly on point and consistently finding the act of talking others into killing themselves to be a criminal act.

The Dennis quote states that: "It can make no difference in principle, whether the hand of the victim or the hand of another agent is employed, if the act be done in the presence of the person charged and at his instigation. (Bolding mine.)

As written (from your quote) the act must be both at their instigation and in their presence. Does it make a difference in your opinion that the “person charged” was not present? (Or is it more a case of 1870 being pre-telecommunication?)

[Nava]

@Starving_Artist

Well, something else for me to look into, I guess, but I would have thought that, lacking a conscience and empathy for others, sociopaths would be fairly oblivious and unconcerned as to how others feel about them…other than how those feelings might be manipulated to serve the sociopath’s ends, that is.

Manipulating people who like you, and therefore want to please you, is a lot easier than manipulating people who think you’re a crazy bitch. The more people who like you, the more people you can manipulate.

[asahi]

@SlackerInc

Okay, first of all IANAL and I am arguing for what I believe is right based on general civil libertarian principles, so I don’t care about precedent or specifics of Massachusetts law. If the law was followed perfectly here, the law is wrong.

This looks like a straw man. What I am arguing–and I don’t see anyone else disagreeing with the verdict but contradicting my argument–is the following:

(1) She was not joking or speaking off the cuff without thinking.
(2) She knew her words could make it substantially more likely that he would go through with the suicide.
(3) This was her heartfelt desire, that he take his own life.
(4) She should have the legal right to say what she did to him, just as neo-Nazis should have the right to march through Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods, swastikas unfurled. Again, many reprehensible acts should not be illegal. Social reprobation must needs suffice.

In short, I think your general view and understanding of the law is incorrect. If you are arguing that the law is wrong and that such conduct, however irresponsible it might be, ought not to be regulated, then that’s your right, but it’s not necessarily legally valid.

[Slash1972]

@Muffin

A fellow at one side of the road waits for an approaching car and call over a little kid from the other side. Splat.

The next day, he repeats with another child.

And the next day, and the next day and the next days.

No one forced the children to listen to him and obey him, right Manson?

The fact that the person was physically present makes a threat appear for not following the guys instructions.

The suicide guy could have simply hung up the phone.

IMO.

Also, not that it really matters, but my username is not from Charles Manson. At least, not directly.

[purplehearingaid]

@Lemur866

The idea that she didn’t do anything, she just talked to him, and since we have freedom of speech that doesn’t count, is ludicrous.

If I tell my trusted friend Paulie Walnuts to go and kill Jimmy Two Times, and Paulie goes and gets his gun and shoots Jimmy in the face, how do you think the judge is going to handle my argument that it was just words, it’s freedom of speech, Paulie pulled the trigger and I committed no crime because I took no actions, just words.

Obvious that’s bull. Paulie pulled the trigger, but I’m guilty of murder just like him. The judge isn’t going to be distracted by my First Amendment argument.

Or another example. I’ve got a big lever set up in my house connected to a 10,000 volt current. A visitor comes over and asks what the lever is for. I say “pull the lever and a chocolate cake appears”. They pull the lever and are electrocuted.

But I didn’t do anything! I just said words! I took no actions! Freedom of speech!

WTF ! So if someone trained their dog to attack on demand by saying " Give me your paw " and the owner tell a guest to ask for the dog paw , the owner did nothing ???