PONTIAC, Mich. -- Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who claims he has helped more than 130 people to commit suicide, was convicted Friday of murder for giving a fatal injection to a man with a terminal illness.
It was a trial that people on both sides of the assisted-suicide debate believe will have a profound impact on future discussion of this contentious, emotional subject now that the most visible and controversial proponent of euthanasia and assisted suicide could spend much of the rest of his life in prison.Kevorkian, 70, was convicted in the death of Thomas Youk, a 52-year-old man from a Detroit suburb, who suffered from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease. Prosecutors had originally charged Kevorkian with first-degree murder in Youk's death. First-degree murder involves premeditation, but the jury, which deliberated for 13 hours, returned a verdict of second-degree murder, which does not.
Kevorkian faces a minimum sentence of 10 to 25 years in prison on the murder charge.
Kevorkian, whose medical license has been revoked in Michigan, also faces up to seven years in prison on a second charge, delivery of a controlled substance.
Kevorkian reacted impassively as the jury read its verdict, blinking several times as he looked toward the jury box. Released on bond until sentencing in mid-April, he declined to speak with reporters.
This was the fifth time in a decade that prosecutors had tried Kevorkian for his role in the deaths of seriously ill people. Three trials ended in acquittals, while a fourth ended in a mistrial.
In those cases, Kevorkian was charged not with murder but with violating laws against assisted suicide, for helping people to use a contraption called a "suicide machine" to give themselves fatal injections. Juries in those cases had been swayed by emotional statements from the families of the dead, who defended Kevorkian's actions as compassionate.
But this trial was different because prosecutors had unusually direct evidence: a videotape Kevorkian made of himself injecting Youk with lethal chemicals last September. Kevorkian brought the tape to the CBS News program "60 Minutes," which broadcast it in November, along with an interview in which Kevorkian dared prosecutors to file charges against him.
Because Kevorkian was charged with murder, the judge instructed the jury that the issue of whether Youk consented to his death was irrelevant.
"The one thing we knew it wasn't, was it wasn't assisted suicide on trial," said a juror, a young man who would not disclose his name. "That was unequivocal."
He added that "what it came down to was the evidence proved itself."
It was a strikingly short trial in which Kevorkian insisted on defending himself, betraying his lack of legal skill as he asked legally impermissible questions and failed to persuade the judge that his proposed witnesses were relevant to the case. Likening himself to such heroic figures as Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks, he appealed to the jury to send a message that laws against euthanasia and assisted suicide were unjust.
The same juror, the only one of the 12 who would speak to a reporter, said the jury was not influenced by Kevorkian's self-representation.