Mercy killing (sometimes referred to as euthanasia) is when someone directly ends another person’s life, because they believe it is in their best interest in order to relieve pain and suffering from an incurable or terminal condition. The term ‘mercy killing’ is used to describe both situations where a person asked for their life to be ended, and where they did not. Under the current law, anybody who ends the life of another can be charged with murder and would face mandatory life imprisonment if found guilty – even if the act is a compassionate response to a dying person’s request for help to die.
Dignity in Dying believes that mercy killing should remain illegal. However, we call for more distinction to be made in law between mercy killing and murder. At present cases of mercy killing are tried using the framework of murder law, but this law is inflexible: it can only consider a person’s intention, and not their motivation. The current legal framework cannot distinguish between crimes of compassion and crimes of malice.
In contrast, the DPP’s prosecuting policy on assisted suicide, where someone indirectly helps end another person’s life, takes motivation into consideration. Dignity in Dying would like to see the same flexibility in the law governing mercy killing, by creating either a specific offence or specific defence of mercy killing. A change along these lines would be more just – at present some mercy killers do not face time in jail because judges and juries are unwilling to sentence them to life in prison. A clear legal framework that takes motivation into account would allow judges and juries the flexibility to recognise compassionate acts, and better protect vulnerable people by ensuring that mercy killing cases are fully examined by the courts.
The Law Commission raised this as an issue of concern when it reviewed the law in 2006, and came to the conclusion that the law of murder in relation to cases of mercy killing requires a separate review, looking at whether there should be a partial defence to murder of mercy killing, or a separate crime of mercy killing. However, the Government did not take up this recommendation.
The Ministry of Justice conducted a separate consultation into Murder, manslaughter and infanticide in 2008, which Dignity in Dying responded to, calling for a full review of the law in relation to mercy killing. The Ministry of Justice published the government response to the consultation in January 2009, which stated that mercy killing is a matter of conscience for Parliament to decide.