Minnesota Grand Jury Issues 17 Count Indictment against Final Exit Network and Four of its Members

Stephen Drake &
Diane Coleman

Stephen Drake who is the research analyst for the disability rights group Not Dead Yet has been following the issues related to the Final Exit Network (FEN) for several years. FEN is a group that is oriented to assisting the suicides of people.

Drake quotes from the article in the Baltimore Sun and then comments.

This is what Drake wrote:

From the Baltimore Sun:

HASTINGS, Minn. — A Minnesota grand jury has indicted a national right-to-die group and several members for their actions in the 2007 suicide of a suburban Minneapolis woman, prosecutors announced Monday. 

The 17-count indictment charges the medical director of Final Exit Network, Lawrence Egbert of Baltimore, and three other officials with felony counts of assisting suicide and interference with a death scene, a gross misdemeanor. It also charged the New Jersey-based group in its corporate capacity. 

"This investigation and prosecution is not a politically motivated attack on the right-to-die movement," Dakota County prosecutor James Backstrom said at a news conference. "Rather, it is an effort to bring to justice a corporation and several of its officers and volunteers who we are alleging advised, encouraged or assisted Doreen Dunn in the taking of her own life on May 30, 2007, in violation of Minnesota law."

Here's a breakdown of the Final Exit Network (FEN) members and their alleged roles in Doreen Dunn's death:

The indictment names Egbert, 84; Jerry Dincin, 81, of Highland Park, Ill.; Roberta Massey, 66, of Bear, Del.; and Thomas Goodwin, 65, of Punta Gorda, Fla. Backstrom said Egbert and Dincin traveled to Minnesota to be with Dunn on the day she died, and that they likely dumped the equipment she used to kill herself in a trash bin on their way back to the airport.

The fact that Egbert was allegedly one of the 'exit guides' may bring some new heat and light in this (now) criminal case. As I mentioned last week, Larry Egbert was the subject of an extensive (if not terribly probing) interview published in the Washington Post last January. In the interview, he shared the fact that he 're-used' so-callled 'exit bags,' providing them to 'clients' so they wouldn't have to purchase them. He showed the reporter a large number of them stashed in a closet in his home.

It's essential, IMO, that the prosecutor bring this up at trial. If contrary to claims repeated even now in the current story that FEN 'doesn't provide' the means to commit suicide, Egbert provided the 'Exit Bag,' that is actual material assistance. Further, it could implicate Dincin, since it would be hard to hide the fact that Dunn was using a used 'exit bag' that Egbert brought, rather than one she purchased herself. That would also mean that the organization has been knowingly misrepresenting itself and its practices.

Is that shocking? Not really. When you have a bunch of vigilantes whose primary mission is to facilitate the suicides of total strangers, there really can't be any breach of integrity that's really surprising.  --Stephen Drake

My Life My Death My Choice

Wesley Smith, one of the leading bioethicists in America, published this great blog comment on August 5. Since Smith said much of what needs to be said, then I thought you need to read this article also.
-------------------------------

My Life My Death My Choice

By Wesley Smith, August 5, 2010

The advocacy billboards appeared without warning in San Francisco and New Jersey: "My Life. My Death. My Choice." Paid for by the Final Exit Network (FEN), the promotional signs received widespread media coverage as a new wrinkle in the ongoing national campaign to legalize assisted suicide.

But there is much more to this story than controversial messaging on billboard. FEN doesn't just advocate assisted suicide: Its "counselors" make deadly house calls. Indeed, FEN members have been indicted in Georgia—including Ted Goodwin, its former head— and in Arizona for alleged assisted suicide activities. So far, two FEN members have pleaded guilty (in the Arizona case involving the suicide of a mentally ill woman).

FEN-style moral outlawry is nothing new, of course. In the 1990s, Jack Kevorkian plowed this particular field until convicted of second degree murder. (Proving that crime pays: Kevorkian has retired from his deadly avocation and receives $50,000 per speech, as he basks in the warm light of a sympathetic biopic starring AL Pacino. Kevorkian's Australian counterpart, physician Philip Nitschke, still travels the world teaching people how-to-commit suicide as he attempts to touts a suicide concoction called "the peaceful pill," which he opined in a National Review Online interview, should be made available to anyone who wants to die, including "troubled teens."

