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Chicago police department struggles with officer suicide

Ark Maciaszek poses with a photo of his cousin, former Chicago police officer and suicide victim Scott Tracz, at his home in Chicago, Illinois, U.S. May 2, 2017. Picture taken May 2, 2017. REUTERS/Joshua Lott

By Timothy Mclaughlin

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Rookie Chicago police officer Scott Tracz sat in a black sports car outside his girlfriend’s suburban house late last year, put his gun to his head and fatally shot himself.

The normally upbeat Tracz, 30, had become withdrawn and sullen, struggling with the violence he witnessed as an officer but rejecting advice from friends and family to seek help, fearing it would end his career, relatives said.

“He said, ‘I will lose my job,'” his cousin, Ark Maciaszek, said. “Just like that.”

Tracz is believed to be the latest contributor to the Chicago Police Department’s suicide rate, which stands 60 percent higher than the national average according to a recent U.S. Department of Justice report.

Critics say the problem has been exacerbated by a lack of mental health resources. Chicago officials said they are working to improve their mental health services.

The pressure on Chicago’s police officers has intensified as the city has dealt with a surge in murders and increased scrutiny around tactics following the 2015 release of video showing the shooting death of black teenager Laquan McDonald by a white officer.

In 2016, the number of murders in the city jumped nearly 60 percent to over 760, more than New York and Los Angeles combined. There were more than 4,300 shooting victims in the city last year, according to police.

The McDonald video sparked outrage and thrust Chicago into the nationwide debate over police use of force. The subsequent Justice Department report in January found Chicago police routinely violated civil rights, and also cited suicide as a “significant problem” for the city’s officers.

“Chicago is a war zone,” said Alexa James, the executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness-Chicago. “They (officers) are seeing the worst day of everybody’s life every day.”

Chicago police’s suicide rate was 29.4 per 100,000 department members between 2013 and 2015, the report said, citing police union figures. The department disagreed in the report, putting the rate at 22.7 suicides per 100,000 members. Both estimates were higher than the national average of 18.1 law enforcement suicides per 100,000.

RELUCTANT TO SEEK HELP

While each case contributing to Chicago’s suicide rate is different, interviews with mental health professionals and legal experts, as well as current and former officers, reveal deep-rooted stigma for those seeking help from its Employee Assistance Program (EAP).

Some officers believe that seeking counseling will result in the loss of their Firearm Owner Identification Card, a requirement to carry a firearm under state law, according to current and former officers, as well as health officials. That view is mistaken, say Justice Department officials.

Still, “If someone thinks I have talked to EAP they think I’m unstable, so I’m not going to call,” said one veteran officer, who asked not to be identified.

Chicago Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said in February the department’s past approach to mental health was wrong. In a report issued in March, the department said it would review mental wellness support services.

“Law enforcement historically has been seen as a very macho profession,” Johnson said at a public forum about police reform. “To say you needed help was seen as a sign of weakness and we were wrong for looking at it that way, we were simply wrong.”

Tracz had long dreamed of becoming a police officer to help others. But working in the violence-stricken Chicago Lawn district, he came face to face with the city’s violent crime. The area accounted for 58 of the city’s more than 760 murders last year, as well as 228 shootings.

“He would say, ‘You can never imagine what the human race is capable of doing,’ then he would just put his head down,” said his cousin Maciaszek, 46. Tracz’s relationship with his long-time girlfriend also grew strained as he became more irritable and angry, Maciaszek said.

Even if officers like Tracz had sought help they would have found the department’s resources strained. Three clinicians serve roughly 12,500 sworn officers and also their families, providing nearly 7,500 consultations in 2015, the Department of Justice said in its report.

The program is hiring another psychologist, as well as another drug and alcohol counselor, Robert Sobo, the department director of counseling services, said in an interview. In addition, the unit has four officers who serve as substance abuse counselors and a peer support network, he said.

But this would still leave the department lagging other major police cities of similar size. For example, Los Angeles Police has 14 trained psychologists and plans to hire two more for fewer than 10,000 sworn officers.

“Suicide is killing officers, alcohol is killing officers, at a far greater rate than ambushes, but there is not the same sense of urgency around this issue,” said Christy Lopez, a former Justice Department official who led the Chicago federal probe.

