Montanans Have Right To Assisted Suicide

A Montana judge has issued a ruling saying residents of the state have the right to doctor-assisted suicide.

The ruling issued late Friday by state District Court Judge Dorothy McCarter makes Montana the third state in which doctor-assisted suicide is legal.

The judge said Saturday she ruled in a lawsuit filed by a terminally ill Billings man, four physicians and a nonprofit patients rights group, Compassion & Choices, a leading advocate of Oregon's Death with Dignity law. Washington state voters have approved a similar law.

McCarter ruled that mentally competent, terminally ill Montanans have a right to obtain medications that can be self-administered to bring about a peaceful death if they find their suffering unbearable.

The ruling says physicians can prescribe such medication without fear of criminal prosecution.