Shades of the Traci Latimer murder from Canada, now a mother in the UK has apparently overdosed her disabled son with pure heroin. And this, after she was out on bail from a previous attempt! From the story:
Ten days after Thomas was admitted to hospital, [Frances] Inglis approached a neighbour and asked her for pure heroin “to end his misery”, the court heard. She later told police she had only said it in a “fit of anger.” Over the following months Thomas’ condition improved so that he could open his eyes and move his limbs. On September 4, Frances Inglis visited the hospital’s High Dependency Unit at 5pm and was left alone with her son. “A nurse later noticed that Thomas Inglis was a strange colour and wasn’t breathing,” said Miss Moore. Thomas was resusciatated but, according to medics, his progress was slowed by the incident.
She was let out on bail, and amazingly, tricked caregivers into allowing her to be alone with her son:
She was charged with attempted murder but was released on bail on the condition she did not see her son. Staff at the nursing home where he was being held were issued with a photograph of her but Thomas was then moved to The Gardens Neurological Nursing Home in Sawbridgeworth, Herts for further treatment. Around lunchtime on November 21, 2008, a visitor signed in as Thomas’ aunt. Shortly afterwards, a nurse went to give Thomas his medication and found Inglis at the foot of his bed. Inglis ushered the nurse out of the room and shut the door, blocking it with an oxygen tank. When staff eventually forced their way in, Inglis allegedly screamed: “Leave him alone you stupid people. Don’t resuscitate him because I have done him already. He is in peace.” When police arrived she allegedly confessed to giving her son injections in his thigh and arms. A search of her home was said to have revealed provisions for what would happen once she was in custody including instructions for caring for the family dog and paying household bills.
The woman was clearly disturbed, but that said, I don’t understand why anyone would be surprised by this. A powerful meme has been loosed on the West that it is better to be dead than seriously disabled, a dangerous belief actively abetted by England’s head prosecutor when he essentially decriminalized assisted suicide of people with seriously disabling conditions by family and relatives.
Oh, you say, “But Thomas didn’t consent!” True, but once the idea that killing is an acceptable answer to human suffering goes mainstream, it is a very small step from allowing assisted suicide to shrugging at the mercy killing of those who can’t consent–for their “own good,” of course. Notice that this kind of thing happens all the time in the Netherlands, with the only difference is that doctors do the killing, and nothing serious is ever done about it.
It will be interesting to see what kind of punishment is meted out in this case. She might not get off easy. First, she badly embarrassed the authorities by allegedly doing the deed after they let her out. On the other hand, he was profoundly disabled, and the murderers of such people, particularly family members, often receive generous mercy from the courts. But this could be her downfall:
Described by neighbours as a “pillar of the community”, she became a “permanently angry and changed woman” and refused to believe doctors who told her that her son would get better, a court heard.
The murder of people expected to improve is likely, alas, to be treated differently than the killing of someone who wasn’t. The potential for improvement undercuts the power of the emotional narrative of ending pointless suffering out of love. I predict little leniency. But it will be well worth watching.
January 5th, 2010 | 8:42 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Vince Humphreys, Wesley J. Smith. Wesley J. Smith said: UK Mother Overdoses Disabled Son: Why is Anyone Surprised? » Secondhand Smoke | A First Things Blog – http://shar.es/aQaGN [...]
January 5th, 2010 | 9:27 pm
Crap. I noticed that several months went by without family members or the courts trying to kill anyone in particular. Guess that streak is over.
January 6th, 2010 | 12:49 pm
So, she succeeded finally in killing him?
The article was not perfectly clear on this, but seems to be saying so.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
January 6th, 2010 at 1:24 pm
Yes, she killed him.
January 7th, 2010 | 12:00 am
As a Canadian with adult aquired disability (multiple sclerosis) I was saddened, once again, to hear of another case of a parent killing their disabled child. Wesley Smith is right, it is reminiscent of the Tracy Latimer case in my country. It was shocking to witness. The media made her killer-father, Robert Latimer, out like some sort of folk hero. Robert Latimer was given special treatment by the media, the juries, the courts, and even the parole board. His sentence was 2nd degree murder (although it should have been 1st). In Canada, the mandatory sentence for second degree murder is life in prison with no chance of parole for 10 years. He got after 7 years.
The whole fiasco revolving around the murder of Tracey Latimer and the treatment of her father only served to illustrate a pervasive anti-disability prejudice that is so prevalent in Canada. I had no idea my fellow-Canadian citizens held the disabled in such low regard.
Mark Pickup
Beaumont, AB
Canada
January 8th, 2010 | 9:31 am
Thank you Mark from Beaumont.
Maybe more people affected by grave illness should talk against this inhuman trend of euthanasia, and teach the rest of us.
January 8th, 2010 | 11:10 pm
Safepres: It was going on, just a space of time in between media coverage of it.
Lilianne: Of course they should.
January 13th, 2010 | 6:43 pm
As a person who has lost both parents at a young age, both due to seperate incidents of serious head trauma, I have thanked the Lord (and I am not a religious person) for the mercy that they did not remain alive and seriously brain damaged after their accidents.
Had that been the case my sister and I were under strict instructions to take them on a short trip to Switzerland. This discussion had only taken place in our family because my Grandfather (who died before I was born) also died from a severe head trauma.
What worried my sister and I, whilst we waited in the hospital for the results of the brain stem tests, was the fact that on both occasions, neither of our parents had made a living will and even if they had done so they would not have been able to make the one request that they really wanted us to fulfill !
The long and short of this is that;
I believe that people should be able to make a choice for themselves, this can be done easily through a living will, and there should be no call for public or legal opinion on this matter as long as that choice has been officially documented, that way difficult decisions are not left to the grieving family and they cannot be judged either.
January 20th, 2010 | 1:11 pm
[...] I reported a bit ago about the case of Francis Inglis, the mother, who while out on bail for trying to kill her seriously disabled son Tom, went to his hospital room and murdered him. In the UK, as here, such cases often generate “mercy” from the courts. But I predicted she would do do time in this case–primarily because doctors said the young man was improving. I was right. From the story: A mother who gave her brain-damaged son a lethal heroin injection to end his “living hell” was told today she must serve at least nine years in jail. Frances Inglis, 57, was given a life sentence for killing 22-year-old son Tom after he suffered severe head injuries when he fell out of a moving ambulance. She gave a tearful and emotionally-charged account to jurors of how she had “no choice” and had done it “with love” to end his suffering. But a judge instructed them to put emotion aside and told them no one had the “unfettered right” to take the law into their own hands. [...]
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