As outrageous as the FEN, Kevorkian, and Nitschke are, they do not pose the primary threat. In the last ten years, a new class of advocates has emerged pursuing a “professional” approach to assisted suicide promotion. Epitomized by the euphemistically named Compassion and Choices and funded in the millions annually by the likes of George Soros, well off and well tailored elites promote a so-called “medical model” for legalized “aid in dying” in meetings with medical and legal associations, in articles published in professional journals, and ubiquitously to the media. To assuage fears of abuse, unlike the moral outlaws, assisted suicide professionals assure a wary public that doctor facilitated suicide will be restricted to the terminally ill for whom nothing else can be done to alleviate suffering—a false premise designed to play into people’s worst fears about the dying process.

Yet, despite the clear differences in political tactics, both the moral outlaws and professional advocates pose a similar danger to the weak and vulnerable. Indeed, once society accepts the fundamental ideological premise that killing is a legitimate method of eliminating human suffering, the death remedy continually expands to ever growing categories of despairing people. After all, if the time, manner, and place of “my death” is merely a matter of “my choice,” simple logic dictates that “the right to die” will expand beyond the terminally ill—and as we shall see, even beyond “choice.”

A brief review of the jurisdictions where euthanasia and assisted suicide are allowed illustrate the truth of the above assertion. Consider:

The Netherlands: The Netherlands has allowed euthanasia and assisted suicide by doctors since 1973, formally legalizing mercy killing by doctors in 2002. In that time, despite the supposed guidelines to protect against abuse, Dutch doctors have euthanized the terminally ill who ask for it, the chronically ill who ask for it, people with disabilities who ask for it, and the deeply depressed who ask for it—the latter explicitly approved by the Dutch Supreme Court in a case involving the assisted suicide by a psychiatrist of a mother who wanted to die out of grief for her two dead children. Illustrating how profoundly accepting euthanasia consciousness alters human society, this year more than 100,000 Dutch citizens signed petitions requiring the Parliament to debate whether to permit the healthy elderly (age 70 or older) to receive euthanasia if they are "tired of life."

But it gets worse: According to several Dutch government and other studies, death doctors also commit some 800-900 non voluntary euthanasia killings—called "termination without request or consent" in Dutch euthanasia parlance—as well as the infanticide of babies born with disabling or terminal conditions.

Even though non voluntary euthanasia and infanticide remain murder under Dutch law, it is rarely prosecuted, and even when it is, doctors face no meaningful punishment.

Belgium: Belgium legalized euthanasia in 2002, and fell off the same moral cliff as the Netherlands—only more quickly. Despite the legal requirement that all euthanasia deaths be asked for by the patient, Belgian doctors—and nurses—also commit non voluntary euthanasia. For example, a survey of Belgian nurses published by the Canadian Medical Association Journal, found that of 248 euthanasia deaths, 120 (nearly 50%) were administered without request, and moreover, that many deaths were facilitated by nurses. Perhaps even more frighteningly, voluntary euthanasia has been coupled with organ procurement—potentially giving the despairing a reason to end their own lives as a way of serving others, while offering society a utilitarian stake in their deaths.

Switzerland: A very liberal Swiss assisted suicide law has led to a growing international industry in "suicide tourism" that has taken the lives of hundreds of sick and despairing people—including many people who were not terminally ill. Meanwhile, Ludwig Minelli—owner of the suicide clinic Dignitas, was reported by UK media to have become a millionaire from his suicide business, which caters to foreigners. Not coincidentally, the Swiss Supreme Court created a constitutional right to assisted suicide for the mentally ill.

