June Hartley (born 1967) is a California woman who faced charges for
assisting in the suicide of her brother, Jimmy, after he suffered a series of strokes.
[Chawkins, Steve. "Woman pleads not guilty to charges she assisted in brother's suicide" Los Angeles Times, Feb 28, 2009]
Death and criminal charges
Jimmy Hartley, a blues musician and lead singer for the Studebaker Blues Band, was found dead in his family's home in
Lodi, California
Lodi ( ) is a city located in San Joaquin County, California, in the center portion of California's Central Valley. The population was 62,134 at the 2010 census. The estimated population is approximately 67,586 according to 2019 census data. L ...
on December 8, 2008. A helium tank and a copy of an instructional book by
Derek Humphry
Derek Humphry (born 29 April 1930) is a British-born American journalist and author notable as a proponent of legal assisted suicide and the right to die. In 1980, he co-founded the Hemlock Society and, in 2004, after that organization dissolv ...
, the chairman of
Final Exit Network
Final Exit Network, Inc. (FEN) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit right to die advocacy group incorporated under Florida law. It holds that mentally competent adults who suffer from terminal illnesses, intractable pain, or irreversible phys ...
, were found near his body. He had previously been left paralyzed and lost his speech and hearing after a series of strokes in 2006.
[Calif. woman charged with aiding brother's death, San Jose Mercury News, Feb. 24, 2009] Over the next two years, he had repeatedly asked police and others to help him die.
On February 23, 2009,
San Joaquin County
San Joaquin County (; Spanish: ''San Joaquín'', meaning " St. Joachim"), officially the County of San Joaquin, is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 779,233. The county seat is Stockton.
San ...
prosecutors charged June Hartley with assisted suicide, an offense for which she faced six years in prison if convicted. She pleaded not guilty and was freed on bail on February 28, 2009. She later changed her plea to guilty on a lesser charge and received a sentence of probation and community service without jail time.
Opinion and reaction
The case generated a response from both supporters and critics of assisted suicide. Brian Johnston, executive director of the California Pro-Life Council, stated that Hartley's case underscored the need for laws to keep "emotionally vulnerable people" from "taking lethal action" into their own hands.
However,
Barbara Coombs Lee, the president of Compassion and Choices, defended Hartley. She explained that a case like Hartley's "cries out for humane and rational legislation, but lawmakers are unwilling to embrace it."
Assisted suicide advocate
Jacob Appel expressed concerns that the case might have significant repercussions. He wrote that "family members and friends of similarly suffering individuals in California...may now shy away from helping their loved ones die if they fear reprisals from overzealous district attorneys."
["Deterring assisted suicide perpetuates suffering" ''Stockton Record'', March 5, 2009]
See also
*
Right to die
The right to die is a concept based on the opinion that human beings are entitled to end their life or undergo voluntary euthanasia. Possession of this right is often understood that a person with a terminal illness, incurable pain, or without ...
*
Bioethics
Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biology, m ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hartley, June
Assisted suicide in the United States
1967 births
Living people
Death in California