Alexander Ryley

Director, Elderly Project

On Wednesday, our state’s highest court, the NY Court of Appeals, rejected the argument that mentally competent, terminally ill patients have a right under our state constitution to physician-assisted suicide.  In so ruling, the court upheld the rulings of lower courts in New York.

The plaintiffs in the case had asked the court to declare a constitutional right to “aid-in-dying,” which they defined as the right of a mentally competent and terminally ill person to obtain a prescription for a lethal dosage of drugs from a physician to in order to hasten death.

If you’d like some compelling subway reading, you can download the 81-page decision by clicking here.