No charges are to be brought against the parents of a paralysed rugby player who went to Switzerland for an assisted suicide, it was announced yesterday.
No charges are to be brought against the parents of a paralysed rugby player who went to Switzerland for an assisted suicide, it was announced yesterday.
Mark and Julie James were investigated by police in the UK after their son Daniel, 23, committed suicide at a clinic run by the Dignitas organisation last September - more than a year after a rugby accident which left him paralysed from the waist down.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) had considered bringing charges under the Suicide Act against his parents, from Worcester, who made payments to Dignitas, sent documents and made travel arrangements to take their son to Switzerland.
However, Director of Public Prosecutions Keir Starmer, QC, yesterday said that although there was enough evidence to pursue charges against the couple with a reasonable chance of securing a conviction, such a prosecution would not be in the public interest.
Yesterday's announcement came a day after veteran MSP Margo MacDonald proposed a radical new bill which would legalise assisted suicide in Scotland. The Independent politician, who has Parkinson's disease, wants to bring legislation before the Scottish Parliament next year.
Of Mr James's death, Mr Starmer said: "This is a tragic case, involving as it does, the death of a young man in difficult and unique circumstances.
"In reaching my decision I have given careful consideration to the Code for Crown Prosecutors.
"In particular, but not exclusively, I would point to the fact that Daniel, as a fiercely independent young man, was not influenced by his parents to take his own life and the evidence indicates he did so despite their imploring him not to."
The CPS also said no charges would be brought against a family friend who helped with travel arrangements and was also under investigation.
Zurich-based Dignitas offers assisted suicides to people whose quality of life has been affected by illness or an accident. The group, founded in 1998, takes advantage of Switzerland's liberal laws on assisted suicide. To date, more than 600 people have died at its clinics.
The CPS had considered charges under Section 2(1) of the Suicide Act 1961, of aiding, abetting, counselling or procuring the suicide of another. An accident in a scrum in training in March 2007 left Mr James paralysed from the chest down, with no independent hand or finger movement. Eight months later, his consultant said it was unlikely he would ever enjoy a significant recovery.
Mr James was in the third year of a construction engineering degree at Loughborough University at the time of his accident.
He was a promising rugby player and represented England at under-16s level, as well as the England Universities and England Students teams.
The campaign group Dignity in Dying yesterday welcomed the CPS decision not to prosecute and called for the law to be clarified to allow people to know whether they would face charges for helping a loved one to die.
An inquest into Mr James's death is due to begin at Stourport Coroner's Court, Worcestershire, today.
Meanwhile, the moment a man died in an assisted suicide at Dignitas's clinic in Zurich is to be broadcast on British television tonight.
Craig Ewert, 59, an American father-of-two, suffered from motor neurone disease and chose to end his life rather than endure the "torture" he feared from his degenerative condition.
The former university professor, who lived in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, travelled to the Swiss clinic and, with his wife Mary by his side, he drank a mixture of sedatives and turned off his own ventilator using his teeth.
He had allowed his death in September 2006 to be filmed for a documentary by Oscar-winning director John Zaritsky. Right to Die? will be broadcast tonight on Sky Real Lives at 9pm.
