Robert Latimer Still Believes He Was Right to Kill His Daughter

In 1993, Robert Latimer killed his severely disabled daughter, Tracy,  by pumping exhaust fumes into the cab of his truck. He was subsequently sentenced to life in prison, and paroled in 2010.

In a recent challenge to his sentence, Latimer argued: "The harm I caused by her death would have been less than the pain inflicted by her life." "It was pointless to torture our daughter any further." Latimer wants a pardon. But that seems unlikely.

Latimer's conduct is fundamentally distinct from ongoing U.S. and Canadian debates about medical aid in dying and medical futility. Yes, both parents and clinicians regularly decide to forgo treating severely disabled children. Yes, sometimes clinicians make this decision even over the opposition of the parents (as in many recent high-profile British cases.) But no jurisdiction in the world allows parents to take affirmative action to kill their children without the oversight of clinicians.