(Editing by Ben Klayman and Matthew Lewis)

Suspect in Facebook video murder kills self in Pennsylvania: police

Coroner Lyell P. Cook (R) examines the car of a fugitive, who police said posted a video of himself on Facebook killing an elderly man in Cleveland, is seen after he shot and killed himself following a brief police pursuit in Erie, Pennsylvania, U.S. April 18, 2017. REUTERS/Robert Frank

By Robert Frank

ERIE, Pa. (Reuters) – A murder suspect who police said posted a video on Facebook of the killing of a Cleveland man fatally shot himself after a “brief pursuit” by Pennsylvania State Police officers on Tuesday, police said.

Steve Stephens was accused of shooting Robert Godwin Sr., 74, on a sidewalk on Sunday before fleeing in a car and uploading a video of the murder to Facebook, becoming the focus of a nationwide manhunt.

Pennsylvania State Police officers found Stephens in Erie County, Pennsylvania, after getting a tip from the public that his white Ford Fusion was parked outside a McDonald’s fast-food restaurant, Calvin Williams, the Cleveland police chief, told a news conference.

After a brief chase, Stephens stopped his vehicle, Williams said.

“As the officers approached that vehicle Steve Stephens took his own life,” Williams said. “We would have preferred that it had not ended this way,” he added, saying he and the community would have had “a lot of questions” for Stephens.

Stephens, who had no prior criminal record, was not suspected in any other killings, Cleveland officials said. Stephens said in a separate video on Facebook on Sunday that he had already killed a dozen others.

The shooting marked the latest video clip of a violent crime to turn up on Facebook, raising questions about how the world’s biggest social media network moderates content.

The company will do all it can to prevent content like Stephens’ post, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg told Facebook’s annual conference for software developers on Tuesday in San Jose.

Facebook on Monday said it would review how it monitors violent footage and other objectionable material in response to the killing after Stephens’ post was visible on the social media site for about two hours.

Stephens is not believed to have known Godwin, a retired foundry worker who media reports said spent Easter Sunday morning with his son and daughter-in-law before he was killed.

Beech Brook, a behavioral health facility in a Cleveland suburb where Stephens had worked since 2008, said in a statement on Tuesday that Stephens had cleared an extensive background check.

In interviews before Stephens’ death, some of Godwin’s relatives forgave his killer.

“I forgive him because we are all sinners,” Robby Miller, Godwin’s son, said in an interview with CNN.

Others were less sympathetic.

“All I can say is that I wish he had gone down in a hail of 100 bullets,” Godwin’s daughter, Brenda Haymon, told CNN. “I wish it had gone down like that instead of him shooting himself.”

(Writing by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee; additional reporting by Jonathan Allen in New York, Timothy McLaughlin in Chicago and David Ingram in San Jose, CA.; Editing by Dan Grebler)

California gunman kills wife, self as she teaches class; student also dead

REFILE -- CORRECTING TYPO -- Students who were evacuated after a shooting at North Park Elementary School walk past well-wishers to be reunited with their waiting parents at a high school in San Bernardino, California, U.S. April 10, 2017. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

By Olga Grigoryants

SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (Reuters) – A special education teacher and one of her students were fatally shot by her estranged husband when he opened fire with a high-caliber revolver before killing himself in her classroom at a San Bernardino, California, elementary school, police said.

A second student was badly wounded by the gunman, who authorities said had a criminal history that included weapons charges and domestic violence that predated his brief marriage to the slain teacher.

Police said the two students, both boys, were believed to have been inadvertently caught in the gunfire as bystanders to Monday’s shooting, which took place about 8 miles (13 km) from where a radicalized Muslim couple killed 14 people in a December 2015 shooting rampage.

Police Chief Jarrod Burguan said the shooting at North Park Elementary School in San Bernardino, about 65 miles east of Los Angeles, was an apparent murder-suicide. It was the latest in dozens of cases of gun violence at U.S. school campuses.

The gunman was identified as Cedric Anderson, and his wife as Karen Elaine Smith, both 53. Burguan said the couple had been married briefly and had been separated for about a month or month and a half.

