Dr. Kevorkian

Last Friday the Al Pacino movie You Don't Know Jack opened. It also stars John Goodman and Susan Sarandon. You Don't Know Jack is a biography about Dr. Jack Kevorkian. In case you don't know who Jack Kevorkian is, he is very well known for publicly championing a terminal patient's right to die via physician-assisted suicide. He claims to have assisted at least 130 patients to that end. He famously said that "dying is not a crime." On the November 22, 1998, broadcast of 60 Minutes, Kevorkian allowed the airing of a videotape he had made on September 17, 1998, which depicted the voluntary euthanasia of Thomas Youk, 52, who was in the final stages of ALS. After Youk provided his fully informed consent on September 17, 1998, Kevorkian himself administered a lethal injection. This was highly significant, as all of his earlier clients had reportedly completed the process themselves. During the videotape, Kevorkian dared the authorities to try to convict him or stop him from carrying out assisted suicides. This incited the prosecuting attorney to bring murder charges against Kevorkian, claiming he had single-handedly caused the death. On March 26, 1999, Kevorkian was charged with first-degree homicide and the delivery of a controlled substance. Kevorkian's license to practice medicine had been revoked eight years previously; he was not legally allowed to possess the controlled substance. As homicide law is relatively fixed and routine, this trial was markedly different from earlier ones that involved an area of law in flux. Kevorkian discharged his attorneys and proceeded through the trial representing himself. The judge ordered a criminal defense attorney to remain available at trial for information and advice. Inexperienced in law and persisting in his efforts to represent himself, Kevorkian encountered great difficulty in presenting his evidence and arguments. The Michigan jury found Kevorkian guilty of second-degree homicide. It was proven that he had directly killed a person because Youk was not physically able to kill himself. Youk, unable to assist in his suicide, agreed to let Kevorkian kill him using controlled substances. The judge sentenced Kevorkian to serve 10–25 years in prison and told him: "You were on bond to another judge when you committed this offense, you were not licensed to practice medicine when you committed this offense and you hadn't been licensed for eight years. And you had the audacity to go on national television, show the world what you did and dare the legal system to stop you. Well, sir, consider yourself stopped." Kevorkian was sent to prison in Coldwater, Michigan. Terminally ill with Hepatitis C, which he contracted while doing research on blood transfusions in Vietnam, Kevorkian was expected to die within a year in May 2006. After applying for a pardon, parole, or commutation by the parole board and Governor Jennifer Granholm, he was paroled on June 1, 2007, due to good behavior. He had only spent 8 years and 2½ months behind bars rather than the predicted 10–25 years. "Kevorkian will be on parole for two years, and one of the conditions he must meet is that he cannot help anyone else die. He is also prohibited from providing care for anyone who is older than 62 or is disabled. He could go back to prison if he violates his parole." Kevorkian said he would abstain from assisting any more terminal patients with death, and his role in the matter would strictly be to persuade states to change their laws on assisted suicide. He is also forbidden by the rules of his parole from commenting about assisted suicide.