Supreme Court orders retrial for man who helped his mother die

The Dutch Supreme Court has ruled that a man found cleared of helping his 99-year-old mother to die in 2013 will have to stand trial again.

At the time the appeal court in Arnhem said Albert Heringa (74) had carried out sufficient checks that his mother was suffering both psychologically and physically and that she really wanted to die.

However, the Supreme Court has now ruled that euthanasia carried out by someone other than a doctor must be subject to ‘very strict rules’ and a different court, this time in Den Bosch, will have to determine whether or not Heringa should be punished for what he did. Heringa’s earlier appeal was ‘granted far too lightly’, judges said in a statement.

The public prosecutor considers Heringa guilty and wants a suspended sentence of three months.

Heringa decided to help his mother die when doctors refused her request to administer a lethal dose of medication. He filmed his mother, who was almost blind and suffering from crippling back pains, as he helped her take the pills that would kill her. The footage featured in a documentary called De laatste wens van Moek (Mum’s final wish) which was broascast in 2010.

Heringa was disappointed at the outcome of the case, which was expected to go in his favour. ‘I would have liked to have left this behind me but now it will all start again. It is clear that the problems surrounding people who consider their lives completed are not solved. It is back on the political agenda as well,’ Nu.nl quotes him as saying.