{"id":509730,"date":"2026-04-02T23:05:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T23:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/509730\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T23:05:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T23:05:08","slug":"cps-considering-13-suspected-cases-of-assisted-dying-in-england-and-wales-assisted-dying","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/509730\/","title":{"rendered":"CPS considering 13 suspected cases of assisted dying in England and Wales | Assisted dying"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thirteen cases of suspected assisted dying are being considered by prosecutors in England<\/a> and Wales, according to the latest data.<\/p>\n

Encouraging or assisting the suicide or attempted suicide of another person is against the law in England and Wales<\/a>, under the Suicide Act 1961.<\/p>\n

The Crown Prosecution Service<\/a> (CPS) said its latest data showed 209 cases that have been recorded as assisted dying have been referred to it by the police between 1 April 2009 and 31 March this year.<\/p>\n

This was up from 199 cases that had been referred by the end of March last year.<\/p>\n

Of the 209 cases, 131 were not taken forward by prosecutors and 42 were withdrawn by police, the CPS said.<\/p>\n

It added that across two decades, six cases of encouraging or assisting dying have been successfully prosecuted, and two cases have been charged and acquitted after trial.<\/p>\n

Eight cases were referred for prosecution for homicide or other serious crime, rather than the offence of assisted dying, the service added.<\/p>\n

On its website, the CPS said: \u201cSuch cases [of suspected assisted dying] are by their very nature complex and sensitive, not least due to the tragic events that surround them.<\/p>\n

\u201cConduct in these cases can range from circumstances where a victim is being pressured to end their life, to actions wholly motivated by compassion.\u201d<\/p>\n

It added that CPS guidance for prosecutors in such cases \u201cincludes specific public interest factors tending in favour of prosecution and those tending against prosecution\u201d.<\/p>\n

The latest data comes as the Westminster bill proposing to legalise assisted dying continues to be debated but looks likely to run out of time to become law.<\/p>\n

The terminally ill adults (end of life) bill, which passed the Commons last year, has been the subject of days of debate by peers in the Lords chamber.<\/p>\n

The proposals, which would allow terminally ill adults resident in England and Wales for at least 12 months to apply for an assisted death subject to the approval of two doctors and an expert panel, will fall if they do not complete all the parliamentary stages before the end of the current session<\/a> in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

After publication of the latest CPS figures, a man who accompanied his wife to the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland told how he had faced police investigation when he returned home and spoke of the \u201cadditional stress and jeopardy\u201d he endured.<\/p>\n

Dave Sowry, board member of pro-change campaign group My Death, My Decision<\/a>, said: \u201cIn my case, the police decided to take no further action.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat sort of country do we live in where accompanying someone who has made a personal choice at the end of their life results in such additional stress and jeopardy?\u201d<\/p>\n

But Care Not Killing<\/a>, which is opposed to a change in the law, has previously said: \u201cThe political priority must be to give patients a genuine choice through world-class hospice care, not turning doctors into executioners because fixing palliative care is too difficult and costly.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs we have repeatedly said, we urgently need much more care, not killing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thirteen cases of suspected assisted dying are being considered by prosecutors in England and Wales, according to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":509731,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-509730","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-gb","9":"tag-great-britain","10":"tag-greatbritain","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509730","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=509730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/509730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/509731"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=509730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=509730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=509730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}