Case Report Request for euthanasia in the suicide note of a planned suicide Jatin Bodwal 1 , Asit Kumar Sikary 2 , Mohit Chauhan 3 and Chittaranjan Behera 4 Abstract This case is of a suicide victim who purchased various drugs online using forged prescriptions after detailed research about the drugs to commit suicide. He left a suicide note giving details of his suicide methods and the reasons for it. He also denied any treatment and asked for euthanasia if he survived and remained in a vegetative state. Keywords Forged prescription, living will, online drug, advance directive, planned suicide, suicide note, euthanasia Introduction Euthanasia means ‘easy death’ or ‘good death’. It means procuring the painless death of a person suffer- ing from hopelessly painful and incurable disease. It has many facets: active euthanasia comprises administering medication to the patient to cause death; physician- assisted suicide is providing medication to the patient knowing that he will use it to end his life, and passive euthanasia is where the physician withholds treatment and allows the patient to die. 1,2 The advance directive for treatment is a document in which a person with full mental capacity expresses the extent of his consent to any future medical intervention in case he may not be able to express his consent at the material time. 3 Different countries and societies have their own views about euthanasia. Some countries approve it in all its forms, some countries approve only the passive form, and some do not approve at all. The Netherlands and Australia allow it in specific conditions while in Japan, Russia, Ireland and Cuba euthanasia is illegal. 3 In a recent judgment, the Indian supreme court has given legal sanction to ‘advance directives’ as well as to ‘passive euthanasia’ providing guidelines to be fol- lowed by treating physicians which state that the person issuing ‘advance directives’ must be of sound mind and provide clear instructions about the circumstances under which treatment should be withheld or with- drawn. It should be attested by two witnesses and coun- tersigned by a judicial magistrate of first class with jurisdiction. 4 A suicide note or death note is a message expressed in writing by a person who intends to commit suicide. 5 Suicide notes provide a valuable insight into the frame of mind of suicidal victims and their circumstances before death. The person may also express his or her last wish regarding cremation or burial and for donat- ing his/her organs. 6 We report this case where the first focus is on the wish for euthanasia of the deceased in the form of an advance directive in the suicide note found after he had committed a planned suicide through an online pur- chase of medicines with a forged prescription. Case report A 24-year-old male had committed suicide using vari- ous medicinal drugs that he had bought online using a forged prescription. A multiple page suicide note was 1 Department of Forensic Medicine, DDU Hospital, New Delhi, India 2 Department of Forensic Medicine, ESIC Medical College, Faridabad, India 3 Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences, Department of Forensic Medicine, SGT University, Chandu Budhera, Gurugram, India 4 Department of Forensic Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India Corresponding author: Chittaranjan Behera, Department of Forensic Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, Delhi 110029, India. Email: drchitta75@rediffmail.com Medico-Legal Journal 0(0) 1–3 ! The Author(s) 2018 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0025817218789826 journals.sagepub.com/home/mlj