Oregon: When faced with these facts—and many other horror stories too numerous to recount here—assisted suicide advocates point to Oregon to show that medicalized killing can be practiced in a restricted manner. But Oregon has also had its share of abuses. In 2008, for example, Randy Stroup and Barbara Wagner—both on Oregon's rationed Medicaid program—were prescribed chemotherapy to extend their lives when their terminal cancer recurred. When they asked for Medicaid to pay their medical bills, it refused but sent a letter offering to pay for their assisted suicides. Meanwhile, an article published in the Michigan Law Review by Dr. Kathleen Foley—one of America's most respected palliative care physicians—and psychiatrist Herbert Hendin—one of the Unites States' most notable experts on suicide prevention—revealed that Oregon's protective guidelines "are being circumvented" routinely by doctors because the state's bureaucrats too often act "as defenders of the law rather than protectors of the welfare of terminally ill patients."

All of this—and much, much more that could be written—demonstrates vividly that the assisted suicide movement is a clear and present danger to the lives of the weak, vulnerable, and despairing. Indeed, lurking beneath the loud assertions of "My life, my death, my choice," lurks an ideology that would lead us toward for profit suicide clinics—already proposed in Oregon —and a virtual death on demand social ethic. That is the ugly truth that simplistic billboard sloganeering just can't hide.

Link to Wesley Smith's blog comment: http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2010/08/05/my-take-on-my-life-my-death-my-choice-fen-billboards/

Final Exit Network - Reframing Themselves and Erasing the Past

This is a reprint from the Not Dead Yet Blog written by Stephen Drake. Drake is covering a significant topic because the Final Exit Network is trying to reframe who they are in order to survive the legal challenge they are facing.

The information that Drake is writing about was also blogged by myself when it first came out in November 2008. It is interesting how my comments at that time correlate with what is actually happening today. Link to my blog comment: http://alexschadenberg.blogspot.com/2008/11/washington-state-passes-i-1000-assisted.html

Link to the original blog comment:
http://notdeadyetnewscommentary.blogspot.com/2009/12/final-exit-network-in-news-reframing.html

Alex Schadenberg
--------------

(Note - please read to the end. The main point of this story is that the Final Exit Network seems to have taken some pains to eliminate traces of a November '08 press release that might interfere with current efforts to improve their public image. --Stephen)

Unfortunately, there's been a small rash of elderly men killing - or
attempting to kill - their ill wives in the past couple weeks. One, in Tucson, Arizona, involves a middle-aged man who allegedly killed his wife, who has been struggling with Huntington's disease - a progressive neurological condition that affects the motor and cognitive abilities.

From the latest story in the Arizona Daily Star:

A Tucson man who told police he killed his wife because she was terminally ill likely did so because he felt he could no longer care for her and had no other options, members of a local support group say.

Sanford Garfinkel, 51, is in the Pima County Jail, booked on suspicion of first-degree murder in the death of 56-year-old Mary Garfinkel, his wife of 19 years.

This isn't the first time the Arizona Daily Star has covered the issue of assisted suicide - and it isn't the first time they've featured the Final Exit Network either.

Unsurprisingly, the portrayal of the Final Exit Network and its agenda is misrepresented in the interview included in this recent press coverage:

Without a law allowing assisted suicide, groups such as Final Exit Network have stepped in to provide access to volunteers who give what they say is "guidance, education and support" to people who intend to take their own lives, said Robert Rivas, an attorney for the New Jersey-based nonprofit organization.

"Final Exit Network would rather never do what they do," Rivas said. "If assisted-suicide laws were in existence in every state we'd be happy to completely be phased out."

What assisted laws would those be, I wondered. As we've mentioned before here, the organization issued a press release in November 2008 that stated the assisted suicide laws in Oregon and Washington didn't go "far enough" and they would be assisting "suffering" people everywhere until there were more expansive laws.

Yesterday, I did what I did in previous instances of this kind of misleading spin - went to the Final Exit Network website to access the press release issued in November 2008.

It's not there anymore. The site has been revised and for whatever reason(use your imagination)it has been removed.

Next, I went to The Internet Archive, which accesses the files on websites across the net and archives them. The site contains the files and material from websites that don't even exist any more. The site is that extensive and that good.

The press release isn't there, either. In fact, there aren't any archives for the site for the whole year of 2008. That is very unusual - I won't even hazard a guess as to why there isn't a set of 2008 archives for the site.

