Australian man loses appeal in his conviction for assisting the suicide of his wife for $1.4 million.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jennifer Morant

In a unanimous decision, the Queensland Australia Court of Appeal upheld the conviction of Graham Morant who assisted the suicide of his wife, Jennifer Morant (56) for her $1.4 million in life insurance. 

Morant was convicted in October, 2018 and sentenced to 10 years in prison.

Commentary by Richard Egan on the Court of Appeal decision (Link).

In an article published by the Brisbane Times by Lidia Lynch, Lynch explains why Morant's conviction appeal failed. Lynch reports:

Morant was the sole beneficiary of his wife's three life insurance policies, totalling $1.4 million.

Ms Morant lived with chronic back pain and found even the most simple everyday tasks difficult.

But Morant persuaded her over the months before her death by telling her the funds would go towards building a religious commune.

Morant claimed to police his wife wanted to die, but two witnesses close to her testified she did not want to kill herself and was scared by his pressure on her to do so.

Morant's lawyers appealed his conviction on four grounds and argued for a retrial based on emails between Ms Morant and Dr Nitschke came to light after the initial conviction. Lynch explains why the Court of Appeal didn't view these emails as effecting the conviction:

In the emails sent months before her death, Ms Morant told Dr Nitschke about her suffering and sought his help.

She told him of her anguish and pain and asked for his help about "how to end my life in a peaceful manner".

In his reasons, Court of Appeal President Walter Sofronoff acknowledged the emails were not available to Morant's lawyers at trial.

"However, it is impossible to see how they could have helped the appellant to secure an acquittal," he wrote.

"It would, instead, have reinforced Ms Morant’s vulnerability to the appellant’s inducements."

At his sentencing in November 2018, ABC News Australia reported Justice Peter Davis stating:

"You took advantage of her vulnerability as a sick and depressed woman. 

You counselled your wife to kill herself because you wanted to get your hands on the $1.4 million. 

Your general financial position was such that $1.4 million was a very significant sum, as it would be to most people. 

You have not shown any remorse for the offences you have committed. 

You did not plead guilty and you did not cooperate with the administration of justice."

Candice Lewis

The coercion used by Graham Morant that led to the assisted suicide death of his wife Jennifer is not indicative of most assisted suicide deaths, but it is also not uncommon.

In Canada, Candice Lewis, among others, was pressured by her doctors to ask for an assisted death. We will never know how many assisted deaths occurred after the person was pressured by doctors, nurses, family members or friends because the victim is dead and the victimizer thinks that it was the right thing to do.

Queensland Australia Court of Appeal upheld Decision in Morant Aiding Suicide Case

A Red Flag for Assisted Suicide Law

By Richard Egan

Jennifer Morant

In a unanimous decision by three judges of the Queensland Court of Appeal handed down in Brisbane on 19 June 2020 in the case of R v Morant [2020] QCA 135, Graham Morant’s appeal against his conviction for aiding the suicide of his wife was rejected on all four grounds of appeal and the sentence of 10 years imprisonment was upheld as fair.

Morant was convicted on two counts under s311 of the Queensland Criminal Code. The first was that he had counselled Ms Morant to kill herself and thereby induced her to do so. The second was that he had aided her in killing herself.

One of the grounds of appeal was the belated discovery of two emails Ms Morant had exchanged with Dr Philip Nitschke. The emails presumably showed that she had suicidal ideation and was actively considering means of suicide.

However, these things were already apparent from evidence presented at Mr Morant’s trial. As Sofronoff P concluded (at 38):

The evidence could not have helped the appellant. It would, instead, have reinforced Ms Morant’s vulnerability to the appellant’s inducements.

Sofronoff P explains (at 47):

It was implicit in the jury’s verdicts that the appellant had counselled Ms Morant to kill herself with the intention that she should commit suicide. It also follows that the jury found that the counselling was effective to induce her to commit suicide so that, but for the appellant’s counselling, she would not have gassed herself on 30 November 2014.

Morant stood to benefit from three life insurance policies to the total of $1.4 million.

His efforts to induce his wife to commit suicide included recounting to her a story about “a customer of his [who] had taken out policies of insurance in favour of his wife and had then killed himself.” Mr Morant told his wife that that was “an amazing and wonderful thing” to have done. He encouraged her to do the same for him.

Sofronoff P concluded (at 64-65):

The present case is a paradigm case that exhibits the wickedness of the offence of counselling and thereby inducing a victim to kill herself. The offence was committed against a woman who was vulnerable to the appellant’s inducements. His actions were premeditated, calculated and were done for financial gain… The offence was a serious one that involved a killing of a human being.

