LMonday 1st August, Marco Cappato went to Switzerland to follow up on the request of help of a 69-year-old Venetian woman suffering from irreversible lung cancer with metastases. Then he denounced himself and now faces 12 years of imprisonment.
Marco Cappato of the Luca Coscioni association, during the debate on Euthanasia and Democracy, which took place in the Doge’s Palace. Genoa, 29 March 2022.
ANSA / LUCA ZENNARO
The statements a iO Woman after self-report
Today, Wednesday 3 August, Marco Cappato went to the carabinieri station in via Fosse Ardeatine in Milan to report himself. And he told a iO Woman: «I am grateful to Elena for the trust she has placed in me. And I am grateful to her family – to her husband, to her daughter – for the support and support they have always expressed and shown. I am frankly worried about the fate of a country where we still are forced, in those conditions, to go into exile to avoid unbearable suffering at the end of life“.
And he continued: “I am personally determined to move forward, I have taken on my responsibilities, I have declared myself. It will now be up to the parliamentary halls – because politics has turned its head the other way – to the courtrooms to decide whether this right and this freedom can finally be recognized ”.
The political world, therefore, according to Cappato, has decided not to expose itself. Is assisted suicide a divisive issue? «It is only for the leaders of the parties. For people it is a theme that unites, because it unites in the different experiences of illness, suffering and pain that each one has experienced. And nobody wants to impose their choice on others ».
Finally he explained to iO Woman: “We don’t know what other people in Elena’s condition would have chosen. So people don’t feel divided on an issue like this. I’m those who want to impose their will on others, that is, those who use these issues as a propaganda tool, who need to impose a model on everyone. Here, for them this theme is divisive “.
Marco Cappato: “Elena could not have obtained this possibility in Italy”
Elena – this is her name of the woman who chose assisted suicide for herself – had turned to the Luca Coscioni Association. And she had asked to be accompanied to Switzerland so that she could legally access assisted suicide.
In Italy it is possible to access the technique only in the presence of some specific conditions. The case of Mrs. Elena, not being “kept alive by life-sustaining treatments”, was not, however, included in the sentence 242/2019 of the Constitutional Court on the Cappato / Dj Fabo case for access to assisted suicide in Italy. So he decided to turn to Marco Cappato. To obtain what he himself called “his right”, which allows “choose until the end“.
Once he arrived in Switzerland with Elena, Cappato had declared: “It was a long journey, over eight hours from Veneto, a journey made necessary by the fact that Elena could not have obtained this possibility in Italy, because the sentence of the Constitutional Court excludes that they can be helped to die people who are not kept alive by life-sustaining treatments ”.
It’s still. «Mrs. Elena is terminally ill with cancer, she has a very short life expectancy and ever-increasing suffering, but she is not attached to a car. In the next few hours he will undergo medical examinations, interviews to verify his will and eventual confirmation of his choice“.
Elena’s last message
In a video later published by the Coscioni Association, Mrs. Elena confirmed this will, telling his story with extreme clarity. “I told my husband and my family: they are at a crossroads. I can take a little longer road that leads me to hell. And another, shorter one, which takes me to Switzerland. I chose the latter. I then told my husband that if he tried to dissuade me, in a month or two, when he saw me in pain, he would regret it. ‘
The patient (who had been diagnosed with lung microcytoma in July 2021) then continued. “I have always been convinced that every person must decide on his own life and must also decide on his own endwithout constraints, without impositions, freely, and I think I did it, after having thought about it a lot, also putting into practice beliefs that I had even before the illness. I would certainly have preferred to end my life in my bed, in my house, holding my daughter’s hand and my husband’s hand. Unfortunately this was not possible and, therefore, I had to come here alone“.
Yesterday, Tuesday 2 August, Marco Cappato announced the woman’s death. “Elena just confirmed her will. She died, the way she chose, in the country she allowed her to. Tomorrow morning, in Italy, I will go and report myself“.
Today, in fact, the treasurer of the Luca Coscioni Association went to the Carabinieri station in via Fosse Ardeatine 4 in Milan at 11.00.. Take risks up to 12 years in prison for the charge of assisting suicide.
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