Irish woman learns about mother's assisted suicide death through WhatsApp

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

Eliana Nunes reported for the Sun (UK) on August 5, 2025 that An Irish family was left devastated after allegedly receiving a text from a Swiss assisted dying clinic that their mum was dead and her ashes would be sent by post.

As reported in the Sun:

Maureen Slough, a 58-year-old from Cavan, travelled to the Pegasos clinic on July 8 to seek an assisted death - without her family's knowledge - according to the Irish Independent. 

Maureen reportedly told her family that she and a friend were going to Lithuania.

Her partner, Mick Lynch didn't even know about her impending death. The report states: 

"I was actually talking to her that morning and she was full of life,"

"She said after having her breakfast... she was going out to sit in the sun. Maybe she was heading off to that place. I still thought she was coming home."

Maureen and Megan

The report indicated that her daughter, Megan Royal, received a WhatsApp message from the suicide clinic stating that her mother had died while listening to gospel music by Elvis Presley. The report continued:

The family is shocked that the clinic would accept an application for assisted dying from Maureen, who they say had long struggled with mental illness.

She had also attempted suicide a year prior, after the deaths of her two sisters, according to the family.

Adding to their dismay, the family claims the clinic never informed them of her plans.

Friends are reportedly horrified by the clinic's method of returning the ashes via parcel post.

The report indicated that the family found out Maureen had paid a reported £13,000 to the Pegasos Swiss Association to assist her death.

The report also indicated that there is a dispute about communication. Pegasus claims that Megan (Maureen's daughter) sent a letter to Pegasos accepting her mother's death plan and confirmed it by email. Megan stated that the letter and email were fake.

The report stated that: 

Maureen's brother wants the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, along with Swiss authorities, to conduct an investigation.

"I am working on the assumption that my sister created this email and the clinic’s procedures were woefully inadequate in verification," he wrote.

"The Pegasos clinic has faced numerous criticisms in the UK for their practices with British nationals, and the circumstances in which my sister took her life are highly questionable."

Pegasos claims that they carried out an extensive assessment of Maureen's mental health - including an independent psychiatric evaluation. Pegasos also claims that: Maureen told the clinic she was in unbearable and unrelievable chronic pain and that they received supporting medical documentation from her pain-management consultant.

The report concluded with:

Maureen's family's story is not unique.

Other families have also hit out at Pegasos, claiming they were left in the dark about their loved ones’ plans to go through with assisted deaths.

In 2023, Pegasos reportedly vowed to contact a person's relatives beforehand after 47-year-old teacher Alistair Hamilton - who had no diagnosed illness - died, leaving his family shocked.

However, in 2025, the organisation appeared to break this promise.

Anne Canning, a 51-year-old British mum, who was battling depression after the sudden death of her son 19 months prior, ended her life at the clinic, ITV reported.

Previous articles concerning the Pegasos suicide clinic:

• Swiss assisted suicide clinic facing lawsuit and questions concerning foreign suicides (Link). 
• A mother's warning about the death of her son by assisted suicide in Switzerland (Link). 
• Euthanasia activist, Sean Davison, arrested in London England concerning the death of a 79-year-old woman (Link).
• Swiss assisted suicide clinic's many controversial deaths (Link). 
• My husbands death made me more opposed to assisted suicide (Link).
• Swiss study: Legalizing assisted suicide does not lessen the number of common suicides (Link).

Swiss canton cuts a deal with suicide group.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An article by Marc Leutenegger that was published by Swissinfo.ch on February 21, 2025 states that the Swiss Canton Solothurn has cut a deal with the Pegasus assisted suicide group that will save money for the Canton by eliminating the need for the authorities to send a legal and medical team to investigate the death. Leutenegger reported that:

..the core of an agreement, unprecedented in Switzerland, that was signed late last year between canton Solothurn and the right-to-die organisation Pegasos. Under the new arrangement, if Pegasos provides video evidence that the suicide was carried out by the person themselves, as well as additional information, then the authorities do not send in a legal and medical team to investigate the death.

The agreement will make it easier for Pegasos and reduce the cost for the Canton. Leutenegger reported:

This reduces the costs of the post-mortem investigation to between CHF1,000 ($1,110) and CHF2,000 per case. What is more, the bill is paid by the right-to-die organisation, and therefore ultimately by the person who wanted to die.

According to Pegasos, the costs are subsumed in the total price of assisted suicide, which amounts to around CHF10,000 per person, be it with Pegasos or other, similar organisations in Switzerland.

According to Pegasos, the agreement above all helps to ensure a more dignified setting for the relatives. The farewell and grieving process is now no longer interrupted by the appearance of the criminal investigation team, the organisation wrote in response to a request. “This disturbed the family’s privacy in an intimate moment. Family and friends had to wait until the official procedures were completed.”

This agreement reduces the cost for the Canton with relation to assisted suicide. Leutenegger reports:

Thanks to the agreement, which came into effect in December, canton Solothurn can cut some high costs. Previously, each assisted suicide by a person resident abroad cost the canton around CHF3,000.

“We get a better result in terms of evidence in this way. The new arrangement also eases the burden on the public purse and on human resources,” says Solothurn’s chief prosecutor, Hansjürg Brodbeck. The authorities, meanwhile, reserve the right to carry out random checks.

It is expected that the number of assisted suicide deaths will double by 2035. Leutenegger wrote;

Lately, over 1,700 Swiss residents a year have committed assisted suicide. In addition, over 500 people from abroad travel to Switzerland for this purpose each year. And demand is increasing: observers expect the number of assisted suicides in Switzerland to double by 2035.

