For the second time in two years, prosecutors in Michigan tried to convince a jury that Dr. Jack Kevorkain broke the law by helping people end their lives.
The 67-year-old retired pathologist went on trial for assisting in the 1993 deaths of Merian Frederick, 72, of Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Dr. Ali Khalili, 61, of Oak Brook, Illinois. Frederick suffered from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, better known as Lou Gehrig's disease, while Khalili suffered from bone cancer. Both died by inhaling poisonous carbon monoxide in Kevorkian's former apartment in the Detroit suburb of Royal Oak, Michigan.
The main issue of the trial was whether Kevorkian intended for them to die or set out only to relieve their pain.
Michigan's assisted suicide said that a "person is not guilty of criminal assistance of suicide if that person was administering medications or procedures if the intent to relieve pain or discomfort and not to cause death," even if the medication or procedure "may hasten or increase the risk of death." The law went into effect in February 1993 and expired in November 1994.
Kevorkian testified that he did not want either patient to die but that their deaths were an unfortunate consequence of relieving their suffering. The defense also presented evidence to show that Frederick and Khalili's suffering was uncontrollable and that they had made rational decisions to end thier lives.
The prosecution tried to portray Kevorkian as a sinister man whose radical ideas included human experimentation. It also argued that carbon dioxide did not have any medical or therapeutic value.
The trial was the second time that authorities tried to convict Kevorkian. In May 1994, he was found not guilty in the death of Thomas Hyde, a 30-year-old landscaper, who also had Lou Gehrig's disease.
Verdict
The jury acquitted Kevorkian on March 8, 1996.
