Nielsen case sets benchmark in Queensland criminal law

Today's sentencing of a 50-year-old Mt Nebo man to three years' jail for assisting the suicide of an elderly friend is a significant milestone in Queensland's criminal legal history, a Queensland University of Technology (QUT) law expert has said.

Associate Professor Ben White said Merin Nielsen was the first person in Queensland to be convicted of assisting a suicide. He was convicted of assisting the suicide of 76-year-old Brisbane man, Frank Ward, who died in 2009 after taking the drug Nembutal which Mr Nielsen procured for him in Mexico.

In the Supreme Court this morning Justice Jean Dalton ruled Nielsen would serve six months of the three year sentence in prison. "The case will be used in future by judges considering how they should sentence similar cases," Professor White said. "It will be significant not only in Queensland but also in sentencing nationally as there are only relatively few cases of this type in Australia."

Professor White said the case gave rise to questions about how people who assist suicide or participate in euthanasia are dealt with by the law. "One option is for this conduct to be regulated rather than deemed unlawful," he said. "Assisted suicide or euthanasia occurs lawfully in an increasing number of jurisdictions including the Netherlands, Belgium, and in some US states like Oregon and Washington.
"It was even legalised briefly here in Australia in the Northern Territory in the mid 1990s."

Professor White said to date there had been attempts at law reform in various states and territories in Australia but all had failed.

"It is important though to distinguish between euthanasia and simply stopping life-sustaining medical treatment. The law already recognises that people who are ill have the right to refuse medical treatments which may prolong life. For example cancer patients have the right to refuse chemotherapy.

"The Nielsen case will no doubt give rise to more debate about euthanasia and that's a good thing. Public opinion is consistently in favour of permitting people to be assisted to die in appropriate circumstances so this is a discussion as a community we need to have," he said.

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