Euthanasia complications challenge the "good death" narrative.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

On May 27 an article by Brian Williams and Sharon Kirkey that was published by the London Free Press on May 27, 2026  reported on the euthanasia deaths by Dr James MacLean. 

Dr James MacLean is one of the few doctors to be sanctioned for unprofessional conduct related to his euthanasia deaths. One of the complaints included a euthanasia assessment that was done at a Tim Horton's coffee shop while another concerned a "botched" euthanasia death whereby MacLean declared the man dead, when he wasn't dead...

Sharon Kirkey wrote a difficult article that was published by the National Post on June 3, 2026 concerning euthanasia complications that challenges the "good death" paradigm that is sold by the euthanasia lobby. Kirkey wrote:

An Ontario man groaned, grimaced and repeated “help me” while undergoing doctor-assisted death after one of the drugs didn’t produce the anticipated level of sedation, initially leaving him conscious.

Kirkey suggests that people should be informed that some euthanasia deaths involve significant suffering.

Cases of MAID that do not proceed as planned were highlighted last week in media reports involving the 2024 death of Bradley Stewart, an Ontario man who resumed breathing after being pronounced dead by a London, Ont., family doctor and MAID provider — a traumatic experience his siblings who witnessed his mishandled death are still recovering from.

Brian Williams and Sharon Kirkey wrote in an article published by the London Free Press on May 27, 2026 that:

He’d (MacLean) ordered a MAID medication kit, but it wasn’t ready when he arrived at the pharmacy. He went to the home with a kit he already had.

According to the college, MacLean administered a sedative follow by propofol, a drug used during surgery that, in high doses, puts people in a coma.

The final drug customarily used paralyzes the muscles. Deprived of oxygen, organs shut down, one by one, until the heart finally stops. But MacLean was unable to find the neuromuscular-blocking drug in his kit.

MacLean declared the man dead, when he wasn't dead. He left the scene of the crime. He was then informed that the victim wasn't dead yet, so MacLean returned and pumped him with more lethal poison. 

The family was traumatized.

Kirkey also reported about another case known as “Mr. D.,” an 87-year-old man with congestive heart failure who died by euthanasia in 2023. Kirkey describes the euthanasia death.

The MAID provision took place at his home, the same day he was transferred home from hospital.

Once settled, two intravenous sites were established.

The doctor administered the first drug, midazolam, a Valium-like sedative. Next lidocaine was injected to numb the vein and prepare it for the next injection, propofol, a coma-inducing drug that can burn and sting upon injection.

Midazolam is meant to put people in a deep state of relaxation. People often fall asleep.

However, “During the first three minutes. Mr. D experienced signs of physical and psychological distress, including groaning, guarding (tensing muscles) and grimacing,” reads the case review.

“Mr. D did not experience expected sedation” from the midazalom and remained conscious.

“His behavioural signs of distress escalated to repeated verbalizations, including ‘help me’ that continued until sedation was achieved with propofol and a comatose state was confirmed,” according to the case report.

Kirkey explains that the family experienced significant distress related to their father's euthanasia death:

“These unfortunate end-of-life circumstances created profound distress for the family. They witnessed their father suffering with physical and psychological distress and these final memories stay with them.”

The family “shared reflections such as powerlessness to change the course of their father’s final suffering, anguish regarding the decision to support their father through the MAID process and immense grief and sorrow regarding their final memories with their father,” according to the case review.

Studies show that complications with euthanasia do happen. Kirkey reports:

In a survey of 335 Canadian emergency doctors, three reported having seen MAID patients come to emergency because of IV failure.

A 2022 study of 3,557 MAID deaths in Ontario and Vancouver between 2016 and 2020 found complications in 41 cases (1.2 per cent). Most fell into one of two categories, the authors reported: obtaining or maintaining IV access, or prolonged time to death requiring a second kit of MAID medications.

Kirkey further describes the death of Bradley Stewart. Stewart, had liver cancer, had fell unconscious three days before his death. Kirkey reports:

MacLean was called to the house three days later, after Stewart had become unresponsive. Stewart was surrounded by his siblings, family members and friends. His three chihuahuas were perched on his bed. MacLean injected midazalom and propofol. But missing from his briefcase was a third drug that paralyzes the muscles and stops breathing. After injecting the propofol, and unable to hear a heartbeat, he pronounced Stewart dead and left.

MacLean was called to the house three days later, after Stewart had become unresponsive. Stewart was surrounded by his siblings, family members and friends. His three chihuahuas were perched on his bed. MacLean injected midazalom and propofol. But missing from his briefcase was a third drug that paralyzes the muscles and stops breathing. After injecting the propofol, and unable to hear a heartbeat, he pronounced Stewart dead and left.

I questioned in my previous article, if MacLean used left-over drugs from a previous killing? After reading this article it is clear that MacLean used left-over drugs from previous killings.

Kirkey writes that the death had a profound effect on the family. The family was upset about the minimal penalty that MacLean received. Kirkey writes:

They’re angry that despite finding serious concerns with Maclean’s MAID practice — including a second complaint involving his assessment of a MAID patient outside a Tim Hortons — MacLean wasn’t brought before a disciplinary hearing by his licensing college. Instead, he agreed to a minimum of six months’ clinical supervision, among other voluntary undertakings. He is permitted to continue practising MAID.

“It literally was a slap on the wrist,” Townsend said.

“It shocks me because, in a lot of jobs, that’s the kind of action that would have got someone fired and yet they are literally saying it’s remediation,” Stewart-Mott said.

