One day after the Montana House voted down a bill that would criminalize doctor-assisted suicide, another bill was introduced with the same goal.
Libby Republican representative Jerry Bennett wants to change the current law against assisting a suicide, to allow doctors to be prosecuted.
“Why in a state like ours that’s reported to have one of the highest suicide rates in the nation, would we exacerbate the problem?”
Bennett’s bill was given a hearing in the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Among the opponents was Mary Douglas, a registered nurse from Helena, who said patients have an “inalienable right” to ask for a doctor’s help in dying.
“I do not wish to force my personal beliefs on anyone. But I do wish to have my own rights left to me and to my physician.”
The hearing came less than a day after the House narrowly killed a bill that would have allowed a doctor to face a homicide charge for giving a patient a lethal dosage, even if the patient requested it.
The new bill simply adds doctors to those who can be charged with aiding a suicide, a crime that carries a possible 10-year prison sentence and $50,000 fine. The committee will decide later whether to send the bill on to the full house.