The two students struck by gunfire had been standing behind Smith, the chief said. One 8-year-old boy, identified as Jonathan Martinez, died from his wounds. A 9-year-old classmate who was not publicly identified was admitted to a hospital, where he was said to be in stable condition.

Fifteen students and two adult teacher assistants were in the classroom along with the couple at the time of the shooting, police said.

Police said Anderson was welcomed into the school as a legitimate visitor, stopping by the “drop something off with his wife,” and kept his weapon concealed until opening fire in the classroom, Burguan said.

ANGUISH AND RELIEF

The school was evacuated after the shooting and students were bused to the campus of California State University at San Bernardino to be briefed and interviewed by authorities. From there, they were taken to a nearby high school and be reunited with their families.

Aerial television footage showed children holding hands and walking single-file across the campus to waiting buses.

Parents waved and cheered as they greeted their children, who school staff had plied with bottled water, sandwiches and snack bars while waiting for parents to arrive.

“I’m glad my daughter is fine,” said Angelique Youmans, 31, as she hugged her 10-year-old daughter. “She is too young to understand what happened.”

Samantha Starcher, 25, said she waited four hours to be reunited with her 6-year-old daughter.

“When I heard about the shooting, I started praying, asking God to keep my daughter safe” she said. “She heard two gunshots but she didn’t know what it was. I’m not going to tell her (about the shooting) because I don’t want to traumatize her.”

School officials said North Park Elementary would remain closed for at least two days.

The city of San Bernardino last made national headlines on Dec. 2, 2015, when a husband and wife who authorities said were inspired by Islamic extremism opened fire on a holiday office party of county health workers, killing 14 people and wounding more than 20. The couple, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik were killed by police during a shootout.

MOUNTING SCHOOL GUN VIOLENCE

The school shooting came two days after a fitness instructor returned to a Florida gym a few hours after he had been fired and shot two former colleagues to death.

An estimated 10,000 people are murdered with guns each year in the United States, according to federal crime statistics.

The United States has had an average of 52 school shooting incidents a year since a gunman killed 26 young children and educators in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun-control group founded in response to that massacre.

Total school shootings, a figure that includes elementary schools, high schools and colleges, regardless of whether anyone was killed or wounded, rose from 37 in 2013 to 58 in 2014 and to 65 in 2015, before declining to 48 in 2016, according to the group’s data.

With Monday’s San Bernardino incident, the United States has had 12 school shootings this year, on pace to match 2016’s tally.

Mayor Carey Davis said he had spoken about the shooting to White House officials who said President Donald Trump expressed “concern for students and teachers” at North Park.

Security experts said schools have few options to limit such incidents, given the prevalence of guns in the United States.

“If people have guns, people are going to use guns, so it’s literally the price that we pay for that freedom,” said. John DeCarlo, a criminal justice professor at the University of New Haven and the former chief of police in Branford, Connecticut.

One answer, he said, would be for all schools to sweep everyone who entered with metal detectors like those used at airports and sports venues. U.S. Education Department data said just 2 percent of U.S. schools require people entering to pass through metal detectors, up from 1 percent in 2000.

Gun control activist Shannon Watts, who founded Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America following the Newtown shooting, said her group will continue to push for regulation on gun access rather than metal detectors as a solution.

“It’s a cultural question,” she said. “Do we want to become a country of magnetometers and safety checkpoints and gun lockers?”

(Additional reporting by Steve Gorman, Piya Sinha-Roy and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles and Scott Malone in Boston; Writing by Steve Gorman; Editing by Toni Reinhold and Bill Trott)

Refugees being driven to suicide on Nauru says Amnesty International

Anna Neistat, Senior Director for Research with Amnesty International, talks to journalists as she holds a copy of a report she co-authored titled 'Island of Despair - Australia's "Processing" of Refugees on Nauru' in Sydney, Australia

By Colin Packham

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Many of the 410 asylum seekers held on a tiny Pacific Island are being driven to attempt suicide to escape the prison-like conditions they face in indefinite detention on behalf of Australia, rights group Amnesty International said on Monday.

Under Australia’s tough immigration policy, asylum seekers intercepted trying to reach the country by boat are sent for processing at a camp in Nauru or to Manus Island in Papua New Guinea (PNG) and are not eligible for resettlement in Australia.