“They had the ability to suspend his doing MAID but never went down that road.”

Dr Ramona Coelho

Dr Ramona Coelho a London family physician and former member of the Office of the Chief Coroner of Ontario’s MAID death review committee. told Williams and Kirkey in the May 27 article:

“What is striking is not only the seriousness of the concerns identified in these cases, but the limited regulatory response,”

“The level of scrutiny and accountability applied to MAID is inconsistent with how other serious medical procedures are regulated,”

Dr Coelho commented on the notion that Canada's euthanasia law operates well.

The federal government “frequently points to the absence of criminal findings or disciplinary action as evidence that the MAID system is functioning safely,” she added.

“Cases such as these, along with those documented (by the coroner’s MAID death review committee) confirm that important gaps in oversight and accountability remain.”

The Chief Coroner of Ontario established the Ontario MAiD Death Review Committee that published multiple reports underlining the concerns with the law. Even though that report found cases of people who had no actual medical condition or who died by euthanasia based on poverty or a lack of proper housing, none of those cases were then brought to the CPSO to determine if any sanctions should be applied to the doctors and nurse practitioners who caused those deaths.

Reduction in home care for people with disabilities in Québec

By Odile Marcotte
Retired Professor Department of Computer Science, UQAM and a Euthanasia Prevention Coalition board member.

Odile Marcotte

The May 28 edition of the Le Devoir newspaper featured the story of Benjamin Leclair, a former wakeboarding champion who is now a tetraplegic. The local health board authority, known by the acronym CISSSMO, has recently reduced to 56 hours the number of hours allocated to Mr. Leclair's home care, arguing that this number of hours is more in line with its criteria ("grid") for allocating home care time to patients. Mr. Leclair's social worker explained to him that the health network, now managed by Santé Québec, was under pressure to save money. Actually CISSSMO claims that it is offering services to more patients than before (2335 in 2026 versus 2314 in 2025), and the number of service hours had to be reduced for some patients.

Mr. Leclair is not the only person in this situation: according to Hugo Vaillancourt, director of Ex aequo, people with disabilities are made to feel guilty when they ask for resources such as home care. Eventually the person has to rely on a caregiver, such as a spouse, who has not always undergone health care training. For instance, Aurélie, Benjamin Leclair's partner, had to quit her job to take care of him but is not trained to help him with his pressure sores, which he are likely to develop since he does not have anyone to move him in his bed during the night.

What does all this have to do with euthanasia? 

We remember with sadness the case of Jean Truchon, who lived with a disability similar to that of Mr. Leclair. Truchon could not obtain enough services from the health system, and was finally euthanized after having "won" the Truchon-Gladu challenge to the then euthanasia law. 

In Truchon, Judge Christine Beaudoin ruled that the end-of-life requirement for obtaining euthanasia was unconstitutional. The Canadian and Quebec governments did not appeal the Truchon decision resulting in the Canadian government modifying the law so that people such as Mr. Truchon and possibly Mr. Leclair could be euthanized without being terminally ill. 

Canada's two-track euthanasia law has Track 1 for persons with a terminal condition and Track 2 for persons living with a grievous and irremediable medical condition. Track 2 euthanasia has been condemned by the UN Committee on Disability Rights: see the excellent press release by Dr. Heidi Janz and Jonathan Marchand here (https://www.ccdonline.ca/en/humanrights/endoflife/Media-Release-29Jan2020).

More articles on euthanasia for people with disabilities in Canada:

• Canadian government ignores UN scrutiny over euthanasia law (Read).
• United Nations Committee directs Canada to repeal Track 2 euthanasia deaths (Read).
• How euthanasia fails Canada's most vulnerable (Link).
• Shouldn't care come before euthanasia? (Link). 
• The International disability rights community is concerned with Canada's euthanasia law (Link).
• UN demands change: Canada must end MAiD for people without terminal illness (Link).

He Sold Death On Shopify. Canada Built The Market.

This article was published on Kelsi Sheren’s Substack on June 2, 2026.

By Kelsi Sheren

I want you to think about a 16 year old.

Not hypothetically. An actual kid. In Ontario. Who went online, found a website, placed an order, and received a package in the mail containing the means to end their life.

The man who sent it just pled guilty.

Article: Canadian man pleads guilty to aiding suicide in 14 deaths (Read).

Fourteen counts. Fourteen dead in Ontario alone. Seventy-nine more in Britain being factored into sentencing. At least 130 total. Shipped to 41 countries. Nearly $300,000 in revenue. Consultation calls included. Documentation that explicitly absolved him of responsibility for “the end use of its products.”

Kenneth Law ran a death business and it was booming.

He built multiple storefronts on Shopify. Named them things like Imtime Cuisine and EscMode. Sold hot sauce alongside the poison to make it look like a food company. Put “SN” in the logo a nod to ... for the customers who knew what they were actually buying. Bundled gas masks and nitrogen regulators with the kits. Offered consultation calls. Sent 1,209 packages to 41 countries and collected $300,000 through Shopify and PayPal like any other Canadian small business.

He’s going to get 14 years. Maximum. If the court actually delivers that. We find out in September.

Murder charges? Dropped. Plea deal. Aiding suicide. Cleaner charge. Lighter optics. The same way everything in this country gets softened when the subject is death.

Here’s what nobody wants to say out loud.

Canada spent a decade telling its own people that death is a solution. We built the infrastructure. We wrote the billing codes. We trained the practitioners. We gave it a name that sounds like a spa treatment Medical Assistance in Dying and we put it in hospitals next to maternity wards. We expanded it and expanded it again and we’re about to expand it to people whose only condition is a mental illness.

