Gale Encyclopedia Of American Law 3Rd Edition Volume 6 P17 docx

However, one at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio near Akron turned deadly.. The Kent city mayor, having heard rumors of a radical plot in the making, declared a state of emergency and

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disrupted his studies During one of his forced suspensions, Kent read Sir William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–

69), which led him to decide on a legal career

Following college he secured a clerkship with the attorney general of New York, and he was admitted to the New York bar in 1785

Kent began his law practice in Poughkeepsie, New York In 1790 he was elected to the New York state legislature, where he served three terms A steadfast Federalist and supporter of the U.S Constitution, Kent was committed to a strong national government After losing a congressional race in 1793, he moved to New York City, where he practiced law and served as a professor of law at Columbia University

Kent became a member of the New York Supreme Court in 1798, and served as chief justice from 1806 to 1814 He is credited with transforming the court into a professional, respected bench He introduced the practice of issuing written as well as oral opinions, and was instrumental in appointing an official reporter

to collect the written opinions into officialLAW REPORTS Kent believed that such reports were necessary so that past precedents could be read and cited more easily

During his time on the court, Kent addressed the then burning issue of whether English

precedents could claim the authority of law in the United States Some members of the New York bar felt that the American Revolution would be unfinished until the United States had

a body of law of its own, untainted by the laws of its former imperial master

Kent disagreed He argued that the predict-ability of justice was an indispensable require-ment for achieving the commercial progress and stable social order sought by the Federalists He further suggested that citation and the following

of precedent were the best means to judicial predictability Like many Federalists he admired the stability of the English common law and he maintained that it was the best system ever devised to ensure justice and order Although he did not follow precedent blindly, Kent believed that previous decisions should not be expressly overturned except when absolutely necessary Kent was appointed chancellor of the New York Court of Chancery in 1814 This court was

a court of equity, which applied rules of fairness, rather than a court of law, which applied common and statutory law to the resolution of disputes Most of the matters before it involved commercial disputes As chancellor Kent was empowered to do justice based on the particular facts of each case and the equitable principles that had developed in England He used his equity powers to effect his sense that commercial bargains ought to be subject to some equitable scrutiny to ensure that unconscionable advantage was not taken

By law Kent was forced to retire from the bench at age 60, in 1823 He returned to the privatePRACTICE OF LAWand was reappointed to a professorship at Columbia He was consulted by lawyers and judges about legal issues, and gave a series of lectures at Columbia that became, in revised form, the core of his Commentaries This treatise, which was published in four volumes, was similar to Blackstone’s Commentaries in scope but did not follow Blackstone’s precisely

in form Kent’s Commentaries covered INTERNA-TIONAL LAW, the Constitution and government of the United States, the municipal laws of the states, personal rights, and real and PERSONAL PROPERTY It quickly became an authoritative and classic example of the U.S treatise tradition Five editions were published in Kent’s lifetime, and many more followed in the nineteenth century The twelfth edition (1873) was edited

by OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES,JR

James Kent.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS

148 KENT, JAMES

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Kent died December 12, 1847, in New York

City

CROSS REFERENCE

Blackstone ’s Commentaries.

KENT STATE STUDENT KILLINGS

In 1970 the United States was in the middle of

the VIETNAM WAR, and anti-war demonstrations

among students around the country were

frequent However, one at Kent State University

in Kent, Ohio (near Akron) turned deadly In

13 seconds of rifle fire, four students were killed

and nine others injured by a NATIONAL GUARD

contingent called in to quell the crowd The

tragic event cast the university into the

international spotlight, and changed the face

of student demonstrations forever

The rioting had begun on Friday, May 1,

1970, when several students organized an

on-campus demonstration to protest U.S troops

entering Cambodia That evening, a crowd of

drinking and agitated students moved off

campus and began BREAKING windows in the

center of town Police were called in to disperse

the crowd The Kent city mayor, having heard

rumors of a radical plot in the making, declared

a state of emergency and Ohio officials called in

the National Guard Local bars were closed by

authorities, and rioters were herded back toward the campus with tear gas

By Saturday the agitated demonstrators had threatened local merchants and surrounded the on-campus barracks of the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC), setting the building on fire When firemen attempted to extinguish the blaze, the rioters punctured or cut open their water hoses National Guard troops again cleared the campus The hostility intensified on Sunday, when the crowd failed to disperse on orders to do so The Ohio Riot Act was read to them and tear gas was fired The hostile rioters regrouped and moved into town, where the Riot Act was again read to them and tear gas was again used Several persons, including guardsmen, were injured

