Euthanasia activist arrested over ‘suicide pod’ dies

A pro-Euthanasia activist who was arrested following the death of a woman using the first so-called pod suicide in the world died.

Dr Florian Willet, 47, would have been the only other person present When a 64 -year -old American woman committed suicide Using the device in a forest in Switzerland last September.

Pod’s inventor, Philip Nitschke, told BBC News that Dr. Willet died by assisted suicide in Germany.

In a separate declaration, Mr. Nitschke said that Dr. Willet had undergone psychological trauma after his arrest and detention in connection with the death of Switzerland.

“In the last months of his life, Dr. Florian Willet has supported more than any man,” he said.

The last appeal – an assisted dying organization founded by Dr. Willet to facilitate the use of the pod – said that the arrest had left it “broken”.

The activist was detained in prior detention for 70 days while the police investigated if he had intentionally killed the woman – an allegation of which he was not accused.

Before his death on May 5, Dr. Willet fell from a third floor window, said the group, leaving it requiring surgery and needing to be “supported by a complete psychiatric team”.

While assisted death is legally protected in certain circumstances in Switzerland, it is strictly regulated and the Pod has met the opposition.

Defenders say that the device – manufactured by Sarco – offers an assisted death option that does not depend on drugs or doctors and widens potential access.

Critics fear that the modern design of the glamorous apparatus suicide and that the fact that it can be operated without medical supervision is worrying.

Dying assistance is illegal in the United Kingdom and in most other European countries, but thousands of people have gone to Switzerland over the years to end their own lives.

BBC News contacted the Swiss prosecutor’s office to comment.