We did not create Kenneth Law. But we absolutely created his customer base.

You don’t spend ten years normalizing the idea that suffering is best resolved by dying and then act confused when someone builds a business around it. He didn’t manufacture demand. He found it and he packaged it behind a hot sauce label. He shipped it to a 16-year-old in Ontario and two other children who weren’t supposed to be able to order at all and somehow did anyway.

The same week Law pled guilty, Canada quietly crossed 100,000 MAiD MURDERS since 2016.

One hundred thousand.

That number got less coverage than a mid-level political scandal. It landed with almost no noise. Because we’ve normalized it so thoroughly that six figures doesn’t register as a crisis anymore. It registers as a program working as intended.

I am a combat veteran. I have been assessed as eligible for MAiD under Canada’s current criteria. I’ve said that to Parliament. I’ve said it on Triggernometry. I’ll keep saying it until someone in power feels the weight of what that means. I’ll keep saying it until someone in power feels the weight of what that means.

The system doesn’t distinguish between a soldier who survived war and a teenager who found a website. It just sees suffering it can close a file on.

Kenneth Law saw the same thing. He just didn’t have a medical license.

He’s going to prison. That’s correct, but the ideology that made his product desirable that gave it cultural permission, that built the demand, that told an entire generation of vulnerable people that death is a reasonable off-ramp for pain that’s still fully operational.

Still funded.
Still expanding.
Still coming for people I know.

The dead don’t talk. The families are traumatized and mostly silent. The practitioners who approved the deaths are protected by law. And the people who designed the whole system are still writing op-eds about dignity and compassion and calling critics emotional.

I’m angry, pissed off and over people accepting this. You should be too.

Reguest for Information Regarding Medical Aid in Dying

Letter from Senator James Lankford, Rep James L Correa and Rep Gregory F. Murphy (M.D.) to The Honorable Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Secretary Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Department of Health and Human Services

June 1, 2026

RE: Request for Information Regarding Medical Aid in Dying (MAID) (CMS-1851-P) (RIN 0938-AV78)

Dear Secretary Kennedy:

We submit this comment as bipartisan, bicameral Members of Congress in response to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) request for information regarding medical aid in dying (MAID), 91 Fed. Reg. 17338. Medically assisted suicide raises significant informed consent issues as well as concerns about disability and age discrimination. Since the vast majority of assisted suicide patients are enrolled in hospice—92% according to Oregon data and 90% according to Washington data‍1 this is problematic for HHS and CMS’ regulation of patient health and safety within the hospice program. We urge HHS and CMS to implement reporting requirements in the hospice program to monitor assisted suicide for discriminatory practices against vulnerable populations,‍2 as well as ensure compliance with the Assisted Suicide Funding Restriction Act.‍3

In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld Washington’s and New York’s bans on assisted suicide in Washington v. Glucksberg and Vacco v. Quill.‍4 The majority opinions found that there is no right to assisted suicide under the Due Process or Equal Protection Clauses.‍5 Justice Sandra Day O’Connor concurred, joined by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Justice Stephen Breyer, expressing concern about “the risk that a dying patient’s request for assistance in ending his or her life might not be truly voluntary.”‍6 Nearly thirty years of assisted suicide practice in the United States has not alleviated that concern.

Currently, thirteen states plus the District of Columbia permit assisted suicide.‍7 These laws permit certain medical practitioners to prescribe drugs at lethal dosages to a patient that is, among other criteria, eighteen years or older and “terminally ill” with a six month or less prognosis, with or without care, so that the patient may self-administer the drugs.‍8 Yet, as the National Council on Disability warns, under assisted suicide laws, “some people’s lives, particularly those of people with disabilities, will be ended without their fully informed and free consent, through mistakes, abuse, insufficient knowledge, and the unjust lack of better options.”‍9

There are grave informed consent issues within assisted suicide. Doctor shopping is rampant; Oregon data indicates the median patient-physician relationship is four weeks, with some relationships ranging as little as zero weeks.‍10 Mental health referrals are practically nonexistent, as only 0.5% of patients received them, even though many assisted suicide patients show signs of depression, which can impair the decision-making process.‍11 On top of this, “it is common for medical prognoses of a short life expectancy to be wrong,” and under the definition of terminal illness in assisted suicide laws, “[t]here is no requirement that the doctors consider the likely impact of medical treatment, counseling, and other supports on survival.”12

Assisted suicide drugs are experimental. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) does not approve compounded drugs,‍13 which are commonly used in assisted suicide,‍14 and the FDA could never approve drugs indicated for assisted suicide because they are not “safe” for purposes of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act.‍15 As The Atlantic reported in 2019, “[i]n states where the practice is legal, state governments provide guidance about which patients qualify, but say nothing about which drugs to prescribe.”‍16 With “no government-approved clinical drug trial, and no Institutional Review Board oversight,” assisted suicide drug prescribers are left to experiment directly on end-of-life patients.‍17

Disability issues arise in assisted suicide. An individual with terminal illness meets the definition of a physical disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act.‍18 In fact, individuals with disabilities and disability rights groups have raised this argument and alleged assisted suicide laws violate federal disability rights laws in litigation across the country.‍19 Patients seeking assisted suicide commonly request assisted suicide, not due to pain or concerns about future pain, but for disability-related reasons, citing concerns about “loss of autonomy,” being “less able to engage in activities,” and “loss of dignity.”‍20 Consequently, assisted suicide stigmatizes disabilities, and sends the message that the lives of persons with disabilities are less valued in society.