More information on the Switzerlands assisted suicide law.

• Swiss assisted suicide clinic's many controversial deaths (Link). 
• Euthanasia activist, Sean Davison, arrested in London England (Link).
• A mother's warning about her sons death by assisted suicide in Switzerland (Link). 
• My husbands death made me more opposed to assisted suicide (Link). 
• Swiss study: Legalizing assisted suicide does not lessen the number of common suicides (Link).

Swiss assisted suicide clinic provides death for $11,000.

Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director, Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

The shocking news that two healthy American sisters died by assisted suicide in Switzerland is opening new questions about assisted suicide and the Pegasos suicide clinic.

Healthy American sisters die at Swiss suicide clinic (Link).

An article by Ronny Reyes published in the Daily Mail on March 23 explains that Lila Ammouri, a 54 year-old palliative care doctor, and Susan Frazier, a 49-year-old nurse, who were sisters, traveled from Phoenix Arizona to Basel, Switzerland on February 3, and died by assisted suicide on February 11 at the Pegasos suicide clinic. Pegasos is known for providing death for people who are not terminally ill.

Reyes reported that Pegasos charges $11,000 for an assisted suicide.

In order to use Pegasos services, individuals must be members of the organization and pay an annual fee of about $110. Once a member, a person can apply for VAD.

In order to apply for the process, Pegasos needs to know the reason a person is requesting a VAD as well as their current living situation and family background.

Patients must also submit a brief biography, a birth certificate, marriage or divorce certificates, funeral instructions, health reports and proof of residence.

Aside from the membership fee, which could be waived if a patient is already a member of Exit International, the average cost of a VAD with Pegasos is more than $11,000.

Reyes further reported that two healthy American sisters recently died by assisted suicide at the Pegasos suicide clinic. He stated:

A Swiss government source told DailyMail.com that: 'The two American ladies died on February 11.

'They died the same day and the timings were close, if not at the same time.'

The sisters deaths were confirmed by the US consulate on February 18. Their brother Cal, 60, who lives in New York said he only learned of his siblings' passing when contacted by The Independent earlier this week.

In a previous article that was also published by the DailyMail, Reyes reported:

Dr. David Bilgari, a longtime friend of the sisters, said no one had heard from the duo since February 9, four days after they arrived in Switzerland, and that some of their final texts seemed to have been sent by someone else.

Prior to that, Bilgari told Fox 10 that co-workers had been texting them and felt that the person responding was not actually one of the sisters.

'Some of the text communications they had, we are certain they were not from them,' Biglari said. 'They were most likely fabricated with someone else.'

A spokesman for the Basel-Landschaft Public Prosecutor's Office confirmed to The Independent that the sisters had died by suicide 'within the legal framework'.

The concepts of euthanasia and assisted suicide are sold to the culture under the guise of ending suffering. These ladies do not appear to have been sick or suffering but they likely established a suicide pact that was carried-out by the Pegasos assisted suicide clinic.

It is time, once again, to universally reject euthanasia and assisted suicide and to promote a society that cares and not kills its citizens.

A Swiss group caters to Dutch who are not eligible for euthanasia

This article was published by Bioedge on January 24, 2021.

Michael Cook

By Michael Cook

You might think that the Dutch, who live in a country where euthanasia is legal, would have no need for the schemes of Dr Philip Nitschke, Australia’s rogue right-to-die campaigner. You would be wrong.

The Dutch magazine Trouw profiled an 87-year-old man, Kees Kentie, who went to Switzerland to die with the help of a new assisted suicide organisation, Pegasos, which is affiliated with Nitschke’s Exit International. As he explained in a recent tweet:

"The Swiss have not medicalised their end-of-life laws. Those tired of life can be helped, and couples can die together. Pegasos makes this possible. This pisses off the Dutch, where you MUST be sick, from NL, and a doctor makes the decisions, not you."

Kentie, who is not terminally ill, but frail and tired of life, wanted to die. But no Dutch doctors would help him as he did not fulfil the euthanasia law’s criteria.

So he looked into dying in Switzerland and found Pegasos which promises shorter waiting times and less red tape and conducts business in English.

Kentie went to Switzerland with two Dutch friends who made sure that he was comfortable and accompanied him in his last days. The paperwork was minimal. He had a brief chat with one of the officials of Pegasos. According to Trouw:

That Kentie is ‘tired of life’ is explained in the context of the conversation and from the supporting documents. It does not need to be explicitly asked. It was important that [his friend] Hooimeijer had earlier helped Kentie put his thoughts down on paper.

Half an A4 page long, Kees explained that he was at a time when he felt that his life was increasingly completed and that he had a fear of further decline. He wanted to stay in control until the very end.

Nitschke – who now resides in the Netherlands -- keeps Pegasos at arm’s length, but he promotes it on the website of Exit International, his organisation. The Swiss Medical Association regards it as unethical, although it seems to act within the law. According to Trouw, it “is the only one of the six Swiss death aid organizations to also provide assisted suicide to those who are 'tired of life', older than 'around 70 to 75 years' and not seriously ill.” It seems that it has less red tape because it by-passes the Swiss requirement for “unbearable suffering”. Instead of asking a doctor to certify this, it takes the word of the patient himself. However, the head of the ethics department of the Association, Thomas Gruberski, told Trouw, “We do not agree with that interpretation.”

Michael Cook is editor of BioEdge