Luckily, though, I printed out several copies of the press release some months ago. In case there is any lingering confusion in anyone's mind, it is the clear statement by the Final Exit Network that the types of assisted suicide laws in Oregon and Washington State don't go "far enough" and that they'll keep facilitating suicides for people until the laws become expansive enough to satisfy them.

Here is a link to a pdf document (scanned document).
http://www.cdrnys.org/images/files/FEN_I_1000_PressReleaseNov08.pdf

Since it's a pdf of a scanned document, it won't be accessible to people with vision-related disabilities. In the interest of full accessibility, the full text of the press release is included below (minus contact info):


FINAL EXIT NETWORK

Contacts:
Ted Goodwin, President
Marietta, GA

Jerry Dincin, PhD, Vice President

News For Immediate Release

Washington State Passes I-1000!

November 5, 2008
Olympia, WA

Although the supporters of Initiative I-1000 are delighted that
Washington becomes the second state to pass a "Death with Dignity Act", there is much more work to be done.

Ted Goodwin, President of Final Exit Network, said, "We congratulate all those who worked so hard to achieve this important right for Washington's citizens, and we applaud the citizens of Washington State for making the right choice. "Final Exit Network and its members supported passage of this landmark initiative by donating to the advocacy effort spearheaded by Washington Death with Dignity and former Governor Booth Gardner. However, the job is not finished".

Although, like Oregon's "Death with Dignity Act," I-1000 gives doctors the authority to prescribe a lethal dose of medications to terminally ill individuals under strict controls, it condemns to continued suffering as many as 40% of those who desperately want to end their life because of intolerable suffering but cannot under the law because their illness is not diagnosed as "terminal".

"Unfortunately," said Goodwin, "many patients do not meet I-1000's
strict criteria. Individuals with neurological illnesses such as
Parkinson's disease, Multiple Sclerosis, Muscular Dystrophy, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease) and Alzheimer's disease often lose the reason and will to live long before their disease qualifies as 'terminal'." Goodwin adds, "For these individuals, neither I-1000 nor the Oregon law go far enough. "That is why Final Exit Network pledges, until laws protect the right of every adult to a peaceful, dignified death, Final
Exit Network will be there to support those who need relief from their suffering today!"

"The Network's Exit Guide Program is available nationwide," Goodwin
said. "With the Network's compassionate guidance and support, physically and emotionally competent adults in all fifty states are free to exercise their last human right - the right to a peaceful, dignified death. "Final Exit Network is the only organization in the United States that will support individuals who are not "terminally ill" - 6 months or less to live - to hasten their deaths. No other organization in the US makes this commitment," said Goodwin.

Final Exit Network is a four-year-old volunteer-run nonprofit that is committed to serve many move other organizations turn away! More
information is available from (contact information omitted).

***

Please feel free to share this. And if anyone from the Final Exit Network is reading this:

If you're proud of what you've done and what you stand for, why do you have to hide documents like this and lie about what your real goals are?

Stephen Drake

Ted Goodwin defends the deaths of people with disabilities

Stephen Drake

By Alex Schadenberg
Executive Director - Euthanasia Prevention Coalition

An article published in the AP Press on March 17 written by Greg Bluestein and Lindsey Tanner and titled: AP Interview: Leader of suicide ring defends work exposed the Final Exit Network's support for aiding, abeting and counseling suicide for people with disabilities who are not dying.

Stephen Drake, the research director for Not Dead Yet a disability rights group, has been attacked for suggesting that the Final Exit Network supports assisted suicide for people who have disabilities, but not dying. I wonder if all the critics of Stephen Drake have apologized to him yet?

The AP Press interview with Ted Goodwin, the former President of the Final Exit Network and the Vice-President of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies, a group that includes Compassion & Choices in its membership.

Ted Goodwin

The interview with Ted Goodwin in the AP Press states:

A former assisted suicide network leader being prosecuted in a Georgia man's death is defending his group's practice of guiding people who want to kill themselves because they're suffering but not necessarily dying.