One of the judges, Boddice J summarised (at 248-249) the case against Graham Morant:

[T]he deceased was a vulnerable person with difficulties with her physical health, who was already suffering depression; and the fact that the appellant, by his conduct, took advantage of those vulnerabilities in order to persuade her to kill herself and then assisted her to do so. 

In addition to those matters, the more serious aspect of the offences, counselling suicide, occurred over a period of months. Its seriousness was aggravated by the fact that the appellant had also aided the deceased to kill herself, being the end result of that extended period of counselling.

This case should be a big red flag to those intent on legalising assisted suicide and euthanasia as the current Queensland Government intends to do if re-elected on 31 October 2020. It has charged the Queensland Law Reform Commission with preparing draft legislation and is instructed in doing so to “have regard to” the draft legislation prepared by Ben White and Lindy Willmott.
 
That draft legislation proposes that the two doctors assessing requests for euthanasia or assisted suicide must, among other things, undergo “approved assessment training” and assess the request as “made voluntarily and without coercion”.
 
The approved training prepared by Ben White for doctors licensed to kill by lethal injection or to prescribe poison to people in Victoria under its euthanasia and assisted suicide law contains a total of just over 5 minute (including a 2 minute 20 second video and slides which take a further 2 minutes 50 seconds to read) assessing voluntariness, including assessing the absence of coercion. 

As a co-author of “an article entitled “Biggest decision of them all – death and assisted dying: capacity assessments and undue influence screening”, published in the Internal Medicine Journal in January 2019, White dissented from the recommendations of his co-authors proposed “Guideline for clinicians assessing capacity and screening for undue Influence for voluntary assisted dying”.
 
Issues identified in this insightful report but completely ignored in the training prepared by White for Victorian doctors include:

• undiagnosed depression;
• cognitive impairment associated with Motor Neuron Disease and its effect on decision making capacity;
• the use of supported decision making “allowing one person to communicate or assist with communicating another’s decision raises concerns about potential for undue influence, especially given the gravity of the assisted suicide or euthanasia decision”.

If Queensland passes a law permitting euthanasia and assisted suicide it will be removing from vulnerable Queenslanders like Ms Morant, the protection of Section 311 with its absolute prohibition on counselling, inducing and aiding suicide.

Instead manipulative, greedy, coercive, murderous perpetrators like Graham Morant, will simply need to suggest to a vulnerable spouse or parent or “friend” that accessing legal doctor provided euthanasia or taking doctor prescribed lethal poison is “all for the best dear”.

Indeed, no jurisdiction that has legalised assisted suicide has even made any serious effort to establish a genuinely safe framework in this regard. No such framework is possible. Any law permitting assisted suicide or euthanasia will result in wrongful deaths from coercion.

Richard Egan is a researcher who has studied euthanasia and assisted suicide laws for 36 years and is the author of Seventeen Fatally Flawed Experiments in Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia and Twelve Categories of Wrongful Death from Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia

Euthanasia Advocate Backs Convicted Husband

This article was published by HOPE Australia on December 6, 2018

Euthanasia advocates have shown how far they would push euthanasia and assisted suicide laws if legalised in Queensland, giving no weight to financial motivations for helping someone to take their own life.

Last month, a judge sentenced Queensland’s Graham Robert Morant to ten years in prison for counselling his wife to kill herself, and then assisting her to do so.  He found that the motive for the crime was the $1.4 million that he stood to receive under insurance policies he had taken out in her name.

I

Jennifer Morant

n sentencing Morant to ten years imprisonment, Justice Davis sent a message to the community about the gravity of the crime of counselling a person to commit suicide, commenting that it was even more serious than assisting a person to do so.

Despite the clearly shocking nature of the crime and its motive, euthanasia advocates have sprung to his defence, calling the sentence “totally inappropriate.”

Bizarrely, Exit International’s founder Philip Nitschke argued that Morant’s actions of counselling and assisting his vulnerable wife to suicide in order to inherit $1.4 million an “act of love.”

According to the ABC, Nitschke said:

"Exit staff remember Jenny as being lovingly cared for by her husband, who was considered to be as kind, considerate and as compassionate as any husband could be… The severity of the sentencing for this act of love is totally inappropriate."

Kind, considerate, compassionate.  That’s how euthanasia advocates describe a man who a court found spent years encouraging his wife to take her own life and helping her to do so in order to financially gain from her death.

The real agenda of euthanasia advocates is clear.  That they are willing to hail as a ‘loving husband’ a financially-motivated man who a jury found – beyond reasonable doubt – to have counselled and aided his wife (who was not terminally ill) to take her own life shows how far they are wanting to extend the reach of euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Any safeguards included by Queensland legislators won’t be welcomed by euthanasia advocates; they will be constantly trying to undermine them so that the Graham Morant’s of the world not only get through, but are hailed as kind, considerate, compassionate husbands.

