Commonwealth v. Carter and Legal Interpretations of Facilitated Suicide

In June 2017, a media frenzy ensued after Michelle Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the state of Massachusetts for facilitating the suicide of Conrad Roy. The verdict stirred controversy and cast a spotlight on facilitation of suicide, i.e., a person's act(s) done with the purpose of helping another to die by suicide. One form of facilitation, physician-assisted suicide, has been extensively debated in the existing literature. In this article, we set out to explore the legal and forensic ramifications of non-physician-assisted suicide, which we refer to as facilitated suicide. We first conducted a review of all fifty states' legislation regarding facilitated suicide: forty-four states prohibit it by statute, and three states prohibit it through common law. Thirteen states specifically outlaw verbal facilitation of suicide. We then surveyed the case law to identify legal precedent to the Commonwealth v. Carter verdict. Final Exit Network, Inc. v. State and State v. Melchert-Dinkel provide contrasting yet complementary perspectives on the interplay between speech and assisted suicide. Finally, we detailed the role of forensic psychiatry in investigating facilitated suicide, specifically among adolescents and youths.