At least three of the people known to have commited suicide through the Final Exit Network were not terminally ill. In his most extensive remarks since his arrest last month, Ted Goodwin told The Associated Press Tuesday that people with just months to live aren't the only ones who should be able to seek help committing suicide.

"These people who are terminally ill are blessed in a small way — there's a finite time for their suffering," said Goodwin, who stepped down as president of the network after his arrest. "But there are many, many people who are doomed to suffer interminably for years. And why should they not receive our support as well?"

The article exposes three cases where the suicide victim was not terminally ill. The article states:

Georgia authorities say John Celmer, the 58-year-old man whose suicide led to charges against Goodwin and three others, was making a remarkable recovery from cancer when the group sent exit guides to his home to show him how to suffocate himself using helium tanks and a plastic hood. And police say that in 2007, the group helped an Arizona woman named Jana Van Voorhis who was depressed but not terminally ill.

The third person, Kurt Perry, a suburban Chicago resident who was to have been the group's next suicide, has a debilitating neurological condition that is painful but usually not fatal. The 26-year-old said frightening breathing lapses prompted him to seek support from the network.

Goodwin disputed the claim by the investigators that he showed them how he would hold down the hands of his suicide victim to prevent the person from removing the "Exit/Suicide" Bag while being gassed with helium. The article stated:

Goodwin, who is not a physician and founded the group in 2004 after his father died of emphysema, says the network helped guide nearly 200 people across the country die to but never actively assisted suicide. He says he was personally involved in 39 deaths.

Goodwin would not comment on the suicide process, but disputed Georgia authorities' contention that guides held down members' hands to prevent them from removing the hoods they placed over their heads while they breathed helium.

"We do not hold hands down. We do not cause them to suffer," he said. "And this will be proven in a court of law — I promise you."

Goodwin realizes that if it is proven that Final Exit Network "Guides" are holding down the hands of their victims then they will be found guilty of homicide and not assisted suicide.

The article also indicated that there are concerns that some of the suicide victims were experiencing mental illness or chronic depression. Goodwin did admit knowledge of one case. The article stated:

Authorities have also questioned how carefully the group, which claims 3,300 members and donors and about 100 volunteers, screened people who want to commit suicide.

Goodwin says the vetting process was tightened in 2007, after questions about Van Voorhis' death.

Goodwin defended the group's involvement, saying Van Voorhis suffered from other illnesses, but people who sought help after her were asked to detail their complete mental history.

About 30 percent of the applications the group received each year were from mentally ill people who wanted to die because of a lost job, lost spouse or other anguish. Those applications were immediately set aside, Goodwin said.

If an applicant's mental history raised a concern, which happened occasionally, one of 10 psychiatrists or psychologists working with the group visited to assess the situation.

But if it didn't, Goodwin said, the applicant got help, even though the group knew its work could one day lead to prosecution.

"We believe that it is the right of every mentally competent adult to determine whether he or she is suffering," Goodwin said. "We do not believe this should be left to the physicians, church leaders or politicians. This is the right of every mentally competent individual to make this decision themselves."

The fact is that the Final Exit Network stated on their website on the day after the passing of the I-1000 assisted suicide Initiative in Washington State that their group would assist the suicides for the people who do not qualify for assisted suicide under the Washington State law. The Final Exit Network was founded to assist the suicide of people who may not be terminally ill.

It doesn't matter how they 'dress it up' the Final Exit Network considers people with disabilities as qualified candidates for assistance with suicide.

Stephen Drake, should not only be receiving apologies from his critics but he should be demanding that every media outlet that has covered the Final Exit Story print an article that exposes all of the truth behind the Final Exit Network.

Link to the article from the AP press:
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jQQbFpru3R2YAciio8AgCE0ccvVwD97023200

Final Exit Network raided - 4 leaders arrested

On Wednesday, February 25, 2009; four leaders of the Final Exit Network, a group of Death Lobby activists, were arrested in a sting operation that was carried-out by investigators in eight states and allegedly 14 sites.

The Final Exit Network is founded by Derek Humphrey, the former leader of the Hemlock Society, a group that joined with Compassion and Choices a few years ago.

