Versailles
Enlightened
- Oct 1, 2020
- 1,652
The Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice referred for the first time to the crime of "assisting suicide" contemplated in the Criminal Code and made clarifications on when it is incurred and when in homicide.
The high court, by majority and with two save votes, said that what should be punished in "help to suicide" is "mere help" for the suicide to carry out his intention, but not go a step further. because the third party that with his own hand takes the life of that person, more than cooperating or contributing to the achievement of a result, what he does is commit a homicide.
The Chamber explained that whoever wishes to commit suicide must commit the action and have the ability to stop it at all times. "Therefore, when it is another person who deals the final blow, it is unknown if it was his will, really, which firmly guided the cause of his own death to the end or acted, in some sense, the will of the third party". says the decision.
With a presentation by Judge Myriam Ávila, the Chamber explained that there are several scenarios in this type of situation such as, for example, the person has expressed their intention to end their life and regrets it at the last moment, "but the person The person who has asked for his contest kills him for a promise of remuneration or revenge, etc."
In this sense, says the Court, there are cases where there are doubts about the suicidal intent or its true scope, for which reason the judges must verify that the actions of a third party have not been an arbitrary deprivation of the suicide's life, because then it is a homicide and does not help suicide.
"Considering the consensual execution of death as an aid to suicide ignores that homicide on request is a figure distinguished from the first. In this sense, it would be a dogmatically questionable solution. It would imply introducing, through interpretation, a criminal offense from other legislations (other countries), with its own characteristics and connotations and that, although at some point it existed in Colombian legislative history, it has disappeared for more than forty years", says the decision.
"Due to the complexity of determining that the autonomy of the suicide, not that of the agent, led the causal process that ended in the deprivation of life of the first, the constitutional obligations of guarantee and safeguard at the head of the State imply considering the causation of the death at the hands of third parties within the crime of homicide", insisted the Court.
The high court, by majority and with two save votes, said that what should be punished in "help to suicide" is "mere help" for the suicide to carry out his intention, but not go a step further. because the third party that with his own hand takes the life of that person, more than cooperating or contributing to the achievement of a result, what he does is commit a homicide.
The Chamber explained that whoever wishes to commit suicide must commit the action and have the ability to stop it at all times. "Therefore, when it is another person who deals the final blow, it is unknown if it was his will, really, which firmly guided the cause of his own death to the end or acted, in some sense, the will of the third party". says the decision.
With a presentation by Judge Myriam Ávila, the Chamber explained that there are several scenarios in this type of situation such as, for example, the person has expressed their intention to end their life and regrets it at the last moment, "but the person The person who has asked for his contest kills him for a promise of remuneration or revenge, etc."
In this sense, says the Court, there are cases where there are doubts about the suicidal intent or its true scope, for which reason the judges must verify that the actions of a third party have not been an arbitrary deprivation of the suicide's life, because then it is a homicide and does not help suicide.
"Considering the consensual execution of death as an aid to suicide ignores that homicide on request is a figure distinguished from the first. In this sense, it would be a dogmatically questionable solution. It would imply introducing, through interpretation, a criminal offense from other legislations (other countries), with its own characteristics and connotations and that, although at some point it existed in Colombian legislative history, it has disappeared for more than forty years", says the decision.
"Due to the complexity of determining that the autonomy of the suicide, not that of the agent, led the causal process that ended in the deprivation of life of the first, the constitutional obligations of guarantee and safeguard at the head of the State imply considering the causation of the death at the hands of third parties within the crime of homicide", insisted the Court.