“I met children as young as nine who had already tried to kill themselves and were talking openly about ending their lives,” said Anna Keistat, an Amnesty official, who is one of a handful of international observers to have visited Nauru.

An undated supplied image from Amnesty International claiming to show children playing near a fence at the country’s Australian-run detention centre on the Pacific island nation of Nauru. Amnesty International/Handout via REUTERS

“Their parents were talking about hiding everything, sharp objects, pills, and not allowing them to leave the house, because they were so worried their children would end their lives,” said Keistat, who spent six days in Nauru in August.

Amnesty said that 58 detainees, or about 15 percent of the total on Nauru, to whom it spoke for its report, had either attempted suicide or have had thoughts about harming themselves.

A spokesman for Australia’s immigration minister did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.

Many of the 410 men, women and children Australian figures show to have been in detention on Nauru by August 31 have been confirmed as refugees and have been there for several years.

Despite the refugee status, they continue to be confined to poor accommodation with little access to medical care, Amnesty said, adding that children, who make up little more than a tenth of the number of detainees, suffer disproportionately.

Amnesty joins a chorus of criticism of Australia’s immigration policy from human rights groups, and comes just weeks after the United Nations said Nauru was failing to protect children.

International condemnation of Australia was stoked after more than 2,000 incidents, including sexual abuse, assault and attempted self-harm, were reported in about two years at an Australian detention center in Nauru, more than half involving children, the Guardian said.

Australia seeks to organize resettlement of the asylum seekers, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has said. But with Australia unable to convince a third party to take them, the future of the detainees remains in question.

Australia’s detention center in Papua New Guinea (PNG) faces greater pressure, after PNG’s Supreme Court in April ordered its closure. The 823 men held on Manus Island have been given limited freedom, but they remain detained.

(Reporting by Colin Packham; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

Japan’s Death by Overwork on Rise

oad workers prepare a construction site at night in central Tokyo

By Stanley White

TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan is witnessing a record number of compensation claims related to death from overwork, or “karoshi”, a phenomenon previously associated with the long-suffering “salary man” that is increasingly afflicting young and female employees.

Labor demand, with 1.28 jobs per applicant, is the highest since 1991, which should help Prime Minister Shinzo Abe draw more people into the workforce to counter the effect of a shrinking population, but lax enforcement of labor laws means some businesses are simply squeezing more out of employees, sometimes with tragic consequences.

Claims for compensation for karoshi rose to a record high of 1,456 in the year to end-March 2015, according to labor ministry data, with cases concentrated in healthcare, social services, shipping and construction, which are all facing chronic worker shortages.

Hiroshi Kawahito, secretary general of the National Defense Counsel for Victims of karoshi, said the real number was probably 10 times higher, as the government is reluctant to recognize such incidents.

“The government hosts a lot of symposiums and makes posters about the problem, but this is propaganda,” he said.

“The real problem is reducing working hours, and the government is not doing enough.”

The labor ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

Kawahito, a lawyer who has been dealing with karoshi since the 1980s, said 95 percent of his cases used to be middle-aged men in white-collar jobs, but now about 20 percent are women.

Japan has no legal limits on working hours, but the labor ministry recognizes two types of karoshi: death from cardiovascular illness linked to overwork, and suicide following work-related mental stress.

A cardiovascular death is likely to be considered karoshi if an employee worked 100 hours of overtime in the month beforehand, or 80 hours of overtime in two or more consecutive months in the previous six.

A suicide could qualify if it follows an individual’s working 160 hours or more of overtime in one month or more than 100 hours of overtime for three consecutive months.

Work-related suicides are up 45 percent in the past four years among those 29 and younger, and up 39 percent among women, labor ministry data show.

TWO-TIER WORKFORCE

The problem has become more acute as Japan’s workforce has divided into two distinct categories – regular employees, and those on temporary or non-standard contracts, frequently women and younger people.

In 2015 non-regular employees made up 38 percent of the workforce, up from 20 percent in 1990, and 68 percent of them were women.

Lawyers and academic say unscrupulous employers operate a “bait-and-switch” policy, advertising a full-time position with reasonable working hours, but later offering the successful applicant a non-regular contract with longer hours, sometimes overnight or weekends, with no overtime pay.