The case that led to the charges was that of John Celmer, a 58 year old man who had cancer but was not terminally ill. More cases are being investigated.

According to its website, the Final Exit Network claims to be: “dedicated to serving people who are suffering from an intolerable condition.”

At the World Federation of Right to Die Societies Bi-Annual Conference in Toronto (September 2006) I learned that the Final Exit Network trained its volunteers to visit people who are considering suicide. They counsel them on effective methods and stay with them as they commit suicide to ensure that the suicide is carried out effectively and that all of the suicide device materials are removed.

An Associated Press article explained that: The Final Exit Network charges a $50 per year fee and they have more than 3000 members. Those seeking to end their lives are assigned an “exit guide” who instructs them to purchase two new helium tanks and an “exit bag.” When ready to commit suicide, the member is visited by the “exit guide” and a “senior exit guide” to lead them through the process.

According to an Associated Press article: “Investigators raided the homes of the group’s volunteers in seven of the states, a group office in Georgia and a company in Montana that authorities said supplied items used in suicides.

Those who were arrested included: Ted Goodwin, Final Exit’s recently resigned (resigned February 23, 2009) president, Claire Blehr, a member, who were both arrested at a home in northern Georgia. Maryland authorities arrested Dr. Lawrence Egbert and Nicholas Alec Sheridan who were both from Baltimore.

It is alleged that Goodwin walked an undercover agent through the steps and showed him how he holds the persons hand to prevent him/her from removing the “exit bag.”

It was reported that the authorities investigated the Final Exit Network for 8 months. The Final Exit Network were allegedly very difficult to find evidence against because of their methods that allegedly included wearing gloves at all suicides and meticulously cleaning up all evidence of involvement by Final Exit Network "Exit Guides."

The Final Exit Network is claiming to be innocent of all charges and has set up a legal defense fund.

Fortunately Goodwin allegedly let down his guard when he explained to the investigator how he holds the hands of the person who he is assisting the suicide for. You can claim that you are only holding the hands of the victims but when you have allegedly explicitely explained the how and the why of your actions.

Goodwin is the Vice-President of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies and is anticipated to become its President in 2010.

Compassion & Choices and Final Exit Network - Two peas in a pod

Compassion & Choices has sent out a press release suggesting that they are not like the Final Exit Network. The fact is that these two organizations are more alike than different.

First: Ted Goodwin, the former president (resigned Feb 23, 2009) of the Final Exit Network became the Vice-President of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies at their bi-annual conference in Paris in 2008. Goodwin is scheduled to become the President of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies at their conference in 2010. Compassion & Choices is a member of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies.

Second: Derek Humphrey founded the Final Exit Network and the Hemlock Society. Hemlock Society was one of the large groups that amalgamated to form Compassion & Choices.

Third: Compassion & Choices has its own suicide support service called the: Client Support Program. The Client Support Program has the same aims as the Final Exit Network.

I attended the World Federation of Right to Die Societies bi-annual Conference in Toronto (Sept 2006).

During a presentation about the Client Support Program - A Client Support Program volunteer stated that he had been involved in his first hastened death a few weeks earlier (before the conference) and he felt that it was the "right thing to do." Another Client Support Program volunteer stated that she became a volunteer because she wants to hasten her own death and thought that her involvement was a safety net for her own death. A Client Support Program - regional co-ordinator stated that volunteers are trained to know the law in order to avoid prosecution. The training program is designed to protect the volunteer from prosecution, but in the case of a charge, the training should enable them to be acquitted. She said: 'If you understand the law you can avoid conviction.'

The Final Exit Network also claims to be providing "Aid in Dying" which is a euphemism for assisted suicide, and like the Client Support Program, they claim to only act in support of a suicide and not actually assist the suicide.

It is interesting that Goodwin allegedly showed an investigator how he holds the hands of the client, making it impossible for the client to remove the "Exit Bag". This is the same Goodwin who is a mainstream leader of the World Federation of Right to Die Societies.

The Final Exit Network and the Compassion & Choices Client Support Program have the same purpose and are designed to do the same thing.