LOCKED-IN syndrome sufferer Tony Nicklinson has lost his High Court battle for the legal right to end his life when he chooses with a doctor’s help.
• Both Mr Nicholson and another “locked-in” victim both fully aware of their predicament
• Doctors and solicitors who encouraged or assisted another person to commit suicide were “at real risk of prosecution”
A second victim of the syndrome referred to as “Martin”, 47, who cannot be identified, also lost his challenge to the legal ban on assisted dying.
Three judges sitting in London referred to their “terrible predicament” and described their cases as “deeply moving and tragic”.
Mr Nicklinson, 58, from Melksham, Wiltshire, was left paralysed by a catastrophic stroke while on a business trip to Athens in 2005.
The court heard that he had been told his existence of “pure torture” could continue - if a doctor could not help end it - for another 20 years or more.
ETHUANASIA
But the judges unanimously agreed that it would be wrong for the court to depart from the long-established legal position that “voluntary euthanasia is murder, however understandable the motives may be”.
Refusing the stricken men judicial review, the judges ruled that the current law did not breach human rights and it was for Parliament, not the courts, to decide whether it should be changed.
Any changes would need “the most carefully structured safeguards which only Parliament can deliver”.
Lord Justice Toulson, sitting with Mr Justice Royce and Mrs Justice Macur, said both are tragic cases which raise constitutional issues and “present society with legal and ethical questions of the most difficult kind”.
Barring unforeseen medical advances, neither man’s condition is capable of physical improvement.
Mr Nicklinson wanted a declaration that it would not be unlawful “on the grounds of necessity” for his GP, or another doctor, to assist him to die.