Although we recognize the paramount importance and profound significance of all end-of-life decisions, after careful consideration, we conclude that the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights does not reach so far as to protect physician-assisted suicide.3 We conclude as well that the law of manslaughter may prohibit physician-assisted suicide, and does so, without offending constitutional protections.
Why Choice is an Illusion?
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Monday, December 19, 2022
Major Assisted Suicide Win in Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
Saturday, October 22, 2022
Going the Way of the Dinosaur
By Margaret Dore, Esq.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhqyGsiaMQi86K5I0Ak5YSkeP0lLeALQQ6C5Gyrs3X6pKL9ktSzsG-eD8knWHvv6-HLNipPjBoysMsxuK9MjWP_eDCrlqMUu4BycnmUnjGAQOZVbSlsCtffTlOkyZZ-WT4ZMqqJ4s-CEcQOc2ks0fL6YbKyej-ovFaFKfyVa21ItsN-HL49eBmPgwm/w200-h150/dino-1.jpg)
I am an attorney licensed to practice law in Washington State. I have been working against assisted suicide and euthanasia since 2008. I am also president of Choice is an Illusion and the Foundation for Choice is an Illusion.
Monday, October 10, 2022
Connecticut Event Background Materials
Friday, October 7, 2022
Join Margaret Dore and Other Featured Speakers Opposing Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia. An In-Person and Online Event
Thursday, October 6, 2022
Off Topic: My Best Friend Zena
By Margaret Dore
Approximately two years ago, my friend, Dr. Annie Bukacek, purchased a dog for protection, naming her Zena. It soon became apparent that Zena was a different kind of dog. For whatever reason, she never learned her name, but she knew when we were talking about her. She was smart, silly and very social.Zena loved to make friends with the people who came to Annie’s office. Sometimes they brought her treats. She made friends [with me] at the local Starbucks, meaning more treats. She reached out to a lonely woman at the bank, making the woman’s day.
Tuesday, March 1, 2022
Maybe You Trust Your Kids, But What About Your Son's New Wife?
My name is Margaret Dore. I am a licensed attorney and president of Choice is an Illusion, a nonprofit corporation opposed to assisted suicide and euthanasia. I have personally testified in 20 U.S. legislatures, including Connecticut, and also internationally. I oppose Raised Bill No. 88.
Yesterday, I submitted a formal legal analysis detailing problems with the proposed Act, that it is not what it's sold to be.
I also encourage you to look at my website, which has an online version of my analysis, which can be viewed here.
Monday, February 28, 2022
Board Member Kate Kelly Is Moving on to the Next Stage of Her Life
In 2011, I met a beautiful blonde woman at a Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Conference in Vancouver BC Canada. To me, she looked like a movie star. She was in fact a jazz singer and also a teacher.
We talked and she explained that her mother had been starved and dehydrated to death in a Canadian long-term care home. She also told me that she had published an article about her experience and agreed to let me republish the article on the Choice in an Illusion website.[1] We also became friends.
In April 2013, Alex Schadenberg, head of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, wrote Kate regarding the impact of her republished article:
I want you to know that I had a meeting with a head nurse at a local nursing home today who was converted by your article about your mom's death.
She cried and cried . . . she is trying to change her nursing home.
Tuesday, February 22, 2022
Reject Connecticut Bill 88: Don't Let Yourselves or the People You Care About Become Sitting Ducks to Predators
To read a pdf version, click here.
I. INTRODUCTION
I am an attorney and president of Choice is an Illusion, a nonprofit corporation opposed to assisted suicide and euthanasia. I have personally appeared and testified against these practices in 20 US states and also internationally.[1]The proposed Connecticut Act, Raised Bill No. 88, seeks to legalize physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia as those terms are traditionally defined.[2] This will be on both a voluntary and involuntary basis.
The Act is based on similar acts in Oregon and Washington State. I urge you to protect yourselves and the people you care about. Vote “No” to reject Raised Bill No. 88.
Friday, February 18, 2022
EPC - USA Files Brief to Massachusetts Supreme Court in the Kligler Assisted Suicide Case
Alex Schadenberg, Executive Directive, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition
In January 2020 the assisted suicide lobby appealed a Massachusetts Superior court decision which found that there was no right to assisted suicide in Massachusetts.
Recently the Massachusetts Supreme Court agreed to hear the case and yesterday, EPC-USA submitted a brief in the Massachusetts Supreme Court in this case.
The case known as Kligler concerns Dr Roger Kligler, who is living with prostate cancer and seeking death by assisted suicide and Dr Alan Schoenberg, who is willing to prescribe lethal drugs for Kligler to die by assisted suicide. Kligler who claimed to be terminally ill when launching the case in 2016 remains alive today.
Kligler and Schoenberg are arguing that doctors cannot be prosecuted for prescribing lethal drugs for assisted suicide to a competent terminally ill person under the Massachusetts state constitution.
