Breck noted that Kevorkian counselled Wantz and Miller to seek alternative relief from their pain. The judge said there was no testimony that Kevorkian started the device that injected lethal drugs into Miller or opened the canister from which Wantz inhaled carbon monoxide. Had the women not activated the devices, their deaths would not have occurred. Kevorkian bought the supplies, set up the apparatus used in the suicides and connected them to the women so they could initiate their deaths, Breck said. Citing a Michigan Supreme Court ruling in December that assisted suicide can be considered a crime in Michigan under common law, the judge ordered Kevorkian tried on those charges.
Common law is based on legal precedent, customs and traditions dating back centuries.
Breck originally had dismissed the murder charges in 1992. But in its December ruling, the state's high court sent the two cases back to Oakland County, saying there was no constitutional right to assisted suicide. Townsend said the charges against Kevorkian would be amended and filed once the judge filed his order, probably by Friday. Kevorkian attorney Geoffrey Fieger objected to Breck's order, saying the Supreme Court ruling making assisted suicide a crime under common law did not define it. Those have never been addressed by any court.