Age discrimination and elder abuse are also concerns within assisted suicide practices. Most assisted suicide patients are age 65 or older (88.3% under Oregon data and 86.2% under Washington data).‍21 Although assisted suicide laws require two witnesses to the lethal drug request, most states only require one witness to be disinterested, meaning, one of these witnesses may be a beneficiary to the patient’s will or life insurance policy.‍22 Assisted suicide laws do not require a prescriber or any witnesses to be present when the patient self-administers the drugs.‍23 Especially with patient age and education demographics—most patients are well educated—these circumstances are “consistent with elder abuse” and possible financial exploitation.‍24

Assisted suicide undermines America’s national posture of suicide prevention. America is facing an epidemic of suicide. In 2024, we lost more than 50,000 Americans to suicide and over 1.5 million Americans attempted suicide. Suicide is the eleventh leading cause of death in America and around 135 suicides occur every day on average. Additionally, over 14 million adults reported seriously considering suicide in 2024. Peer-reviewed data shows that where assisted suicide is legalized, rates of non-assisted suicide spike.25 Additionally, each year the U.S. government invests hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars annually in suicide prevention services. States and localities spend millions each year as well. A 2024 NIH report shows that the economic cost of suicide/self-harm is estimated at $510 billion annually.26 New data shows that people living with serious and potentially life limiting health conditions are more than twice as likely to die by suicide compared with the general population.27 Assisted suicide undermines suicide prevention services, normalizes premature death for vulnerable populations, undermines their sense of autonomy and dignity, and pushes society away from robust care, support, and the protection of life.

Congress has restricted federal funding for assisted suicide and protected conscientious objections to the practice. The Assisted Suicide Funding Restriction Act broadly limits federal funds from “paying (directly or indirectly)” for the provision of “any health care item or service furnished for the purpose of causing, or for the purpose of assisting in causing, the death of any individual, such as by assisted suicide, euthanasia, or mercy killing.”‍28 This prohibition extends to a “pay[ment] . . . for such an item or service” and a “pay[ment] (in whole or in part) for health benefit coverage” related to the coverage or expenses of “such an item or service.”‍29 The Affordable Care Act also provides anti-discrimination protections for an individual or institutional health care entity that does not participate in “assisted suicide, euthanasia, or mercy killing.”‍30

As you consider the assisted suicide issue further, we recommend you use the statutory language, “assisted suicide, euthanasia, or mercy killing,” which is more precise than “MAID.”‍31 “MAID” includes both assisted suicide and euthanasia,‍32 even though no jurisdiction in the United States permits euthanasia.

We also request that you establish reporting requirements within hospice programs regarding assisted suicide. In doing so, please consider monitoring assisted suicide practices for the following:

• Discrimination against individuals with disabilities, older persons, and other vulnerable groups; Eligibility of patients solely due to an eating disorder;‍33
• Proper disposal of unused medication and prevention of drug diversion;‍34
• Insurance denials of life-sustaining medical care that offer to cover assisted suicide drugs instead;‍35
• Drug complications;
• Experimentation of assisted suicide drug compounds;
• Compliance with federal restrictions on using funds, directly or indirectly, for health care items or services for assisted suicide.

As Senators and Members of Congress who are committed to the health and safety of hospice patients, especially those in vulnerable populations, we are grateful to see HHS and CMS consider how assisted suicide practices pose discrimination and informed consent issues. We urge HHS and CMS to establish reporting requirements to monitor assisted suicide for discriminatory practices and oversee compliance with federal funding restrictions within hospice programs. All hospice patients—regardless of physical disability, mental health, eating disorder, age, or financial means—deserve compassionate end-of-life care that is free of coercion and discrimination.

