Posted on 06/09/2004 4:12:52 AM PDT by kattracks
Pacific Rim Bureau (CNSNews.com) - An Australian woman who committed suicide two years ago surrounded by supporters and euthanasia activists was not dying of cancer at the time of her death, an official post-mortem report has confirmed.
The country's leading euthanasia campaigner -- who knew ahead of Nancy Crick's death that she was cancer-free but did not make that public -- said in response to the report's release that the point was immaterial.
"To Nancy's mind it didn't really matter and I guess to my mind it didn't matter either," Dr. Philip Nitschke told a commercial television channel.
Nitschke advised Crick in the weeks leading up to the day she took a lethal barbiturate on May 22, 2002, although he was not one of the 21 people with her when she died, having decided to absent himself for legal reasons.
The 69-year-old resident of Queensland state used an Internet homepage to record her final months and her intention to kill herself at an undisclosed time, in a conscious bid to promote the campaign for voluntary euthanasia.
According to the website, she was "terminally ill," and that was also the way her supporters characterized her.
Neither Crick nor Nitschke said publicly that the bowel cancer she suffered from earlier had evidently been successfully removed during several bouts of surgery.
After she died, Nitschke acknowledged in an interview with CNSNews.com that he had known beforehand that she seemed to be cancer-free.
The release in recent days -- at her family's request -- of the official autopsy result has focused renewed attention on the case, and Queensland police said Wednesday a decision on whether anyone would be prosecuted was just days away.
Pro-lifers reiterated their concerns about the dangers involved in legalizing euthanasia.
Alan Baker, vice-president of the Queensland Right-to-Life Association, said Wednesday that making euthanasia available would place at risk elderly, vulnerable people, who may come under indirect pressure from families or society to end their lives prematurely.
But as Nitschke's reaction to Crick's death showed, he said, "the scope of the euthanasia movement is not restricted to the terminally-ill. It extends to anyone who is dissatisfied with his or her life."
Baker said pro-lifers supported the concept of palliative care, allowing people to "die with dignity."
Physical, emotional and spiritual needs should be provided by doctors, nurses, counselors and pastors, "so that people at the end of their lives can be given the help and support and care and love that they need."
'Palliative care helped'
A few weeks before her death, Crick recorded on her website that she had decided to give palliative care a chance, and checked into a private Catholic hospital for a week. She came out saying the pain had been eased, but she was keeping her options open.
Euthanasia campaigner John Edge, one of the 21 people who witnessed Crick's death, agreed in a phone interview Wednesday that the palliative care had helped.
Crick had acknowledged that the care had reduced the level of pain, and helped her to put on a little weight, but complained that the medication left her in a daze.
"I spend most my time sleeping. I walk into walls, I stumble. What sort of a life is this?" he quoted her as saying.
Edge said that Crick felt the question of the cancer was academic. Although doctors said they had removed it, "she was not convinced that it wasn't still active."
"To her, whether she had cancer or whether it [the pain] was coming as the result of surgery didn't matter to her," Edge said. "She just wanted peace, and the only way she could see she would get peace, was to end her life."
As the convenor of the local voluntary euthanasia support group and one who offered "hands-on help" with the website, Edge said he was probably the most likely of the 21 supporters to face criminal charges.
Even so, he said release of the autopsy report was "a step in the right direction," as he and others involved hoped the case may now be settled.
'Complex case'
A spokesman for the Queensland Police Service said Wednesday a review into the Crick case was being wrapped up and the police commissioner indicated he would be making a decision as early as next week.
He said the post-mortem results, which had long been known to the police, did not in themselves affect the inquiry.
"The reason why she took her life is not the issue. The only matter for investigation is whether someone broke the law in assisting her in some way," he said.
"There's a range of possibilities: Just witnessing her death or having knowledge of what she intended to do is not necessarily an offense in itself, but actively assisting her could be an offense."
The spokesman said the investigation had been held up because it was "a very complex case." A number of those present at her bedside had not been available for questioning.
"Obviously if full and frank interviews were given by everybody involved, it may well have been this could have been resolved earlier."