By noon on Monday, May 4, approximately 2,000 demonstrators gathered and were ordered

to disperse They responded with curses and rocks Eventually, tear gas was again employed but was ineffectual in the afternoon breeze As the crowd grew more agitated, it was herded by guardsmen toward an athletic practice field surrounded by fence After being pelted with rocks, the guardsmen receded but were followed

by angry demonstrators, some as close as 20 yards Guardsmen turned and fired several shots toward the demonstrators, felling several of

Students approach one of the four classmates slain when National Guard troops opened fire on protesters during the May 1970 riots at Kent State University UPI/CORBIS-BETTMANN KENT STATE STUDENT KILLINGS 149

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them Within seconds, four persons lay dying and nine more were wounded; all 13 were students A University ambulance moved through the crowd, announcing over a public address system that demonstrators were to pack their things and leave the campus immediately

Shock and disbelief of the tragic events spread worldwide within hours By the follow-ing mornfollow-ing, James A Rhodes, governor of Ohio, had called in the FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION(FBI).RICHARD M.NIXON,PRESIDENT

OF THE UNITED STATES, invited six Kent student representatives to meet with him after their meeting with a state congressman

On May 21, 1970, Attorney General JOHN MITCHELLannounced that theJUSTICE DEPARTMENT

would investigate the shootings to determine whether there had been criminal violations of federal laws Two weeks later, the Ohio legisla-ture passed a new campus riot bill providing for swift action and stiff penalties for those charged

in connection with disturbances at state-assisted colleges and universities

By June 10 the first private lawsuit for

WRONGFUL DEATHwas filed in federal court by the father of a killed student Governor Rhodes and two Ohio National Guard commanders were named as defendants The parent also filed a second suit against the state of Ohio in local Portage County Court ofCOMMON PLEAS A few days later, the White House announced the naming of a special commission to investigate campus unrest at Kent, as well as the deaths of two black students at Jackson State University in Mississippi

In September 1970, the President’s Com-mission on Campus Unrest released its general report, which found the National Guard shoot-ings“unwarranted.” The report also found that the“violent and criminal” actions by students contributed to the tragedy and caused them

to bear responsibility for deaths and injuries

of fellow students According to Kent State University Library archives, the report concluded that“The Kent State tragedy must surely mark the last time that loaded rifles are issued as a matter of course to guardsmen confronting student demonstrators.”

A special stateGRAND JURYissued indictments against 25 persons in October 1970, but found,

in its 18-page report, that the guardsmen were not subject to criminal prosecution because they

“fired their WEAPONS in the honest and sincere

belief that they would suffer serious bodily injury had they not done so.” A federal district judge upheld the indictments against the individuals in January 1971 However, several private lawsuits against the state of Ohio were dismissed on grounds of SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY Ohio’s Eighth District Court of Appeals then ordered a lower court to consider on the merits any suits in which liability was based on the actions of individual Ohio state agents

The Sixth CIRCUIT COURT of Appeals, mean-while, upheld the Portage County Court’s GAG ORDERprohibiting discussion of the shootings by

300 witnesses and others connected with the grand jury indictments It also upheld the federal grand jury’s 25 indictments and the district court’s order to destroy the grand jury’s report as prejudicial

Going all the way to the U.S Supreme Court was a challenge to Ohio’s new anti-riot laws, but the Court, in a 6–1 decision, took no action and refused to delay scheduled trials In November