Morant will appeal his conviction, using emails allegedly sent from his wife to Exit International as evidence that she was determined to die.  He will also appeal the length of his sentence.

• Australian man convicted of assisting his wife's suicide for $1.4 million.

Australian man sentenced 10 years for assisting the suicide of his wife.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jennifer Morant

Graham Morant (69), an Australian man who was accused of assisting the suicide of his wife, Jennifer Morant (56) for the $1.4 million insurance money was convicted on October 3, 2018 of the crime and has now been sentenced to 10 years in prison for his crime.

ABC News Australia reported Justice Peter Davis stating:

"You took advantage of her vulnerability as a sick and depressed woman.

You counselled your wife to kill herself because you wanted to get your hands on the $1.4 million. 

Your general financial position was such that $1.4 million was a very significant sum, as it would be to most people. 

You have not shown any remorse for the offences you have committed. 

You did not plead guilty and you did not cooperate with the administration of justice."

The Morant case shows how euthanasia and assisted suicide can hide the crime of murder. 

The circumstances related to Morant's health and death are similar to the circumstances related to most assisted suicide deaths.

Australian man, convicted of assisting his wife's suicide for $1.4 million.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition.

Jennifer Morant

An Australian man who was accused of having $1.4 million reasons to assist his wife's suicide was found guilty. Graham Morant was convicted of the crime in order to collect his wife's life insurance. According to 9News.com report:

Morant, 69, was today convicted by a Brisbane Supreme Court jury of aiding and counselling Jennifer Morant to kill herself on the Gold Coast in 2014.

Morant was the sole beneficiary of her three life insurance policies totalling $1.4 million when she took her own life in November that year.

The evidence confirmed that Jennifer Morant had back pain, but Graham Morant persuaded her, over several months, to die by suicide. According to the report:

Morant claimed to police his wife wanted to die, but two witnesses close to her testified she did not want to kill herself and was scared by his pressure on her to do so.

The Judge will sentence Graham Morant on October 19.

More articles concerning the Morant court case:

• Australian man had $1.4 Million reasons to assist the suicide of his wife.
• Australian man denies assisting his wife's suicide for $1.4 Million dollars.
• Australian man charged with assisting his wife's suicide. Her friend said she didn't want to die.
• Australian man accused of assisting his wife's suicide for her Life Insurance says she wanted to die.

Australia man accused of assisting his wife's suicide for her Life Insurance says that his wife wanted to die.

Alex Schadenberg

Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jennifer Morant.

Three days ago I reported that Graham Robert Morant was charged with assisting the suicide of his wife, Jennifer Morant, in Australia, to receive 1.4 million dollars in Life Insurance.

• Australian man had 1.4 million reasons to assist the suicide of his wife.

Two days ago, I reported that Morant told the court that he was innocent.

• Australian man denies assisting his wife's suicide for 1.4 million dollars.

Yesterday, Jennifer Morant's best friend said that she didn't want to die, but she expressed that her only hope was to win the lottery.

• Australian man charged with assisting his wife's suicide, her friend said she didn't want to die.

Today Morant told the court that his wife wanted to die by suicide, and yet her doctor stated that she never said to him that she wanted to die.

An article written by Warren Barnsley for the Sydney Morning Herald explains:

Mr Morant told police Jennifer did not want to continue suffering chronic back pain and had attempted to kill herself three times previous.

"I had such a zest and zeal to live. She had such a zest and zeal to die," Mr Morant told police in an interview played in Brisbane Supreme Court on Thursday. 

He said he tried to talk her out of it but became desensitised to her attempts. 

"That's horrendous, but she that's just what she wanted to do. 

"She actually forbid me from stopping her taking her life." 

Mr Morant also lamented Jennifer's extravagant spending, saying she had a "gift for spending money".

The article then reports on the statements by her doctor. The article stated:

But while she had been treated for back, weight, thyroid, blood pressure, dental and mental health issues, her doctor Mariusz Zielinski told the court she suffered no terminal illness. 

Dr Zielinski said she had never made a comment to him about wanting to end her life.

The trial continues.

Australian man charged with assisting his wife's suicide, her friend said she didn't want to die.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jennifer Morant

Two days ago I reported that Graham Robert Morant was charged with assisting the suicide of his wife, Jennifer Morant, in Australia, to receive 1.4 million dollars in Life Insurance.

• Australian man had 1.4 million reasons to assist the suicide of his wife.

Yesterday I reported that Morant told the court that he was innocent.

