Cape Town - Euthanasia campaigner Sean Davison - who assisted his mother Patricia and others to end their lives - has declined to say whether he helped another terminally ill patient to die.
The patient, Justin Varian, who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease about six years ago, died on July 25.
Dignity SA (DSA), an organisation Davison founded in 2011 after serving a five-month house arrest in New Zealand for the role he played in his mother’s death, has revealed that Varian had contacted the organisation asking for help.
DSA spokesperson Lee Last said Varian first contacted her in March via one of the organisation’s supporters. “When I met him at his home, his first words to me were ‘I want to die’, spelt out on an alphabet sheet on his lap. “He described his unending suffering and said he had wanted to die for over a year already.
“I explained to him that we would not be able to represent him in court until such time as the Robin Stransham-Ford case, which was being appealed, was finalised and that this could take a year or more.
“Subsequent to this meeting he requested an opportunity to meet Sean Davison, which was arranged,” Last said.
Davison became an international advocate for the right of the terminally ill to die “dignified deaths” after his arrest in New Zealand in 2010, when he helped his mother, 85, commit suicide.
On July 13, a source told the Cape Times Davison would be assisting Varian to commit suicide. The source said Davison would be using gas to end Varian’s life at 4pm on July 14 at a residence in Fresnaye.
When the Cape Times contacted Varian via Facebook, he said: “You can tell (the source) to f*** off with their religious rumours and to mind their own business. Get a life…”
On Sunday, when asked if he had helped Varian end his life, Davison replied: “I cannot answer this question.”
Cape Times