1972, the first student was tried and convicted of the MISDEMEANOR of interfering with a fireman The jury could not reach a VERDICT on FELONY

charges of ARSON, rioting, and throwing rocks at firemen A few more students pleaded guilty to first-degree riot charges Prosecutors then dropped all charges against 20 remaining defendants on grounds of lack of evidence, having put their strongest cases first and not being successful in any felony convictions

In May 1972 the AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION (ACLU) filed several suits totaling $12 million in damages in federal district court against the Ohio National Guard and the State

of Ohio More than a year later, in August 1973, the Justice Department announced that it would reopen its investigation Also in 1973, a federal grand jury reviewed Justice Department evi-dence and issued indictments against eight former guardsmen, officially charging them with violating the CIVIL RIGHTS of students In

1974 a federal district judge acquitted the guardsmen of all charges, ruling that U.S prosecutors failed to prove willful or intentional deprivation of civil rights

Once again, the U.S Supreme Court issued

a decision related to the tragedy In the 1974 case of Scheur v Rhodes, the Court reversed a lower court that found state officials immune from private suits by the parents of slain students In 1975 all individual civil suits were

150 KENT STATE STUDENT KILLINGS

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consolidated into one case, Krause v Rhodes.

Following a 15-week trial, a federal jury, by a

9–3 vote, acquitted all 29 defendants, including

Ohio Governor James Rhodes The decision was

appealed and in 1977 the U.S Circuit Court of

Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ordered a retrial,

based on evidence that at least one member of

the jury had been threatened and assaulted In

January 1979 an OUT-OF-COURT SETTLEMENT was

reached in all of the consolidated civil cases and

approved by the Ohio State Controlling Board

The $675,000 settlement was dispersed

among 13 plaintiffs, the largest amount going

to an injured student who was paralyzed in the

incident According to Kent University Library

archived documents, the compensation was

accompanied by a statement from the

defen-dants that the May 4, 1970, tragedy“should not

have occurred.” The statement also noted that

the Sixth Circuit had upheld as “lawful” the

university’s ban on rallies and its May 4 order

for the students to disperse The statement

concluded,“We hope that the agreement to end

this litigation will help assuage the tragic

moments regarding that sad day.”

FURTHER READINGS

Caputo, Philip 2005 13 Seconds: A Look Back at the Kent

State Shootings Detroit: Chamberlain.

Kent State Univ Libraries, Special Collections and Archives

Web site 1995 Legal Chronology May 5, 1970–January

4, 1979 Available online at http://www.library.kent.

edu/page/10300; website home page: http://www.

library.kent.edu (accessed August 5, 2009).

Koestler-Grack, Rachel A 2005 The Kent State Tragedy.

Edina, MN: ABDO & Daughters.

CROSS REFERENCES

Protest; Riot; Vietnam War.

KENTUCKY RESOLUTIONS

See VIRGINIA AND KENTUCKY RESOLVES

KEOGH PLAN

A retirement account that allows workers who are

self-employed to set aside a percentage of their net

earnings for retirement income

Also known as H.R 10 plans, Keogh plans

provide workers who are self-employed with

savings opportunities that are similar to those

under company pension plans or individual

retirement accounts (IRAs) However, Keogh

plans allow for a much higher level of

contribu-tion, depending on the type of plan selected

Keogh plans were established in 1962 by the Self-Employed Individuals Tax Retirement Act (26 U.S.C.A § 1 et seq.) and modified by provisions in the EMPLOYEE RETIREMENT INCOME SECURITY ACTof 1974 (29 U.S.C.A § 1 et seq.), the Economic Recovery Tax Act of 1981 (26 U.S.C

A § 1 et seq.), and the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of 1982 (26 U.S.C.A § 1 et seq.) Keogh plans are considered tax shelters because Keogh contributions, which are deduct-ible from a taxpayer’s gross income, and the earnings they generate are considered tax free until they are withdrawn when the contributor retires or dies At the time of withdrawal, the money is taxable as ordinary income

Self-employed individuals are defined as people who pay their ownSOCIAL SECURITYtaxes

on their net income This net income cannot include any investment earnings, wages, or salary The self-employment does not have to

be full-time; in fact, workers who are self-employed on the side can have a separate IRA or other retirement account in the pension plan of the company that pays their wages or salary

