Suicide Tourism: Dignitas Dumps Urns in Lake

By Wesley J. Smith

Editor’s note. The following is from Wesley’s terrific blog, http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/

Ah, those compassionate people at Dignitas, the Swiss assisted suicide clinic that will make you dead for about $10,000. Allegedly, they dumped the ashes of former “clients” in a lake. From the story:

BOSSES of Swiss suicide firm Dignitas were facing jail today after the discovery of up to 300 urns containing human remains in a lake. British “suicide tourist” ashes are believed to be in some of the caskets found at the bottom of Lake Zurich by police divers. Authorities were first alerted in 2008 when Dignitas staff were caught pouring the ashes of 20 clients into the water.

But “piles” of urns bearing the logo of the company’s cremation service have now been found by chance on the lake bed. Dignitas boss Ludwig Minelli now faces up to three years jail and a £3,000 fine for carrying out unauthorised burials.

So, facilitating the suicides of these people is perfectly fine, but burying them wrongly–that gets Minelli in trouble! The word irony fails to adequately characterize the situation–particularly as the country’s Supreme Court created a constitutional right to assisted suicide for the mentally ill.

Assisted suicide advocates often claim the mantle of compassion–as Minelli often has. But as with Kevorkian, that is often a mask for indifference and abandonment.