Sincerely,

James Lankford
United States Senator

J. Luis Correa
Member of Congress

Gregory F. Murphy, M.D.
Member of Congress

1 Oregon Death With Dignity Act: 2025 Data Summary (Oregon Report), Or. Health Auth. 1, 9 (Apr. 1, 2026), https://sharedsystems.dhsoha.state.or.us/DHSForms/Served/le8579_25.pdf; 2024 Death with Dignity (Washington Report), Wash. State Dep’t Health 1, 1 (July 2025), https://doh.wa.gov/sites/default/files/2026-02/422-109-DeathWithDignityAct2024.pdf.
2 See 42 U.S.C. § 1395x(dd)(2)(G) (directing hospice programs to “meet[] such other requirements as the Secretary may find necessary in the interest of the health and safety of the individuals who are provided care and services by such agency or organization”).
3 See 42 U.S.C. §§ 14401 to 14408; see also 41 C.F.R. § 411.15 (q) (2025).
4 Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702 (1997); Vacco v. Quill, 521 U.S. 793 (1997).
5 Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 735; Vacco, 521 U.S. at 808.
6 Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 738.
7 Euthanasia, Cornell L. Sch. Legal Info. Inst. (Oct. 2025), https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/euthanasia; 410 Ill. Comp. Stat. 22/1 to /999 (2026) (eff. Sept. 12, 2026); N.Y. Pub. Health Law art. 28-F, §§ 2899-d to -s (McKinney 2026) (eff. Aug. 5, 2026).
8 E.g., Or. Rev. Stat. §§ 127.800, 127.805 (2023).
9 Nat’l Council on Disability, The Danger of Assisted Suicide Laws, Bioethics & Disability Series 14–15 (2019).
10 Oregon Report, supra note 1, at 18.
11 See id. at 15.
12 Nat’l Council on Disability, supra note 9, at 21–22.
13 Human Drug Compounding Laws, U.S. Food & Drug Admin. (Dec. 17, 2024), https://www.fda.gov/drugs/humandrug-compounding/human-drug-compounding-laws.
14 See Oregon Report, supra note 1, at 22.
15 See 21 U.S.C. § 355(b)(1)(A)(i).
16 Jennie Dear, The Doctors Who Invented a New Way to Help People Die, Atlantic (Jan. 22, 2019), https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/01/medical-aid-in-dying-medications/580591/.
17 Id.
18 See 42 U.S.C. § 12102; 29 U.S.C. § 705(9).
19 E.g., United Spinal Ass’n v. California, No. 24-2751 (9th Cir. argued Mar. 26, 2025).
20 Nat’l Council on Disability, supra note 9, at 37.
21 Oregon Report, supra note 1, at 12; Washington Report, supra note 1, at 4.
22 Margaret K. Dore, “Death With Dignity”: A Recipe for Elder Abuse and Homicide (Albeit Not by Name), 11 Marq. Elder’s Advisor 387, 388 (2012).
23 Nat’l Council on Disability, supra note 9, at 42.
24 Dore, supra note 22, at 396; see also About Abuse of Older Persons, U.S. Ctrs. for Disease Control & Prevention (Nov. 7, 2024), https://www.cdc.gov/elder-abuse/about/index.html.
25 https://sma.org/southern-medical-journal/article/how-does-legalization-of-physician-assisted-suicide-affect-ratesof-suicide/
26 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38479565/
27https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/suicidesamongpeoplediagnosedwithseverehealthconditionsengland/2017to2020
28 42 U.S.C. § 14402(a)(1).
29 Id. § 14402(a)(2) to (3).
30 42 U.S.C. § 18113(a).
31 42 U.S.C. § 14402; 42 U.S.C. § 18113.
32 See Medical Assistance in Dying: Overview, Gov’t Can. (Aug. 27, 2025), https://www.canada.ca/en/healthcanada/services/health-services-benefits/medical-assistance-dying.html.
33 See Chelsea Roth & Catherine Cook-Cottone, Assisted Death in Eating Disorders: A Systematic Review of Cases and Clinical Rationales, Frontiers Psychiatry, July 31, 2024, at 1.
34 See Oregon Report, supra note 1, at 4 (noting 400 people died by assisted suicide in 2025, but prescribers wrote 637 prescriptions).
35 Nat’l Council on Disability, supra note 9, at 20–21.

Families are Traumatized and Dead People Don't Talk

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Last week a story about Dr James MacLean, who works, along with his wife, with the Westmount Family Physicians in London, Ontario, met Thomas Dillon outside a Tim Horton's in St. Thomas, Ontario on June 27, 2023 where he assessed him for MAiD (medical homicide). MacLean assessed Dillon over a coffee, and possibly a donut, to decide if Dillon should live or die.

Kelsi Sheren explains in her substack:

On January 29, 2024, MacLean picked Thomas up again at the Tim Hortons and drove him personally to a room inside an industrial unit where cadavers are prepared for funeral transport. That’s where Thomas Dillon died. His family didn’t know where he was and his sister had shown up to the Tim Hortons. Thomas refused to let her ride along. The doctor drove him instead.

Dillon's sister

Dillon's family told the Globe and Mail reporter that he should not have been approved for medical homicide based on his physical and mental health.

Another complaint was filed against MacLean for how he did a medical homicide. Brian Williams and Sharon Kirkey wrote a report published by the London Free Press on May 27, 2026 that:

He’d (MacLean) ordered a MAID medication kit, but it wasn’t ready when he arrived at the pharmacy. He went to the home with a kit he already had.

According to the college, MacLean administered a sedative follow by propofol, a drug used during surgery that, in high doses, puts people in a coma.

The final drug customarily used paralyzes the muscles. Deprived of oxygen, organs shut down, one by one, until the heart finally stops.

But MacLean was unable to find the neuromuscular-blocking drug in his kit.

MacLean declared the man dead, when he wasn't dead, he left the scene of the crime, he was then informed that the victim wasn't dead yet, so MacLean returned and pumped him with more lethal poison. The family was traumatized.

I questioned in my previous article, if MacLean used left-over drugs from a previous killing?

There are many more instances of careless killings and traumatized families.

I was recently contacted by a family who's father was killed by medical homicide. The family was opposed to the killing but the father had agreed to get it done.

Killing kit items used to kill their father

The father was scheduled to die on a Tuesday, but since he lived in a rural area, the killing kit was delivered on the Friday (first shock). When the nurse practitioner arrived on the Tuesday to do the deed, the family left the house, as they didn't want to witness the killing.

When the family returned they found a dead father and the items from the killing kit that had everything in it that was used to kill their father, including some items with bodily fluids on it and left-over poison.

It is bad enough that the father was killed but to leave the kit behind was traumatizing.

This was not a MacLean killing but the fact that MacLean only received a slap on the wrist (6 months of oversight) is ridiculous. 

Euthanasia activists suggest that the law is working. MacLean made mistakes, but he was caught and he is now being punished. I guess it doesn't matter that Dillon's family have no idea how his death was approved, but of course, Dead People Don't Talk.

These cases are the tip of the iceberg since relevant witnesses, in these cases, are dead and the families are traumatized and usually unwilling to file a complaint.

Dear France: We Already Built What You’re Voting On. Here’s What It Produced.

This article was published by Kelsi Sheren on her substack on May 27, 2026.

Tim Hortons MAID Dr, France and Canada's Killing Machine.