Self-employed taxpayers who own a busi-ness and set up a Keogh plan for themselves are also required to set up a Keogh plan for each employee who has worked for their company for at least 1,000 hours over a period of three or more years The level of contributions allowed depends on the type of Keogh plan chosen

Four different types of Keogh plans are available: profit sharing, money-purchase pen-sion, paired, and defined benefit Profit sharing plans are most often set up by small businesses because they require a minimal contribution by employees The maximum amount that may be contributed to this type of plan is 13.04 percent

of an employee’s net income, up to a total of

$22,500 per year

Money-purchase pension plans are often used by high-income earners because the percentage contribution is fixed on an annual basis; the amount can be changed only once a year or through termination of the plan This plan’s contribution limit is 20 percent of net income, up to a total of $30,000 per year

Paired plans merge the benefit of the high contributions allowed by money-purchase pen-sion plans with the flexibility of profit sharing plans For example, an employee may make a money-purchase plan contribution of 7 percent

KEOGH PLAN 151

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and then contribute between 0 and 13 percent

of her or his remaining net income to a profit sharing plan With this plan, an employee can make the maximum 20 percent contribution the money purchase plan allows but still be able

to change the contribution amount throughout the year

Defined-benefit plans require a minimum contribution of $30,000 per year, so are not available to everyone who is self-employed

Generally, contributors to these plans will employ an actuary to determine the amount

of money to be contributed

Contributors to all Keogh plans are eligible

to begin receiving benefits when they are age

5912 At this point the payments are taxed as income If any portion of the money in a Keogh plan is withdrawn early (before age 5912), a 10 percent penalty tax is imposed, in addition to the normal income tax A 15 percent penalty tax

is imposed if the contributor does not start receiving benefits before age 7012

Money can be collected from a Keogh plan in several different ways The two most common ways are lump sums and installments Lump-sum payments are subject to regular income taxes However, with a tax break called forward averaging, just one tax is paid This tax is determined by calculating the total amount that would have been paid if the money had been collected in installments This advantage reduces the amount of total income tax paid on the plan

Installment distributions can be set up in several different ways and for various lengths

For example, they can be paid annually for ten years or annually for the number of years the recipient is expected to live Each distribution is taxed as ordinary income

In the event that the contributor dies before reaching age 5912, the contributor’s heirs will receive the money that is in the Keogh plan, minus income taxes In this case no penalty taxes are imposed for early withdrawal

As a general rule of thumb, Keogh plan accounts are judgment proof Their funds can be seized or garnished only in certain situations For instance, the government can take Keogh funds

to pay personal back taxes owed, and a spouse, ex-spouse, or children may be declared entitled

to receive a portion of Keogh money by a court order if the contributor owes alimony or CHILD SUPPORT

FURTHER READINGS Cheeks, James E 1989 The Dow Jones–Irwin Guide to Keoghs Homewood, IL: Dow Jones–Irwin.

Jones, Sally M 1998 “Maximizing Deductible Contribu-tions to a One-Participant Retirement Plan ” The Journal of Taxation 88, no 2 (February).

“Keogh Plan Exempt from Bankruptcy Estate, Appeals Court Rules ” 1998 Tax Management Financial Plan-ning Journal 14 (January 20): 15–6.

Tyson, Eric 2006 Personal Finance for Dummies Indiana-polis: Wiley.

