The Dark Side of Euthanasia: Did Brittany Know?

Brittany Maynard became the poster girl for Compassion and Choices in the last months of her life. Did she know the dark side of this evil group that sprouted from the Hemlock Society founded by Derek Humphrey? Probably not. Here's just one piece of the puzzle about the suicide of Ann Humphrey, Derek's second wife. His first wife, Jean, killed herself (with a little push). Ann also killed herself after Derek abandoned her following her diagnosis of breast cancer, an ugly divorce, and his marriage to third wife Gretchen Crocker. Ann left a suicide note that revealed the truth about the death of Derek's first wife, Jean. He also assisted the double suicide of Ann's parents which led to her own depression and sense that they were murderers. Ann exposed the truth about Jean's death in her suicide note:

APPARENT DEATH NOTE DISPUTES SUICIDE.(Main)Albany Times Union (Albany, NY) (Mon, 28 Oct 1991) Byline: William C. Crum Associated Press A friend of the second wife of right-to-die advocate Derek Humphry says the woman left a suicide note alleging that Humphry smothered his first wife rather than help her die by taking pills. Rita Marker, an anti-euthanasia activist and friend of Humphry's second wife, Ann Wickett Humphry, released the typed note Saturday. It includes a handwritten postscript to Marker: "He is a killer. I know. Jean actually died of suffocation. I could never say it until now; who would believe me? Do the best you can. Ann." Humphry's first wife, Jean, died in 1975....Rita Marker, an anti-euthanasia activist and friend of Humphry's second wife, Ann Wickett Humphry, released the typed note Saturday. It includes a handwritten postscript to Marker: "He [Derek] is a killer. I know....Jean actually died of suffocation. I could never say it until now; who would believe me? Do the best you can. Ann."

Marker told Ann's story in Deadly Compassion: the Death of Ann Humphrey and the Truth about Euthanasia. The death peddlers are not above using vulnerable people to advance their killing agenda. And Brittany was perfect: pretty, young, with everything to live for, with no apparent hope and trust in God to interfere with her decision.

The media coverage is hailing her as courageous, a hero. But one woman in a private group on Facebook whose husband suffered and died from the same cancer disagrees

All I can think of is my late husband, and how filled with hope he was every single day. He never gave up; he used to say 'tomorrow could be the day they find a cure'. Even when he was completely incapable of moving on his own or even speaking, he never believed he was fighting for nothing. In the end, because he wanted no stone left unturned, he was the first patient...to receive an experimental cancer drug that is now typically the first course of treatment for newly diagnosed patients. He left a legacy of hope and even if he decided on no treatments at all (which i would have fully supported!!) he never would have taken his own life.

Now that is a description of courage! Not Brittany's decision. But how many will be taken in by the media adulation and follow in her deadly footsteps -- even those who are NOT suffering from terminal diseases, but depression or mental illness?

What an irony that Brittany chose All Saints Day to kill herself. Saints are champions of LIFE, especially those who faced martyrdom like St. Thomas More, Maximilian Kolbe, and the Roman martyrs.

On the other hand, was choosing All Saints Day providential? Let's ask all the saints to pray for Brittany's salvation. Her act was objectively evil. None of us owns his own life. God made us; we belong to Him, and it is He who has dominion over life's beginning and its end. We don't. But suicide never proves a person is in hell. St. Jean Vianney once told a grieving widow that her husband, who jumped to his death from a bridge, repented as he fell. Let us pray that as Brittany fell into darkness, she too, in the last moment, saw the light and embraced Him.