"Even If a Patient Struggled, Who Would Know?"

By Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

The DC Act allows the death by lethal dose to occur in private without supervision.[1] The drugs used are water and alcohol soluble, such that they can be administered to a restrained or sleeping person without consent.[2] Alex Schadenberg, Executive Director for the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, puts it this way:

The Oregon Experience is B.S.

Bull

The claim by assisted suicide proponents, that Oregon's law is safe, cannot be independently verified because: (1) Studies making the claim are invalid; (2) Oregon's data cannot be verified; and (3) Even law enforcement is denied access to information.

If DC Follows Oregon's Interpretation of "not a public record," the Department of Health Will Be Insulated from Review, Even by Law Enforcement

To view similar information in a pdf format, see Margaret Dore's memo opposing Act 21-577, which can be viewed here and here.

The DC Act charges the Department of Health with issuing an annual statistical report based on data collected concerning people who used the Act.[1] The Act also states:

The information collected by the Department pursuant to this act shall not be a public record and may not be made available for inspection by the public under the Freedom of Information Act of 1976, effective March 25, 1977 (D.C. Law 1-96; D.C. Official Code § 2-2-531 et seq.), or any other law. (Emphasis added).[2]

Oregon’s law has a similar provision, as follows:

Except as otherwise required by law, the information collected shall not be a public record and may not be made available for inspection by the public. (Emphasis added).[3]

In Oregon, this similar provision is interpreted to bar release of information about individual cases, including to law enforcement.

The Act Can be Read as Preventing Disclosure Under "Any Law"

By Margaret Dore, Esq., MBA

The Act, § 17, states:

The information collected by the Department pursuant to this act . . . may not be made available for inspection . . . under the Freedom of Information Act . . ., or any other law. (Emphasis added).

If so, the Department of Health will be an agency beyond review, not only by law enforcement, but arguably by the courts and political authority. This fits the definition of “shadow government,”

A government run by an unelected bureaucracy, or a state within a state.