vKEVORKIAN, JACK Jack Kevorkian has become the most well-known advocate in the United States for the cause of physician-assisted SUICIDE Having helped an estimated 130 terminally or chroni-cally ill individuals kill themselves between 1990 and 1999, Kevorkian sparked a national debate

on the ethical issues involved in EUTHANASIA, or mercy killing Although Kevorkian has argued that his actions have prevented needless suffer-ing for patients in pain and that it has allowed them to die with dignity, others see his work as

a violation of the medical profession’s most cherished ethical principles affirming life over death Working in an area of vexing ethical issues, Kevorkian was championed as a breaker

of unnecessary taboos surrounding death His crusade ended in 1999 when a Michigan state court convicted him of second-degreeMURDER Kevorkian became a focus of national attention in 1990, after he assisted the suicide

of Janet Adkins, a 45-year-old woman who was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, a degenera-tive disease of the brain that causes memory loss and intellectual impairment Adkins had heard through the media about Kevorkian’s invention

of a “suicide machine” that allowed individuals who were ill to administer a lethal dose of poison

to themselves The machine, which Kevorkian assembled out of $45 worth of materials, consisted of three dripping bottles that delivered successive doses of three fluids: a harmless saline solution; a painkiller; and, finally, a poison, potassium chloride When Adkins contacted Kevorkian about using the machine on her, Kevorkian agreed to assist her Kevorkian diagnosed Adkins as suffering from Alzheimer’s and arranged to perform theASSISTED SUICIDEin a public park, in his rusting, 1968 Volkswagen van After Kevorkian had inserted an intravenous needle into her arm, Adkins pressed a red button that caused the machine to administer the painkiller and then the poison Within five

152 KEVORKIAN, JACK

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minutes, Adkins died of heart failure Within

days, Kevorkian had become a national media

celebrity, appearing on such television shows as

Nightline, Geraldo, and Good Morning, America

This first of Kevorkian’s assisted suicides

illustrated the objections that many observers

raise toward Kevorkian’s methods Although she

had begun to show early signs of Alzheimer’s,

Adkins was otherwise in good health and was not

terminally ill; she committed suicide more out of

fear of future suffering than out of current

suffering She had joined the Hemlock Society—

an organization that advocates voluntary

eutha-nasia for terminally ill patients—even before she

became ill In addition, Adkins’s Alzheimer’s

might have impaired her ability to make

decisions Some observers wondered whether

she was also suffering from depression, a treatable

mental illness Moreover, in cases in which a

terminally ill patient has expressed a desire to die,

established rules of medical ethics require that

two independent doctors must confirm that the

patient’s condition is unbearable and irreversible;

Kevorkian had ignored this requirement

Kevorkian was charged with first-degree

murder in the Adkins case, but a judge ruled

that prosecutors failed to show that Kevorkian

had planned and carried out Adkins’s death

Attempts to prosecute Kevorkian were

ham-pered by Michigan’s lack of any law against

physician-assisted suicide Most other states

have laws that make this act aFELONY

In early 1991 a Michigan judge issued an

injunction barring Kevorkian’s use of the suicide

machine, and in the same year, the state of Michigan suspended his medical license Kevor-kian defied such legal actions and continued to help ailing people to end their lives Now that he

no longer could prescribe drugs, Kevorkian assisted with suicides by providing a contraption that administered carbon monoxide through a gas mask As he practiced assisted suicide and published on the subject—describing it in his own terms as“medicide” or “planned death”—

he continued to be surrounded by controversy

For example, an autopsy that was performed on the body of the second person whom he had helped to commit suicide, a patient who had complained of a painful pelvic disease, found no evidence of any disease

Jack Kevorkian GETTY IMAGES

Jack Kevorkian 1928–

◆

❖

◆

1928 Born,

Pontiac, Mich.

1939–45 World War II

1950–53 Korean War

1961–73 Vietnam War

◆

1998 Michigan ballot Proposal B, which would have legalized euthanasia, was defeated

1952 Earned M.D from University of Michigan, began internship in pathology

1959

The Story

of Dissection

published

1960 Medical Research and the Death Penalty published

1960–66 Worked as general pathologist

at Pontiac (Mich.) General Hospital

1970–76 Worked

as chief of pathology

at Saratoga General Hospital

in Detroit

1990 Janet Adkins became first person to commit suicide with Kevorkian’s help

1991 Prescription Medicide:

The Goodness of Planned Death published; Michigan

suspended his medical license

1992 Michigan Legislature passed bill outlawing assisted suicide

1994 Failed in attempt to place assisted-suicide ballot initiative

to voters in Michigan; acquitted in two trials for 1993 arrests

1999 Convicted of second-degree murder and delivery

of a controlled substance;

sentenced to 10–25 years in prison

1998 Acknowledged assisting in at least 130 suicides; 60 Minutes broadcast videotape of Kevorkian administering

lethal injection to terminally ill patient Thomas Youk; charged in Michigan with murder of Youk