Kelsi Sheren

His name was Thomas Dillon. He was 45 years old, he had Crohn’s disease. A history of mental illness. Documented suicidal ideation. Struggles with alcohol and opioids. He lived with his mother. Couldn’t hold a job. No social network. Financially dependent on his family.

By every honest measure, Thomas Dillon was a vulnerable man who needed help.

What he got instead was a death appointment at a Tim Hortons parking lot.

Dr. James MacLean, MAID “Doctor” from Westmount Family Physicians, where both he and his wife work in London, Ontario met Thomas Dillon outside a Tim Hortons in St. Thomas, Ontario on June 27, 2023. That’s where he assessed him for Medical Assistance in Dying (medical murder) Not in a clinical setting, not with family present. Not with the safeguards the system claims to have. In a parking lot. Over coffee. Deciding whether this man should live or die.

Then he drove him to his death.

On January 29, 2024, MacLean picked Thomas up again at the Tim Hortons and drove him personally to a room inside an industrial unit where cadavers are prepared for funeral transport. That’s where Thomas Dillon died. His family didn’t know where he was and his sister had shown up to the Tim Hortons. Thomas refused to let her ride along. The doctor drove him instead.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario investigated.

They found MacLean violated professional boundaries. They found his conduct risked looking like coercion. They found problems in five of twenty patient files reviewed. They found that in a separate case, he declared a patient dead without administering one of the three required drugs and left the home. The patient started breathing again on his own. MacLean came back and finished the job.

Their punishment? Six months of supervision. He kept his license. He can still perform assisted dying today and is working at Westmount Family Physicians. There is several issues here, but let’s be honest. THE DEAD DON’T TALK, and when people like this are allowed to keep practicing medicine, they will do it again.

Now look at France’s Medical murder bill.

The National Assembly passed this legislation describing eligibility as people struck by a “serious and incurable disease” that is “life-threatening and in its advanced or terminal phases,” experiencing “constant physical or psychological suffering.”

Broad language. Interpretable language. The kind of language that starts as a narrow door and ends as an open hallway.

Canada started the same way. Terminal illness. Clear safeguards. Narrow eligibility. That was 2016.

By 2021, we expanded it to people whose deaths were not near. By 2024, a 45-year-old man with addiction, depression, and documented suicidal ideation was being assessed for death in a parking lot by a doctor who would later fail to complete the procedure correctly in a separate case leaving a patient breathing after being declared dead and receive a verbal caution for it.

That trajectory didn’t happen by accident. It happened by design. Each expansion was framed as compassionate. Each one made the door a little wider. None of them came with meaningful accountability.

Buried in the debate around France’s bill is this fact: 48% of French patients who require palliative care do not get it.

Nearly half.

France’s National Assembly passed a separate palliative care bill the same day unanimously, 491 votes in favour. That’s where the actual consensus is. Not on killing people, on caring for them.

Yet the assisted dying bill is the one being pushed through before summer recess. The one Macron wants signed before 2027 elections. The one that carries a two-year prison sentence for anyone who tries to block an act of assisted dying while in Canada, a doctor who failed to complete the procedure correctly and returned to finish the job received a verbal caution.

Two years in jail for obstruction. A verbal caution for negligence. That is what the incentive structure looks like when this becomes law.

I Qualify for This. Today.

I am a Canadian combat veteran. I served in Afghanistan as an artillery gunner. I carry the injuries from that service. Under Canada’s current MAiD criteria, I qualify for assisted dying today.

I’ve said this on Triggernometry. I’ve said it before Parliament. I’ve said it to Winston Marshall, Jillian Michaels and Jordan Peterson and to anyone else who will listen.

The system doesn’t see a veteran who survived war. It sees a cost. It sees suffering it can resolve quickly, cheaply, and permanently. And it has built a legal and financial infrastructure around that resolution.

This week I was back on Triggernometry for the third time making the same argument: assisted dying isn’t being managed as a compassionate last resort. It’s being monetized. There are billing codes for it. Practitioners profit from it and when they get it wrong, the consequences are a verbal caution and six months of supervision.

To France’s Senate, directly. You’ve rejected this bill twice. The National Assembly has passed it twice. That tension is not dysfunction. That tension is democracy doing exactly what it’s supposed to do when a question is this serious.

A 44-year-old woman with Parkinson’s stood outside your building and said this bill would be like a loaded pistol left on her bedside table. She’s not wrong. That is not a metaphor. That is a description of what vulnerability looks like when the state has decided that death is a medical option.

England rejected it. Scotland rejected it, both after watching Canada.

I’m not here to tell you what to legislate. I’m here to show you what you’re legislating. Fix the palliative care crisis. The 48% of patients who can’t access it are the ones who will be pushed toward this door when it opens. They deserve better than that.

Canada is the case study. Thomas Dillon is the data point no one wanted to create.

Don’t build what we built or you and your citizens will regret it and to President Macron, blood will be on your hands if you keep pushing death on your people.

“Emotional Support Animals, Assisted Suicide And Suicide Prevention”

Content Warning: Discussion of A Disabled Person’s Death By "Suicide" 

 

Meghan Schrader

By Meghan Schrader
Disability activist and member of the EPC-USA Board

As I’ve said, I think it’s important for euthanasia opponents to understand how disability policy impacts disabled people’s lives, how euthanasia can relate to those policies, and do what they can to advocate for better disability supports. So I am going to comment on the USA Office of Housing and Urban Development’s decision to not enforce/eliminate the Fair Housing Act’s protections for Emotional Support Animals.

