Scottish police look into man’s Dignitas death

Helen Cowie tells radio show she helped her son Robert take his own life in Switzerland Police are considering the circumstances surrounding the death of a man whose mother took him to the Swiss euthanasia clinic Dignitas to help him take his own life. Helen Cowie told a radio chat show how she helped her son Robert, 33, kill himself after he was left paralysed from the neck down. Cowie, of Cardonald in Glasgow, told BBC Radio Scotland’s Call Kaye programme how her son went to Dignitas in October and “had a very peaceful ending”. A Strathclyde police spokeswoman stressed that there was no investigation at present, but said the matter was “being given consideration in an effort to establish the circumstances”. Cowie said her son was once a “big fit healthy boy” who went training four times a week. He was reportedly paralysed in a swimming accident three years ago. She said: “His life was terrible. He suffered every single day. He couldn’t do anything for himself but sit there. He was just a head and just didn’t want to be like that any more.” She described Monday’s BBC documentary Choosing to Die, presented by author Terry Pratchett, who has Alzheimer’s, as “brilliant” and empathised with the mother who helped her disabled son to die in the television soap Emmerdale. She described the Dignitas experience as “wonderful, relaxed, peaceful and happy”, and said her son died to strains of the Oasis song Listen Up. The song includes the line: “One fine day I’m gonna leave you all behind. It wouldn’t be so bad if I had more time.” She said: “We were in Zurich for four days with my three sons and his friend, and one of my sons said it was the happiest he had seen his brother in three years. “I would rather have been able to do it in this country. That really upsets me that I had to take my son to Switzerland, and I had to leave his body there and wait for the ashes to come back. “It should be allowed here, but not willy-nilly to everybody. It should be investigated hard because you have to be in a sane mind to have it done.” Cowie added: “We are a very close family. We asked him not to do it but it was his decision. “As a mum, your first reaction is that you don’t want them to do it. “There’s a scene going on in Emmerdale right now, and I would have loved to have done what that woman had done but I couldn’t because my son didn’t want me to get into trouble so the only option was to go to Switzerland with him. “That’s what he wanted and nobody could change his mind. We tried everything to change his mind, because he wasn’t a burden, and I am a carer. He just wanted to end his life. He was really unhappy.” Cowie said after his death “the first thing that came to my mind was peace”. She added: “He was at peace, because he was tormented in the body that he was in.” Assisted suicide Scotland guardian.co.uk

Posted by on June 18, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.