OTAGO IMAGES/OTAGO DAILY TIMES

DOCUMENTED: Sean Davison holds the book he wrote about aiding the death of his mother. Around his ankle is the electronic device he must wear. Picture: Craig Baxter

Nigel Benson

Dunedin

Cape Town professor Sean Davison self-consciously rubbed his home-detention anklet that restricts him to a friend’s home in New Zealand as he talked about his hopes for the year.

“If I leave the property, an alarm goes off. It’s a bit degrading and it’s terribly frustrating, but it’s better than being in jail,” he said.

The scientist, who is employed at the University of the Western Cape, was convicted and sentenced to five months in home detention in October after being found guilty of aiding the death of his terminally ill mother, Dunedin doctor Patricia Elizabeth Davison, then aged 85. He is serving his detention at a friend’s home in Kaikorai.

Davison was charged with attempted murder after he wrote a book, Before We Say Goodbye, mentioning how he administered morphine to his mother before she died of cancer in Dunedin on October 24, 2006.

He later pleaded guilty to an amended charge that he “counselled and procured” his mother to commit suicide.

Two months into his sentence, after a trial that ignited debate on voluntary euthanasia, Davison remains unrepentant.

“I acknowledge that assisting my mother’s suicide was illegal. Yes, I broke the law. But I believe I was not judged for what I did; I was judged for writing a book and telling the truth,” he said.

“My sole reason for being there was to keep her alive and make her as comfortable as possible.

“She kept saying: ‘Help me to die.’ She just wore me down. I believe any humane person would have done what I did if faced with the same circumstances. She was a doctor and she was desperate to die.”

Davison said it was “a huge shock” when he was arrested, but he bore no malice towards the police for pursuing the investigation, or the judge for convicting him.

“I spent a year knowing there was a chance I could go to jail. I was always mentally prepared for the outcome. I know that when morality and the law collide, morality will always come out worse.

“But I believe the present law has been exposed in my trial and it stands guilty in the name of justice and humanity…

“It’s time that the law was changed to stop making criminals out of non-criminals,” he said.

Davison’s partner Raine and children Flynn, 3, and Finnian, 1, have been awaiting his return to Cape Town since he was sentenced in the high court at Dunedin on October 27.

“It has taken a terrible toll on my family back home. Hopefully, my unfortunate situation can help bring about some good… I’ve got a platform now, as a result of the trial, and it would be cowardly to walk away.”

He will complete his sentence on April 25.

Dunedin voluntary euthanasia support group Exit International convener Paula Westoby said Davison had made “a brave stand against a terrible law”.

“What a lot of people don’t realise is that euthanasia is simply the Greek word for ‘a good death’.” – Otago Daily Times / APL