• Australian man denies assisting his wife's suicide for 1.4 million dollars.

Today, the best friend of Jennifer Morant, said that Jennifer didn't want to die, but she expressed that her only hope was to win the lottery. 9News.com reported:

"(She said) I'm afraid and I really don't want to do it," Ms Morant's friend Johanna Cornelia Dent testified in Brisbane Supreme Court on Wednesday. 

"But I made so many promises to everybody that the only way out would be to win lotto.

Morant allegedly assisted the suicide of his wife because she had 1.4 million dollars in Life Insurance that he wanted to use to purchase a property for a religious commune. According to 9News.com Dent told the court:

Ms Dent said Ms Morant stayed with her the week before she died and when she returned home, she had a "deal with Graham" to end her life. 

"If I hadn't come down here to see you, I would have already been dead," Ms Morant allegedly said. 

When Ms Dent asked her how she would do it, she claims she responded: "Don't worry, darling. I won't feel any pain. Graham says he knows a way I can do it." 

Under cross-examination, Ms Dent said she did not call the police about Morant because Jennifer eventually told her she would not go through with it.

The court case continues tomorrow.

Australian man denies assisting his wife's suicide for 1.4 million dollars.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Yesterday I reported that Graham Robert Morant was charged with assisting the suicide of his wife, Jennifer Morant, in Australia, to receive 1.4 million dollars in Life Insurance.

• Australian man had 1.4 million reasons to assist the suicide of his wife.

Jennifer Morant

According to a report by Warren Beansley for News.com Morant denied assisting the suicide of his wife Jennifer. Morant told the court that:

Morant claimed he found a suicide note after coming home one night in November 2014. 

The note explained Jennifer didn’t want to be a burden on anyone, especially her husband, and it would not be fair on him to care for her “24 hours a day”. 

Morant said she tried to kill herself at least twice previously, the prosecution says.

The Lynette Lucas, the sister of Jennifer Morant told the court that Morant wanted the money to buy a property to establish a religious commune and her sister feared for her life. According to the report for News.com:

Morant wanted to buy a property in the Gold Coast hinterland with Jennifer’s life insurance, worth $1.4 million, to start a religious commune to prepare for biblical rapture, Ms Lucas testified. 

“Jenny was horrified that he had all these plans. She said she didn’t want to be part of the communal environment.” 

Ms Lucas told the court her sister was “fearful for her life”. 

“(I told her) your life’s in danger with these (life insurance) policies,” she said.

Dean Wells, the lawyer for Graham Morant stated:

“I suggest to you Graham is more innocent than anybody you will hear giving evidence against him,” Mr Wells said. 

“Truth is stranger than fiction. There are ... more subplots in this particular case than you will ever see in any courtroom drama on television.”

The case continues in court.

Australian man had 1.4 million reasons to assist the suicide of his wife.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Jennifer Morant

The Supreme Court in Brisbane Australia is hearing the case of Graham Robert Morant (69) who has been charged for assisting the suicide of his wife Jennifer Morant (58) in 2014.

According to prosecutors, Morant encouraged and assisted his wife Jennifer, to die by suicide, in return he received 1.4 million dollars in Life Insurance. ABC News reporter MelanieVujkovic wrote:

Prosecutor Michael Lehane said the jury would hear from a number of witnesses, including Mrs Morant's sister and closest friends who would testify that he encouraged his wife to end her life, and assisted her to gas herself in her car in November 2014 by helping her buy the petrol generator.

Prosecutor Lehane said Mr Morant initially told police in his interview that he had no involvement whatsoever in his wife's suicide, but when officers questioned him about how a woman with back pain could purchase a generator from Bunnings, his story changed.

"Slowly, very slowly over the course of the next hour the accused explained he did assist his wife in her suicide," he said.

The court heard Mr Morant claimed he did not know the details of three life insurance policies Mrs Morant had taken out to the value of $1.4 million, which named him as the sole beneficiary and would be paid out even in the event of suicide. 

The document claimed Mrs Morant had been diagnosed with a terminal illness, but Mr Lehane said her general practitioner would testify during the trial that she was not fatally sick.

The ABC news article reported that the sister of Jennifer Morant stated that Jennifer wanted to leave her husband and that it was all about money for her him. The article stated:

She (her sister) said Mrs Morant expressed serious concerns for her safety, that her life was in danger and her husband openly spoke about what he would do with the money when she died.

"She said Graham had encouraged her to take them [insurance policies] out," Ms Lucas told the court.

"Jenny said, 'he was trying to encourage me to kill myself'."

The defense attorney told the jury, in a short statement, to keep an open mind. he said that in this case the truth is stranger than fiction.

The case will continue.