Refusing overtime pay and break time are illegal, and the applicant could refuse the job, but activists say companies tell them they will be given regular contracts after six months or so.

They say young applicants often accept due to lack of experience, while women trying to re-enter the workforce after childbirth often feel it would be difficult to get a foothold elsewhere.

Emiko Teranishi, head of the Families Dealing with Karoshi support group, said she hears lots of complaints about hiring tactics, with some companies telling new hires that their salary includes 80 hours of overtime, and they must reimburse the company if they work less.

“Some people don’t even make minimum wage under this system,” said Teranishi, whose own husband committed suicide after working long hours.

Such abuses have become so common in the past 10 years that such companies have been dubbed “black” companies in the media.

Hirokazu Ouchi, a professor at Chukyo University, wrote a book last year about such companies when he realized some of his students were being treated illegally at their part-time jobs.

Ouchi said their hiring practices typically follow a similar pattern.

“Companies will hire someone for two to three years, but they have no intention of investing the time or the money to nurture that employee,” said Ouchi.

He added that the labor ministry lacked the manpower to follow up on complaints.

A ministry official working in corporate surveillance acknowledged that his department was somewhat short-staffed but the government was taking steps to recruit more every year. He declined to give his name as he is not authorized to speak to the media.

Japan’s working-age population has been falling since the mid-1990s, which would normally lead companies to improve working conditions to attract workers, but Ouchi said it was not happening because they can get away with bending the rules.

“This is a way for companies to keep labor costs down, but it is also a path that leads to death by overwork,” he said.

(This version of the story was refiled to correct typo in paragraph 16 to read employers)

(Editing by Will Waterman)

Canada sounds alarm over aboriginal teenage suicide epidemic

File photo of a tattered Canadian flag flying over a teepee in Attawapiskat Ontario

By Rod Nickel

WINNIPEG, Manitoba (Reuters) – Canada’s parliament will meet in emergency session on Tuesday night over a rash of suicide attempts by aboriginal teenagers in a remote, poverty-stricken community whose people feel isolated from the rest of the world.

Over the past weekend alone, 11 people of the Attawapiskat First Nation in Ontario tried to kill themselves, then a second group was brought to hospital Monday night after suicide attempts, prompting Chief Bruce Shisheesh to declare a state of emergency.

An 11-year-old child was in each of the groups treated over the past few days and the attempts follow a total of 28 attempted suicides in the month of March, some of them adults, health officials said.

The reasons for people trying to end their lives are varied but Attawapiskat leaders point to an underlying despondency and pessimism among their people as well as an increasing number of prescription drug overdoses since December.

Living in isolated communities with chronic unemployment and crowded housing, some young aboriginals lack clean water but have easy Internet access, giving them a glimpse of affluence in the rest of Canada.

“We feel isolated – we don’t feel part of the rest of the world,” said Grand Chief Sheila North Wilson of Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak, who represents 30 aboriginal communities. “The basic needs are astronomical.”

Canada’s 1.4 million aboriginals, who make up about four percent of the population, have a lower life expectancy than other Canadians and are more often victims of violent crime. The problems plaguing aboriginals gained prominence in January when a gunman killed four people in La Loche, Saskatchewan.

Since December, Attawapiskat has seen a rash of prescription drug overdoses sending youth to hospital in “a fairly new phenomenon,” said Deborah Hill, vice-president of patient care at Weeneebayko Area Health Authority, whose region includes the community. Seven youth overdosed together on Saturday.

“An individual attempt at suicide is bad enough itself, but if there seems to be a group thing, it’s even more cause for alarm,” said National Chief Perry Bellegarde of the Assembly of First Nations, Canada’s main aboriginal political group.

In Attawapiskat, a community of 2,000 people located near a diamond mine, this weekend’s state of emergency was the fifth since 2006. The community has previously sounded the alarm over flooding and raw sewage issues, poor drinking water and a housing crisis.

Resident Jackie Hookimaw-Witt, whose teenage niece committed suicide last autumn, said it was the third attempt for one 13-year-old girl who survived on Saturday. She said the girl had been challenged to kill herself on social media.

