An 81-year-old Toronto man who won the right to a doctor-assisted death on Thursday passed away Friday morning, his family said in a statement released Friday morning.
Known in court only as A.B., he was the first person in Ontario to be granted legal permission to end his own life.
“Today, A.B., our dear husband, father and grandfather passed away in peace and dignity with the assistance of his caring physicians. It was his life and his choice and we support him in that choice unconditionally,” his family said in a statement.
The elderly man’s lawyers argued in court that he deserved to end his life on his own terms because he was confined to his bed and was enduring increasing amounts of pain due to his lymphoma.
The family thanked lawyers Andrew Faith and Emma Carver for helping “us understand every nuance of this case” and helping “our treasured A.B. to stand up for his rights and articulate his reasoning to the courts.”
In his ruling delivered Thursday, Justice Paul Perell concluded that A.B. was “enduring intolerable suffering” and was not coerced or influenced to choose death, and he also had no other available remedy to relieve his pain. Perell was quite emotional court.
Perell also agreed that the man's body will not be given to the coroner for a post-mortem examination, something the applicant wanted to avoid, calling it "absurd and distressing."
Under current Ontario law, the bodies of all individuals who suffer a "non-natural death" are sent to the coroner for an autopsy.
Instead, the elderly man's death will be classified as "by disease."
“Seeing our beloved A.B. calm, peaceful and without stigma and shame at his life’s end gives us the strength to whether our grief at his departure,” the family said in a statement.
The Supreme Court of Canada given the federal government a deadline to develop doctor-assisted death legislation by June 6, 2016.
