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Police today arrested a London man who watched his partner die in a Swiss assisted suicide clinic.
Officers took Alan Cutkelvin Rees, 57, from his Hackney home to Shoreditch police station.
They questioned him over the death of his partner of 28 years, Raymond Cutkelvin, 58, who was suffering from cancer and died at Dignitas clinic, Zurich, in February 2007.
M Cutkelvin Rees said: "I was angry when police arrived as they made no contact in all this time, but ultimately I am pleased."
Reader views (3)
Why has it taken the police so long? Are political pressures being brought to bear, I wonder?
- Graham Rodhouse, Helmond, Netherlands, 18/07/2009 11:11
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This is a very strange legal development!
As Alan has now been arrested, I hope that I will also be arrested as I accompanied Alan and his partner, Raymond, to Zurich in Feburary 2007, and I was a witness to Raymond's dignified death in the Dignitas clinic there.
For years, especially when I was the chairman of Dignity in Dying (formerly the Voluntary Euthanasia Society), I have campaigned to change the law in the UK to allow terminally-ill individuals the possibility of a doctor-assisted suicide. It is barbaric that such determined individuals like Raymond have to travel abroad to obtain the peaceful death that they so greatly desire.
- Michael Irwin, Cranleigh, Surrey, 18/07/2009 10:26
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How pathetic. Have the police nothing better to do. No real crime there uh?
Amazes me how thinks they are so almighty to judge such a thing. Leave the poor man alone. He lost he partner. The only alternative here was to make his partner suffer. Now that is the real crime. Lets start sending those doctors to jail.
- Alittlelate, USA, 18/07/2009 06:57
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