1996 Acquitted in two separate trials of four assisted suicides

◆

2008 Ran (unsuccessfully) for U.S Congress

as an independent

2007 Released on parole; promised not to assist in any more suicides

KEVORKIAN, JACK 153

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In 1992 the Michigan Legislature passed a bill outlawing assisted suicide, designed specifi-cally to stop Kevorkian’s activities (Mich Comp

Laws § 752.1021) This law was used to charge Kevorkian with assisting in the death of Thomas

W Hyde, Jr., in August 1993 Kevorkian was jailed twice that year, in November and Decem-ber During his second jail stay, he embarked on

an 18-day fast in which he protested his arrest by drinking only juice His bail was reduced and was paid by Geoffrey Fieger, a flamboyant lawyer who has done a great deal for Kevorkian’s cause

as his friend and legal counsel Kevorkian was found not guilty

Kevorkian then attempted to place before Michigan voters a ballot initiative, Movement Ensuring the Right to Choose for Yourself (MERCY), which sought to amend the Michigan Constitution in order to guarantee competent adults the right to request and to receive medical assistance in taking their own lives However, he failed to garner enough signatures to put the initiative on the 1994 ballot In December 1994 the Michigan Supreme Court upheld the law that had made assisted suicide a crime, and in

1995 the U.S Supreme Court refused to hear Kevorkian’s appeal

Kevorkian continued to assist in suicides even as prosecutors in his home county unsuccessfully attempted to convict him on charges of murder or assisted suicide On May

14, 1996, an Oakland CountyCIRCUIT COURTjury again acquitted Kevorkian of assisted suicide In that case, the prosecution had argued that assisted suicide was a crime under Michigan common law After the acquittal, county prosecutors suggested then that it was unlikely that they would take Kevorkian to trial again

In his actions and his statements, Kevorkian flouted the ethical standards of the medical profession on the issue of assisted suicide The

AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION, a national profes-sional association of physicians, specifically forbids the practice of physician-assisted sui-cide Many doctors deplore Kevorkian’s tech-niques and see them as endangering the trust that must exist between physician and patient

Even the Hemlock Society opposes Kevorkian’s actions, citing his lack of typical procedural precautions

In 1998 Kevorkian allowed the CBS televi-sion program 60 Minutes to tape the lethal injection of Thomas Youk, a patient who was

suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease After the broadcast, county prosecutors again brought a second-degree murder charge against Kevor-kian, who served as his own counsel in his trial

On March 26, 1999, a jury in Oakland County convicted him of second-degree murder and illegal delivery of a controlled substance He was sentenced in April 1999 to 10 to 25 years in prison During the next three years, he sought

to appeal the conviction to appeals court in Michigan However, the Michigan Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction, and the Michigan Supreme Court declined to review the appellate court’s decision Lawyers repre-senting Kevorkian sought to appeal the case to the U.S Supreme Court, but it declined to review the case He spent eight years in prison and was paroled in June of 2007 after promising not to assist in any more suicides

Kevorkian’s efforts in the cause of assisted suicide were only the latest in a series of his unconventional, even morbid, attempts to make

a name for himself in the area of medical research Kevorkian had earned the nickname