Sunday, February 13, 2022
"If my doctor had believed in assisted suicide, I would be dead"
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Jeanette Hall and her son, Scott, in November 2000 |
I live in Oregon where assisted suicide is legal. Our law passed in 1997 by a ballot measure that I voted for.
In 2000, I was diagnosed with cancer and told that I had 6 months to a year to live. I knew that our law had passed, but I didn’t know exactly how to go about doing it. I tried to ask my doctor, Kenneth Stevens MD, but he didn’t really answer me. In hindsight, he was stalling me.
I did not want to suffer. I wanted to do our law and I wanted Dr. Stevens to help me. Instead, he encouraged me to not give up and ultimately I decided to fight the cancer. I had both chemotherapy and radiation. I am so happy to be alive!
This last July, it was 21 years since my diagnosis. If Dr. Stevens had believed in assisted suicide, I would be dead. Assisted suicide should not be legal.
Dore Press Release: "Delaware Bill Seeks to Legalize Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia"
“Aid in Dying has been a euphemism for physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia since at least 1992," said Dore. “Per the American Medical Association, ‘physician-assisted suicide’ occurs when a doctor facilitates a patient’s death by providing the means or information to enable a patient to perform the life-ending act. ‘Euthanasia’ is the administration of a lethal agent by another person.”
Saturday, February 12, 2022
Legal Memorandum: Delaware Euthanasia Bill Must Be Rejected
I. INTRODUCTION
Aid in dying has been a euphemism for physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia since at least 1992.[1] The proposed Act is based on similar acts in Oregon and Washington State. Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act went into effect in 1997. Washington’s nearly identical act went into effect in 2009.
All three acts apply to persons with a six month or less life expectancy. Such persons may in fact have years or decades to live. A well known example is Jeanette Hall. In 2000, she made a settled decision to use Oregon’s act. Her doctor convinced her to be treated for cancer instead, such that she is alive today, twenty-two years later.
Thursday, December 9, 2021
Medical Directors Sentenced
To view original article, click here
Judge Lynn |
By Jim Parker
Chief U.S. District Judge Barbara M.G. Lynn has sentenced Novus Health Services Medical Directors Mark E. Gibbs, M.D., and Laila Hirjee, M.D., along with one of the company’s nurses, Tammie Little, to a combined 23 years in prison following their convictions for hospice fraud exceeding $40 million.
Gibbs was sentenced to 13 years as well as paying restitution of nearly $28 million. Hirjee received 10 years in prison and must pay more than $16 million. The judge also sentenced Little to a 33 month incarceration.
The company’s CEO Bradley Harris was also convicted in the case. He agreed to a plea deal, pled guilty and testified against his former employees, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.
Tuesday, July 20, 2021
Constitutional Challenge Brief Filed in New Jersey Euthanasia Appeal
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
TRENTON, NEW JERSEY, USA. Attorney Margaret Dore, President of Choice is an Illusion, which has fought against assisted suicide and euthanasia legalization throughout the United States, and internationally, has released the following statement in connection with the filing of a constitutional challenge amicus brief, which seeks to invalidate New Jersey’s Medical Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act. The case, Petro et al v. Grewal, is pending in the Superior Court of New Jersey Appellate Division, A-003837-19.
Wednesday, May 5, 2021
California Amendments Seek to Weaken Patient Protections, Attestation Provisions Eliminated
By Margaret Dore, Esq.
On February 10, 2021, assisted suicide/euthanasia proponents introduced a bill seeking to amend California's End of Life Option Act. The bill, SB 380, eliminates the Act's 2026 sunset date, and also allows a 15 day waiting period to be shortened to 48 hours in certain circumstances.[1]
Katy Grimes, editor of the California Globe (pictured), had this to say:
When it comes to carrying out the death penalty for convicted murders, the California Legislature finds the lethal drug cocktails "cruel and unusual punishment," which they say is a violation of the Eighth Amendment. Yet lawmakers were more than willing to approve a lethal drug cocktail to allow sick people to kill themselves. I wrote [this] in 2015 as the California Legislature was considering [passage of the Act].[2]
Tuesday, April 20, 2021
Colombia Legislature Defeats Bill to Legalize Euthanasia Again
By Michael Cook
For entire article, click here.
The Colombian legislature has once again failed to pass a law legalizing euthanasia. Earlier this week a bill proposed by representative Juan Fernando Reyes Kuri needed to reach 85 votes in favour, but fell two votes short.
Although Colombia is often described as a country where euthanasia is legal, the actual situation is complicated. In 1997 the country’s Constitutional Court ruled that that “the State cannot oppose the decision of an individual who does not wish to continue living and who requests help to die when suffering from a terminal illness that causes unbearable pain, incompatible with his idea of dignity”. It directed the legislature to pass a law regulating the right to die.
However, more than 20 years have passed and one bill after another has failed.
Monday, April 12, 2021
Washington State: Conrad Reynoldson Makes a Difference
By Margaret Dore, Esq.