Private inititive death panel, not paid for by tax money

[nancylebov]

I know I've been posting a lot of "rot at the top" stuff lately, so here's something a little different....

William Melchert-Dinkel, 47, an American nurse with a loving family, allegedly spent years posing as a twentysomething woman while trawling the internet for people he could persuade to kill themselves while he watched.

I can't find anything solid on what he's charged with, though assisting suicide seems to be part of it.

It would be interesting if he could be charged with fraud-- he set up suicide pacts, but his webcam would fail at the crucial moment.

A British grandmother tracked him down. The BBC was very tiresome about her not being the sort of person one would expect to be a sleuth.

Comments

[madfilkentist]

It does sound remarkably like a Miss Marple story: the grandmotherly sleuth and the devious, not overtly violent means of getting people to die.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

All that remains is to discover that they were destined to be great scientists or diplomats, and that William Melchert-Dinkel is a time-traveller.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

You know, I don't think I've ever seen a story about Time Police protecting individuals rather than the time line.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

It would get convoluted. What if you saved some genius who died young only to discover that in addition to being a genius they were a budding serial killer or something?

Although I think the entire Terminator movie series is about time-travellers protecting an individual.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Good point, but what I was thinking (rather than what I posted) was something more like protecting a right not to be killed or otherwise abused by time travelers.

[madfilkentist]

So does someone need to write a Miss Marple-Time Police crossover story now?

[communicator.livejournal.com]

“It took months and months to collect the evidence but when I went to the police they just said if it bothers you, look the other way,” she said.

What an irresponsible attitude, thank goodness she stuck at it

[scruffycritter.livejournal.com]

Probably not fraud.

Least not any more than a would-be bank robber who assembles a crew to raid a bank, planning to bail on the caper at the last second.

The act of committing suicide is illegal. I suppose you can charge him with conspiracy to commit said crime, but he's got the argument he never intended to go through with the crime.

The sticky wicket here is that because the act of committing suicide is illegal combined with the fact the law generally doesn't protect co-conspiractors from eachother with regard to what goes on during the act of committing the crime.

Aside: The Virgina law against sex outside of marriage got declared unconstituional in a case like that. Woman caught herpes from a guy who knew he had it and sued. Defense tried to claim the act itself was illegal and co-conspirators cant sue eachoter over what happened during the commission of a crime. Judge took the opportunity to toss the law making the act illegal.

[kallisti.livejournal.com]

Nadia Kajouji was a student at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. There was a massive search effort to find her, only after the parents came to Ottawa. Carleton U also screwed up massively, not telling her parents that she was being treated for depression. The have supposedly changed their policies now.

The fact that this monster in Minnesota may have been egging her on is very sick. I am glad that something is being done, as there is nothing that could be done under Canadian law....a combination of the Law, and Jurisdiction. :-(

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

The thing is, I'm utterly revolted by what he did, but I'm not sure what a reasonable law against it would look like.