Dr Death in 1956, only four years after obtaining his medical degree, when he began making what

he called death rounds at the Detroit-area hospital where he was employed During those rounds, he examined dead bodies in order to collect evidence supporting his contention that the time of a person’s death could be determined from the condition of the person’s eyes Kevorkian caused more controversy—and lost his job at the University of Michigan—in 1960, when he published the book Medical Research and the Death Penalty, in which he argued for the vivisection (i.e., the conduct of medical experi-ments on live subjects) of prisoners who had been sentenced to death Claiming it would be“a unique privilege to be able to experiment on

a doomed human being,” he outlined a plan in which the prisoner-subject would be anesthe-tized at the time of execution, then used for scientific experiments lasting hours or months, and finally executed using a lethal overdose According to Kevorkian, this practice would create both a more painless execution and greater advances in medical research The use of condemned prisoners for medical experimenta-tion and organ donaexperimenta-tion has remained a consistent theme for Kevorkian His 1991 book Prescription: Medicide: The Goodness of Planned Death rehashes these same arguments while also making a case for assisted suicide In another

THE VOLUNTARY

SELF-ELIMINATION OF

INDIVIDUAL AND

MORTALLY DISEASED

OR CRIPPLED LIVES

TAKEN COLLECTIVELY

CAN ONLY ENHANCE

THE PRESERVATION

OF PUBLIC HEALTH

AND WELFARE

—J ACK K EVORKIAN

154 KEVORKIAN, JACK

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unsuccessful venture, Kevorkian re-created

experiments in which Soviet scientists had taken

blood from recently deceased individuals and

transfused it to live patients

In a later article that set forth his plans for

assisted suicide, Kevorkian suggested setting up

suicide clinics: “The acceptance of planned

death implies the establishment of well-staffed

and well-organized medical clinics (‘obitoria’)

where terminally ill patients can opt for death

under controlled circumstances of compassion

and decorum.” As his use of the terms obitoria

and medicide indicate, Kevorkian has a

pen-chant for coining words He dubbed his first

suicide machine alternately a mercitron or a

thanatron—the latter from the Greek word for

death, thanatos—and has used the word obitiatry

to indicate the medical specialization in death

Kevorkian was born May 26, 1928, in

Pontiac, Michigan Named Murad Kevorkian

at birth by his Armenian immigrant parents, he

was the first of his family to attend college He

attended the University of Michigan Medical

School and did his internship at Detroit-area

hospitals Acquaintances of Kevorkian testify to

his prodigious intellect The retired physician

has demonstrated talent as a writer, painter, and

composer A series of 18 paintings that he made

on such grisly topics asGENOCIDE, hanging, and

cannibalism created a stir in Michigan during

the 1960s Kevorkian also has commented that

his unconventional ideas have been influenced

by the history of his Armenian ancestors,

particularly the genocide in which 1.5 million

Armenians were killed during WORLD WAR I by

the Turks Kevorkian has never married

Although many deplore his actions,

Kevor-kian has increased public awareness of some of

the most difficult ethical issues surrounding

DEATH AND DYING With medical technology’s

increasing ability to prolong life have come

more situations that bring great pain and

suffering Kevorkian’s efforts to assist people

in their deaths, although often falling short of

accepted professional standards of diagnosis

and care, have sparked a needed discussion on

these issues Nevertheless, even supporters of

euthanasia sought to distance themselves from

Kevorkian’s practices after his convictions,

drawing distinctions between his practices and

their own beliefs in physician-assisted suicide

Since he was paroled in 2007, Kevorkian has

spoken to large audiences, addressing a crowd

of 4,867 people at the University of Florida in January 2008 In February 2009 Kevorkian lectured to students and faculty at Nova Southeastern University in Davie, Florida, discussing tyranny, the criminal justice system and politics At the end of this lecture, Dr

Kevorkian unveiled an American Flag with a swastika where the field of stars should reside

He claimed the flag was intended to shock and remind everyone that this is where America is headed if changes are not made

In 2008 Kevorkian ran for the U.S Congress

to represent Michigan’s 9th Congressional Dis-trict, as an independent His efforts did not get him elected, but he did receive 9,000 votes

FURTHER READINGS Betzold, Michael 1993 Appointment with Dr Death Troy, Mich.: Momentum.

Goldsworthy, Joan 1991 “Jack Kevorkian.” In Newsmakers:

1991 Cumulation.

Huber, Stephen W 2002 “High Court Won’t Hear Appeal

by Kevorkian.” The Oakland Press.

