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Posted on 02.27.06 by J. Neil Schulman
Final Exit (Third Edition) : The Practicalities of Self-Deliverance and Assisted Suicide for the Dying His name was David. A father of eight, the youngest being eight years old, and one of his older children had given birth to his first grandchild three months ago. He and his wife had just celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary, and he would have celebrated his 50th birthday next month. He was a talented entertainment attorney who had run the music department for one of the largest movie studios. Before that, he had been an entertainment attorney at one of the largest Century City law firms. After that, David became a music manager of some of the biggest talents in the business. David was a talented musician, himself — an electric bass player in a rock band in his teenage years, later on a jazz stand-up bass player. He often played in jazz combos with two of his other brothers. There was nothing physically wrong with him. He had no terminal diseases. As far as we know, David didn’t even have a cold. But his largest music client, disappointed about a setback in his career, fired him. David told no one that he had lost this client, even his wife. This client loss started a cascade of financial reverses, about which he told told one. He didn’t have the money to pay the next month’s mortgage payment, and he decided against asking his brothers for money.
He had a life insurance policy which he’d taken out five years before, and the suicide exclusion was only for the first two years of the policy. David was a brilliant lawyer. Of course he knew how these things worked. His notes showed that he had first thought of doing this on February 13th — but that had been scratched out. He couldn’t do this before Valentine’s Day. David loved his wife too much for that. David told his wife and children that he was going on a business trip to New York. He kept up with them by emails and phone calls, told everyone that he loved them. Then he checked into a series of hotels in Southern California, and prepared Fedex packages to go out to his family members. His brother in Pennsylvania received his package at 8:00 AM on February 23, 2006. It contained a CD ROM with over a booklength of material on it, explaining why he was doing this. “I just can’t go on,” he said. Nobody had a clue that David had given up, that he was resolved on this. He had a plastic bubble around him that kept his pain and his problems to himself. He wished to burden no one. He was the Daddy to all. Method #22 in Final Exit involves putting a plastic bag around yourself and suffocating yourself. It was a perfect metaphor for the end of David’s life. David’s brother, panicked, rallied the family to track David down. The Lojack on David’s car was useless — Lojack wouldn’t give out the information of the car’s location without a police authorization. David’s credit cards finally gave a clue what hotel he had checked into last. Around noon, David’s brother called the hotel, which confirmed David had checked in, and there was a Do Not Disturb on his room door and his phone. David’s brother begged the hotel to use their pass key to enter David’s hotel room and call him back. They never called back. An hour later, David’s brother called again. They would give him no information. Finally, David’s wife was told that, yes, David was there, but no, he was not alive anymore. A copy of Final Exit was found by David’s bedside. David had used Method #22 and the ME said David had died at 4:00 AM, February 23rd, 2006 — about four hours before the first Fedex package was opened. Ironically, this was the second anniversary of another of my close friends’ death. This is a true story. I learned it this morning when I called David’s brother regarding a movie project we’ve been talking about working on together. I called him at 8:00 AM, thinking he was on Eastern Standard Time — but we were both on Pacific Standard Time, since David’s brother had come to Southern California to be with his brother’s family. It didn’t matter. He hadn’t slept anyway. David’s brother asked me for some advice today … on what it felt like to identify a body. I had done that for my friend two years ago. I told him it was like seeing counterfeit money. It gave the illusion of being real, but the value was missing. Is Derek Humphrey responsible for David’s death? Should his book be banned? I am a libertarian and an author, myself. I don’t believe in banning books. I believe people are responsible for their own actions. I want no legal action taken against Derek Humphry. But I thought long and hard today about asking David’s brother to take a photograph of David in his coffin, that I could send to Derek Humphrey, inscribed, “From one of your biggest fans.” J. Neil Schulman Filed under: Guest Columns | Report Bad Link Bookmark this post in Furl or Del.icio.us | |
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