The emergency parliamentary session was requested by New Democrat legislator Charlie Angus whose constituency includes Attawapiskat. Angus is demanding Ottawa do more “to end this cycle of crisis and death among young people”.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who called this weekend’s suicide attempts “heartbreaking”, took power last year promising to tackle high levels of poverty, bad housing and poor health among aboriginal residents and promised a new “nation-to-nation relationship”.

Last month, Canada said it would spend an extra C$8.37 billion over five years to help the aboriginal population deal with dire living conditions.

(Additional reporting by Alastair Sharp and Ethan Lou in Toronto and David Ljunggren in Ottawa; editing by Amran Abocar and Grant McCool)

Two Individuals Exposed in Ashley Madison Hack Commit Suicide

Two individuals connected to the release of users of the adultery website Ashley Madison have taken their own lives.

Police in Toronto would not release the names of the individuals and would not release information other than their connection to the release of Ashley Madison info.

“This hack is one of the largest data breaches in the world,” Toronto Police acting staff-Supt. Bryce Evans said. “This is affecting all of us. The social impact behind this leak, we’re talking about families, we’re talking about children, we’re talking about wives, their male partners.”

The shocking news was actually predicted last week by a security analyst that first reported the hacking of Ashley Madison and the release of the names of those who paid to try and have an affair.

“There’s a very real chance that people are going to overreact. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw people taking their lives because of this, and obviously piling on with ridicule and trying to out people is not gonna help the situation,” analyst Brian Krebs said on Wednesday.

Another suicide has been potentially linked to the breach. An employee of the city of San Antonio committed suicide Thursday, but officials would not confirm it was because of the leak.

The company that owns Ashley Madison is offering a $500,000 reward to anyone who will turn in the hackers that revealed their adultery seeking clientele.

Tennessee Considers Assisted Suicide

Tennessee lawmakers are considering the option of legalizing assisted suicide.

The state Senate Health Committee held a meeting on June 10th to consider a bill that would allow physician assisted suicide in the state.

Senate Bill 1362 was presented by Sen. Reginald Tate (D-Memphis) and House Bill 1040 by Rep. Craig Fitzhugh (D-Ripley). The bill would allow doctors to prescribe a massive overdose of drugs for a person 18 years of age or older to end their life; the option for a patient to immediately die after receiving a diagnosis of “terminal” and even allowing health care providers to turn down more expensive life saving treatments when cheaper assisted suicide options are available.

“We think it’s humane to euthanize an animal when they get to the point they can’t take care of themselves. Why can’t we do the same for people?” asked Dr. Douglas Essinger. “What about the patients rights to die with dignity? I think that should be the paramount issue here.”

Pro-life groups were vocal in their opposition.

“If doctor-prescribed suicide is legalized in Tennessee, it could become the only ‘medical treatment’ to which many people have equal access. If the government or insurance companies decide they no longer wish to pay for legitimate care and medical treatments, there will be a pressure upon the elderly, ill and disabled to end their lives. Being coerced into ending their lives does not offer death with dignity, it only offers a frightening and dangerous future for elderly and ill Tennesseans,” Brian Harris, president of Tennessee Right to Life, said.

Connecticut Debates Physician Assisted Suicide

A new proposal in the Connecticut legislature would legalize physician-assisted suicide in the state.

A public hearing was held last week to debate the matter. One of the pro-death speakers was Rep. Kelly Luxenberg (D-Manchester) whose father committed suicide by drowning himself after a battle with Parkinson’s disease.

“He never learned to swim and was intensely fearful of the water. So there is an even sadder irony in the way in which he chose to die,” she told the Judiciary Committee and those gathered. “Parkinson’s stripped my father of a life with dignity. Wouldn’t it have been great if in death his dignity could have been regained?”

Pro-life speakers also had their say before the Committee.

“People with disabilities, advocates against elder abuse are rightly concerned that the ‘right to die’ could become a ‘duty to die,’” Peter Wolfgang of the Family Institute of Connecticut told those gathered.

“Is it acceptable for someone’s life to be shortened because people may be actually on a wrong prognosis, or because they have been pressed to make this final move?” asked Cathy Ludlum of Second Thoughts Connecticut, who is disabled.

The bill would allow a doctor to prescribe a lethal dose of medication to the patient who would then ingest it on their own to end their life after submitting two requests to a physician and having two witnesses unrelated to the patient review the case and be present for the administration of the procedure.

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