My cat, Lucy, is my Emotional Support Animal. She is one of the best things in my life. Every night when I go to sleep, she curls up on the pillow next to mine. I place my hand against her smooth, soft fur and listen to the gentle rumbling of her purr. Often the anxiety and insomnia I struggle with eases and I am able to drift off to sleep. Every morning Lucy wakes me up by tapping me with her paw and nuzzling my face, as she makes little grunts and trills.

Lucy

Lucy also greatly contributes to my understanding of myself as a fully functional adult: Yes, my mental illness and neurological disabilities sometimes cause independent living struggles, but my cat is still alive and doing well, so I must be doing some things right.

So, Lucy is essentially a furry antidepressant that compliments the effects of pharmaceutical intervention. Residual symptoms of depression would be much less controlled if I did not have Lucy.

Unfortunately for people like me, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development has decided not to enforce the Fair Housing Act’s provision for emotional support animals.

In addition to no longer investigating ESA Fair Housing Act complaints, HUD has indicated that it intends to update the FHA’s 1989 assistance animal regulations to exclude ESAs.

HUD now only wants to enforce the part of the FHA requiring landlords to accommodate service animals who perform specific tasks.

Service animals and ESAs are not the same thing. Service animals are trained to do complex tasks to accommodate specific symptoms of a person’s impairment that inhibit independent living. ESAs do not perform specific tasks but have long been recognized as important tools for people with emotional disabilities.

HUD’s actions increase my risk of having to choose between housing and my precious Lucy.

For instance, my low income makes it difficult to afford the pet fees that are waived for ESAs. My landlord could decide that since HUD no longer recognizes ESAs, I could not have Lucy in my apartment. Limiting protections for ESAs means that if I wanted to move to a new apartment for an education or job opportunity, landlords could deny me housing because of Lucy.

According to HUD’s memo, it might still be possible for tenants to seek redress under Section 504 and the ADA. But, one of the flaws in those laws is that neither contains explicit protections for ESAs. The ADA restricts its definition of assistance animals to service animals. This is the template HUD will now base its policies on.

I think some readers may perceive a proliferation of spurious disability complaints, especially around ESAs. But I can tell you from experience that the process of resolving any legitimate disability discrimination complaint tends to be drawn out and burdensome for the filer. HUD’s new blanket policy striking the Fair Housing Act’s provisions for ESAs makes any remaining ESA protections even more difficult to invoke. HUD has removed an important tool for ensuring that vulnerable people who need ESAs can have them.

Perhaps the best way to explain how this policy change relates to euthanasia prevention is to tell the story of “Jane.” Jane was a disabled Canadian woman with autism and depression that I met on #DisabilityTwitter. Jane’s severe depression, autistic dysregulation and various traumas caused chronic housing instability. When I met Jane, she did have an apartment, but the environment wasn’t suitable for someone with her disabilities. Jane was isolated from her family and experiencing poverty. One of the only sources of joy in Jane’s life was her cat.

At first, Jane was angry that Canada had legalized “Track 2 MAiD” instead of funding disability supports; participating in viral hashtags like #AidNotMAiD. But Jane’s mental health and housing situation gradually became more precarious. As Jane’s anguish intensified, she evolved into one of the only disabled Canadians I met on X who thought “Track 2 MAiD” was a good idea.

Lack of accommodations for depression and autism gradually eroded Jane’s sanity, until her tweets became a combination of volatile despair and heartbreaking pleas for help. Jane tweeted about having loud autistic meltdowns.

Rather than show compassion, neighbors fought to have Jane evicted from her apartment.

Many of Jane’s panicked tweets about impending homelessness were about her fear that she wouldn’t be allowed to take her cat to a homeless shelter, and she would have to surrender her cat to an animal shelter, “And then I’ll never see her beautiful face again!”

So, once she had enough evidence that homelessness was inevitable, Jane killed herself “the old fashioned way.”

HUD’s new policy increases the risk of these kinds of scenarios. HUD’s decision to restrict disabled people’s access to beloved emotional support animals will cause the USA’s most marginalized disabled people to suffer more. And that suffering will be just as real as the suffering of disabled Canadians having “MAiD” suggested to them in emergency rooms. Policies like HUD’s recent decision will contribute to the high rate of suicide in the disabled community. And those “regular” suicides will be just as tragic and preventable as the coerced “MAiD” suicides in Canada.

It is important that euthanasia opponents not support policies like this. If you want to save disabled people’s lives, protect our access to the things we need and love.

Author Note 1: For another essay about what Lucy means to me, see my blog post, Society Should Treat Disabled People Like My Cousin Treats Me and “It.”

Author Note 2: Apparently HUD website's entire page about assistance animals, archived by the Wayback Machine as recently as May 23, 2026, has been removed.
 

Author Note 3: Here is HUD’s memo about the rule change.

Author Note 4: Here is the Disability Rights Education And Defense Fund’s briefing on the rule change.

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition files to intervene in Euthanasia for Mental Illness court case.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The Euthanasia Prevention Coalition has filed in court, an application to intervene in the Brosseau case launched by Dying with Dignity, Canada's leading pro-euthanasia lobby group. The Brosseau case is asking an Ontario court to legislate from the bench by approving medical homicide for Claire Brosseau who is living with mental illness alone.

Court interventions are very expensive. We need your support.

Last week I wrote that EPC legal counsel, Hugh Scher, submitted a court intervention application outlining our litigation experience that included interventions at every level in Carter, the case that legalized medical homicide in Canada. Today, EPC filed a formal application to intervene in the Brosseau case.

