A retired GP was cleared yesterday of murdering three patients with heavy overdoses of morphine painkiller.
After a long trial and a judge's summing-up which lasted almost a week, a jury decided that Howard Martin had not been "playing God" in his treatment of two men who were suffering from aggressive cancers and a third who had senile dementia.
As Dr Martin, 71, left Teesside crown court he described his relief at the end of "a year and a half under house arrest, and eight weeks of hell on earth". Relatives of the patients, all from the Newton Aycliffe area in County Durham, where Dr Martin practised, were visibly shocked when the jury of six women and six men gave their unanimous verdicts.
The Voluntary Euthanasia Society said that the 33-day trial, the biggest investigation in Durham police's history, showed how British law "struggles to distinguish murder from mercy". The society's chief executive, Deborah Annetts, said: "It shows the lack of clarity in the law surrounding decision making at the end of life. It was all about what the doctor intended. People may be surprised to discover that it makes no difference what the patients wanted. Bad practice is not being properly exposed and good doctors are not being properly supported or protected. The sooner we move to a system that allows a patient's wishes to be respected, with proper safeguards, the better-protected patients will be."
Dr Martin, a practising Christian and former army officer, did not give evidence during the trial. The defence barrister, Anthony Arlidge, QC called expert witnesses who said that the patients were close to death. Mr Arlidge also argued that the prosecution had failed to prove that the morphine doses were lethal or that Dr Martin knew exactly what effects his prescriptions would have.
The GP's 80-year-old wife, Theresa, burst into tears of relief as he was acquitted of murdering Frank Moss, 59, and Harry Gittins and Stanley Weldon, who were both 74, between March 2003 and January last year. Dr Martin, who retired from medicine in the north-east to live in Penmaenmawr, Gwynedd, north Wales, was accused of intending to kill the three patients after relatives of Mr Gittins complained of his treatment and forensic science tests found large traces of morphine. Exhumations were then carried out on the bodies of the other two men.
Mr Gittins's family said the verdicts had left them and the relatives of the other patients devastated. Detective Superintendent Harry Stephenson said he shared their feelings: "In my 31 years as a police officer, this is one of my most disappointing days." Police will consider whether checks should be made on a number of other deaths of patients of Dr Martin.
The GP's solicitor, Sara Mason, said afterwards: "Dr Martin has always maintained that he was doing no more than doing his best to relieve the suffering of these three patients. Being prosecuted for murder came as a particularly bitter blow as he has spent nearly 50 years of his life caring for others, at personal sacrifice."
