Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Book brings 'Dr. Death' back into spotlight

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Book brings 'Dr. Death' back into spotlight

    Book brings 'Dr. Death' back into spotlight

    The Daily Oakland Press (Oakland County, Michigan)
    Sunday, July 24, 2005

    By JACK LESSENBERRY, Special to The Oakland Press

    BLOOMFIELD HILLS, MICHIGAN - Jack Kevorkian was once a regular feature
    on the nightly news, a figure of ferocious controversy and a
    pop-culture icon at the same time. That was back in the 1990s, when
    every American knew his name and virtually nobody had heard of Osama
    bin Laden.

    Today, Dr. Death sits in a jail cell in Lapeer, 77 years old, out of
    touch with the media and nearly forgotten. But if Ruth Holmes has her
    way, that may be about to change. Holmes, a handwriting analyst and
    document examiner, regards the man who made assisted suicide famous as
    a martyr, a hero and a genius.

    And the Bloomfield Hills woman wants the world to know he has a new
    cause, a new passion and a new book: "Amendment IX: Our Cornucopia of
    Rights", which she and her daughter Sarah helped him put together and
    publish.

    Simply put, it is about one of the least-known amendments in the Bill
    of Rights. The Ninth Amendment says: "The enumeration in the
    Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or
    disparage others retained by the people." For the former pathologist,
    that says it all.

    "Every human being is born with the lifelong, powerful, unalterable,
    essentially instinctual will or drive to absolute personal freedom,"
    Kevorkian declares at the beginning of his short (65 pages) paperback
    book, which is really more like an extended pamphlet.

    "The full power of natural rights is latent in Amendment IX of the
    Bill of Rights," he argues over and over again. According to his
    theory, the Ninth Amendment "renders all the bill's other amendments
    superfluous."

    He said he believes the Ninth Amendment guarantees the right of
    assisted suicide, or, as he would put it, "the right to seek a
    competent medical professional's assistance in ending unendurable
    suffering."

    He also thinks it guarantees the right to marry anyone of any sex,
    ride a motorcycle without a helmet, carry concealed weapons or fly the
    flag. In short, Kevorkian, who usually voted Libertarian when he voted
    at all, is now more concerned with personal freedom than with assisted
    suicide.

    "This shows that he is interested in moving the philosophical
    discussion beyond the (assisted suicide) issue," said Holmes, who
    talks to Kevorkian nearly every day.

    Writing even a short book wasn't easy for the elderly inmate, who is
    only allowed to write in longhand and has very limited access to
    reference materials. Some of it he mailed out in the form of letters.

    Some he dictated over the phone to Sarah Holmes, at considerable
    financial cost to her family. Prisoners have to reverse the charges on
    any call they make, and a heavy surcharge is added. "We don't even
    talk about the phone bill," Ruth Holmes said.

    The well-written, thought-provoking book only occasionally lapses into
    a rant. Whether his arguments are likely to sway the legal community
    is doubtful.

    Robert Sedler, a professor of constitutional law at Wayne State
    University and a supporter of Kevorkian, once noted that "the Ninth
    Amendment is a little like Hamburger Helper. It needs to be used in
    connection with something else, another legal argument."

    There has never been - as Kevorkian himself said - a U.S. Supreme
    Court decision based on the Ninth Amendment. He thinks it is about
    time, and unless we start giving it the primacy it deserves, a fascist
    America is inevitable, he says.

    "(The Ninth Amendment's) seismic power will help us restore our
    struggling Republic's tarnished glory," Kevorkian concludes in his
    book.

    Whether Kevorkian himself will ever be restored to prominence seems
    doubtful. After presiding over, he says, more than 130 assisted
    suicides, he was convicted of second-degree murder in 1999 for
    performing euthanasia on Thomas Youk of Waterford Township, who had
    Lou Gehrig's disease and wanted to die.

    Ever since, he has been serving a 10- to 25-year
    sentence. Technically, he won't be eligible for parole until May 2007,
    but his lawyer, Mayer Morgenroth, plans to file a motion this November
    asking the governor to commute his sentence or move up the date when
    he is eligible for parole.

    That seems unlikely. Though Jack Kevorkian vows he will give up
    helping people die, Gov. Jennifer Granholm is highly risk-averse, and
    is said to be adamantly opposed to everything Kevorkian has done.

    Last winter, CBS's Mike Wallace called her to ask her to consider
    clemency in the case. Wallace, whose report of his euthanasia on "60
    Minutes" helped lead to Kevorkian's conviction, feels that he has been
    punished more than enough. But the governor refused to speak to him.

    "We won't give up," said Holmes, who said that a Hollywood producer is
    planning a major movie on Kevorkian, though details are hazy. For now,
    she hopes his new book will make a difference.


    Jack Lessenberry has covered Dr. Kevorkian and the assisted suicide
    issue for The New York Times and many other publications. He opines
    weekly for the Detroit Metro Times, and is a Lecturer of Reporting and
    Feature Writing at Wayne State University in Detroit.

    Getting the book

    Jack Kevorkian's book, "Amendment IX: Our Cornucopia of Rights", is
    available at Ariana Gallery (119 S. Main St., Royal Oak, Michigan
    48067 -- Day Time Phone: 248-546-8810), or from Penumbra
    Inc. (P.O. Box 231, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan 48303).

    http://www.theoaklandpress.com/stories/072405/loc_20050724004.shtml
Working...
X