Due to the nature of the legal proceedings, I will not, at this time, share our legal documents, but our intervention provide important information for the court. For instance, we stated that:

EPC frequently receives stories about people with mental illness only who at one time sought access to suicide and/or to MAiD, but who later expressed gratitude about their inability to end their own lives either by suicide or by MAiD and about how their continuing lives have been fulfilling despite past and ongoing difficulties. This is particularly so for those who were able to access mental health resources and supports that addressed their mental health disabilities and that increased their social integration and inclusion. These people acknowledge that if they had access to MAiD for mental illness only they would have acted on it during times of profound depression, hopelessness and desperation.

In our application, EPC provided significant information about how Canada's law is currently operating. EPC is not only concerned with medical homicide being extended to people who's sole criteria is a mental illness, but we also want Canada's law to be fully reviewed.

Whether or not our intervention application is accepted, court interventions are important and very expensive. 

 

We need your financial support. 

Donate to the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition court intervention (online donation) (paypal donation) donate by e-transfer to info@epcc.ca or call our office at: 1-877-439-3348.

Canadian man pleads guilty to aiding suicide in 14 deaths.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Some of Kenneth Law's victims.

Kenneth Law, a Canadian who sold suicide poison kits online to as many as 1200 people world-wide, pled guilty to 14 charges of aiding and abetting suicide in a New Market court (today), May 29, 2026..

Jon Woodward and Codi Wilson reported for CTV News that:

Law was arrested in 2023 in connection with 14 deaths in Ontario after he was accused of aiding and abetting those suicides by supplying the victims with ... which is typically used to preserve meat but is deadly when consumed in high concentrations.

At the time of his arrest, police said Law sent more than 1,200 packages to 41 countries, selling the deadly chemical and other items that can be used for self-harm through multiple websites.

The youngest victim in Ontario was just 16 years old.

Based on a plea agreement, the Crown Prosecutor dropped the 14 counts of murder for an agreement where Law pled guilty to aiding the suicide of his victims, a charge that would likely result in a 14 year sentence.

Woodward and Wilson reported that: prosecutors said the victims in England and Wales will be included as “part of Mr. Law’s sentencing in Canada.”

 Joseph Brean reported for the National Post that:

Court has heard details of the 14 Ontario deaths that are the subject of his pleas, and details of his business by which he would ship products to customers, mostly a culinary curing salt that is toxic in sufficient quantities, but also asphyxiation masks. He would also offer consultation phone calls, and sent documentation saying his businesses “will be held harmless for the end use of its products.”

Court is now hearing details of 79 similar deaths in the U.K., details of which were shared by British authorities and will be considered in sentencing later this year in September. Assisting suicide has a maximum jail term of 14 years.

His online material said he would not sell to minors, but court has heard two Canadian children, and another in Britain, successfully placed orders.

He shipped 1,209 packages to 41 countries.

An agreed statement of facts indicates that from 2020 to his 2023 arrest, he received nearly $300,000 from this business, roughly equally between Shopify and PayPal. 

On May 3, 2023; I reported that Law, had been arrested and charged with two counts of assisted suicide and was believed to have assisted the suicide of at least 7 people in the US and the UK.

On May 9, 2023 CTV News journalist, Jon Woodward reported that Law was facing two counts of aiding and abetting the deaths of two people in Peel Region, allegedly through the online sales of a legal substance that is lethal in high concentrations. Law sold the substance world-wide for the purposes of aiding suicide.

Neha Raju & Tom Parfett

Woodward reported that 23-year-old Neha Raju and 22-year-old Tom Parfett died in the U.K., 20-year-old Noelle Ramirez died in Colorado, and 17-year-old Anthony Jones died in Michigan and the police were investigating 1200 people who were sent the lethal poison online.

Euronews reported on August 25, 2023 that Law was being investigated by UK authorities in the suicide deaths of 88 people and it was suspected that Law had shipped the suicide poison to at least 232 people in the UK.

Imogen Nunn

On August 27, 2023 Jon Woodward reported on CP24 on the Law investigation that the death of Imogen Nunn, in the UK, was also connected to Law. Nunn died suddenly in January, 2023 and the family didn't know how she died until the toxicology report confirmed that she died from poisoning.

On December 12, 2023 CBC News Toronto reported that Law was charged with 14 counts of second-degree murder. The CBC news report stated:

Law was charged with 14 counts of second-degree murder, in addition to the 14 counts of counselling or aiding suicide that he was already facing. CBC News Toronto stated that York Regional Police Insp. Simon James, who heads up a multi-service task force investigating Law confirmed the charges at a news conference today. The new charges are related to the same alleged victims in multiple Ontario municipalities, from Toronto to Thunder Bay.

On October 7, 2024, Jon Woodward reported for CTV news that Law was challenging the second-degree murder charges to the Supreme Court of Canada. Woodward reported:

“Assisting suicide is not murder,” Law’s lawyers, Matthew Gourlay, Stephanie DiGuiseppe, and Taylor Wormington wrote in a brief filed Friday.

"Mr. Law is not alleged to have been present at any of the deaths. He is not alleged to have deceived the victims into unwittingly ending their own lives. It would impermissibly warp the language of the Code to assert that someone who mails a toxic substance that another person later voluntarily consumes in another location with suicidal intent has “actually committed” their murder," they write.Woodward's report indicates that at least 130 people died after consuming the poison.

Charges against Law included a 16-year-old death in Ontario. CBC News reported on May 8 that 17-year-old Anthony Jones from Michigan allegedly died in connection to Law's suicide kit.