Michigan group may bring physician-assisted suicide to vote

March 3, 1998
Web posted at: 9:37 p.m. EST (0237 GMT)

DETROIT (CNN) -- Dr. Jack Kevorkian attracted the world's attention to Michigan by helping his patients kill themselves.

But it is a grass-roots group supporting physician-assisted suicide that disagrees with Kevorkian's tactics which may propel the issue to the ballot box in the doctor's home state.

Merian's Friends is collecting signatures in an attempt to get the question of legalizing physician-assisted suicide before Michigan voters in November.

Yvonne Sosville, a multiple sclerosis patient and an active member of the group, advocates the right to die and believes there should be a law to define it.

"It should not be the jumble that it is right now. There is no direction," she said.

Merian's Friends -- named for Merian Frederick, a patient of Kevorkian who ended her life at age 72 after a battle with Lou Gehrig's disease -- says the controversial doctor has been a crusader for assisted suicide.

CNN's Joan MacFarlane reports

However, unlike Kevorkian, members believe that only the terminally ill should have the right to end their lives.

"Dr. Kevorkian has been the person who put the issue before the American public," said Ed Pierce of Merian's Friends. "However, he makes his own rules, and he is almost like the arresting officer, the judge and the jury combined. We think he makes serious errors."

According to autopsies, at least four of Kevorkian's patients showed no signs of disease.

Kevorkian was tried twice in two different counties and was acquitted both times. However, CNN has learned that a metro Detroit prosecutor hopes to put the doctor on trial again.

Meanwhile, Merian's Friends is concentrating on getting another 240,000 signatures needed to put physician-assisted suicide on the ballot.

Correspondent Joan MacFarlane contributed to this report

Related stories:

• Kevorkian, associate present at two deaths - December 17, 1997
• Kevorkian assists in motel room death - October 30, 1997
• Kevorkian organ offer part of long-range plan - October 23, 1997

Related sites:

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• Right to Die Society
• International Anti-Euthanasia Task Force

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