Lawyers said earlier that Queensland law provides for life jail terms for anyone who advises, counsels or assists someone to take their life.
Apart from actively helping a suicide, one issue under consideration is whether merely being with someone at the time provides them with psychological support, and could therefore be a indictable offense.
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With "friends" like this, no wonder she wanted to end it all.
Liberals don't let small details get in the way of an agenda. They are so compassionate....
Just Damn!!! All these people knew she was healthy, and still encouraged her to kill herself, just to further a political cause?????
And now the Thomas More Institute will be suing LA County on behalf of the people who don't want the ACLU to be rewriting CA history because they hate Jesus. So the councilmen get to pay for a lawsuit after all, and I hope it's a very expensive lesson that the people are sick of being persecuted for being Christian. It is really way past time to stand up to the bullying of the ACLU.
I can't help but believe that euthanasia is for the control freaks to eliminate anyone who makes them uncomfortable.
There's an organization for the handicapped that is fighting euthanasia (and took up the cause of Terri Schiavo) as the concern is that the physically able will exterminate the physically impaired. ProDeath sounds very much like nazism, which is another good reason to oppose it. For it seems that it is death for convenience, and this poor woman was exploited rather than sent to therapy.
Did you ever notice how much these lefties talk as though they understand psychology, but woebetide he or she who would recommend counseling to a leftist control freak?
most of Kavorkian's victims weren't dying either.
One had "fibromyalgia" and a husband who had been arrested for beating her up, who "helped" her commit suicide.
Another was a paranoid schizophrenic who had delusions he was dying of cancer after it had been cured.
A couple had crippling diseases but were not in the terminal stages--again who were "helped" to commit suicide by "helpful" caretakers.
The idea is "choice" in dying, preferably with your friends cheering you on. Indeed, one doctor from Michigan at a recent conference was shocked to have two of his healthy elderly patients commit suicide...and later found a lot of their "friends" also had drugs at hand. It almost became "the thing to do" in their social group...which is a sad commentary on our times.
On the other hand, we plan to retire to the Philippines when we are old. Medical care isn't great in our village, but at least they love and respect the elderly.
This reminds me of Jim Jones, drink the kool-aid everyone, after all aren't we all terminally ill?
The ultimate act of free will!
This is a socialized medicine success story. She eliminated herself prior to developing any further illnesses therefore saving money for the nationalized health fund. She should be congratulated for her contribution to society. Oh, wait a minute, it's too late.
How sick and wrong is this...
So what? She wanted to die anyway.
What was all the circus for? She could just shoot herself...
They need to burn in hell !!
"How sick and wrong is this..."
No more sick and wrong than it would be for any outsider to force her to continue. Her life is/was hers (the same argument was used against slavery). The only legitimate objection would be her (hypothetical) unfulfilled obligations to others while still alive.
murderer
I'm neither advocating nor objecting. I believe it is their business and none of mine (or any other busybody's) - just like it should not concern anyone which hand John Doe might be using to hold a handkerchief while blowing his nose.
Once again, somebody falls prey to the illusion (common among liberals) that people are basically good, and that if we only continue to tinker with the social structure that all will be roses.
Let us leave aside for the moment all theological arguments that ones life is NOT ones own, that life belongs to God and taking ones own life is an act of defiance against God. Let's just look at the practical aspect.
One societal reason for the age-old strict taboo against suicide is the ease with which evil men can exploit it for their own purposes. As obviously occurred in this case - a non-terminal individual with some mental issues was exploited to further the goals of the pro-death movement.
Other examples have surfaced in the Netherlands, where legal euthanasia has been used by relatives to gain the late lamented's inheritance and even by doctors, sworn to preserve life, to free up scarce hospital beds!
Legal assisted suicide puts the ill, the elderly, and the weak at the mercy of those who wish them dead, sometimes for the most trivial of reasons. And that cheapens the life of every one of us.
No thanks. (Why do "modern" people always think they know better than hundreds of years of experience?)
Just Damn!!! All these people knew she was healthy, and still encouraged her to kill herself, just to further a political cause?????
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