Kevorkian, Jack 1991 Prescription Medicide: The Goodness of Planned Death New York: Prometheus Books.

Murphy, Brian 2000 “Jack Kevorkian Continues Crusade from Prison Cell ” The Seattle Times.

CROSS REFERENCE Physician-Assisted Suicide KEY NUMBERS®

A system devised by West Group involving the classification of legal subjects that are organized within their publications according to specific topics and subtopics Each topic and subtopic is given a key number that consists of one or more digits preceded by the symbol of a key assigned to each individual classification

A particular point of law can be traced through different law books by following the cases listed under a Key Number in each series

West Group, formerly the West Publishing Company, developed the Key Number System

of Classification during the decade spanning 1897–1906 The system is a valuable research tool because once the topic and Key Number have been located, a researcher has ready access

to all American cases that have litigated that issue provided those cases have been reported

More than 425 Key Numbers in the system are arranged by subject matter under seven main headings—persons, property, contracts, torts, crimes, remedies, and government—and 32 subdivisions of the system

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Key Numbers are also a vital component of Westlaw,TMan on-line resource for conducting

COMPUTER-ASSISTED LEGAL RESEARCH The Key Numbers employed on Westlaw are identical

to those used in the print counterparts to the on-line system

FURTHER READINGS Kunz, Christina L., et al 2008 The Process of Legal Research.

7th ed Frederick, MD: Aspen.

KEYCITETM

An interactive, computer-assisted citatory service that allows legal researchers to verify the validity of

a case and to find all references that have cited that case as authority

Every day, lawyers are asked by their clients

to persuade judges to rule in their favor One way

in which they try to accomplish this task is by citing prior legal decisions, called precedent, that support their clients’ positions Depending on its factual similarity to a pending legal dispute, a relevant precedent can control or influence the outcome of a case Consequently, lawyers look for ways to make precedents appear more persuasive, while courts look for ways to determine which precedents are relevant, impor-tant, or controlling in their jurisdictions

KeyCite is designed to expedite the process

of assessing a case’s presidential value Released

by West Group in July 1997, KeyCite was initially available only through Westmate, an online software package that allows subscribers

to Westlaw,TM West’s computer-assisted re-search service, to connect through their

person-al computer modems over a telephone line into

a central mainframe computer located in Eagan, Minnesota By the end of 1997, however, KeyCite was also made available to customers over the INTERNET and through West Group’s CD-ROM software package called Premise.TM The majority of users now use the service through Westlaw on the Internet

KeyCite uses graphical markers to signify the status or history of a case A red flag warns that a case is no longer good law for at least one

of the points it contains, meaning that a case has been reversed, vacated, superseded, overruled,

or abrogated in some respect A yellow flag warns that a case has some negative history, meaning that a point of law contained in a case has been amended, modified, limited, or called into doubt, but not completely eviscerated

A blue letter H indicates that a case has some history, but no known negative history, which generally means that a case contains a point of law that has been appealed, affirmed, discussed, relied on as precedent, or otherwise cited as relevant authority

KeyCite also employs graphical markers to signify the extent to which courts have subsequently relied on a case Stars are used

to reveal the extent to which one case discusses another: four stars indicate that a case has been

“examined,” meaning that the cited case has received more than a printed page of treatment

in another decision; three stars indicate that a case has been “discussed,” meaning that the cited case has received more than a paragraph

of treatment in another decision, but less than

a full printed page; two stars indicate that a case has been “cited,” meaning that the cited case has received less than a paragraph of treatment in another decision; and one star indicates that a case has been “mentioned,” meaning that the cited case has been briefly referenced in another decision

Quotation marks are used in KeyCite displays to signify that a cited case has been quoted by another court Based on the idea that cases cited more frequently tend to be more significant, KeyCite tallies citation counts for every case within its coverage Although KeyCite coverage is not comprehensive, it is available for

a growing number of types of authorities Beginning coverage for state case citations varies according to jurisdiction Citator coverage now also covers state and federal statutes

KeyCite integrates many of the features already found on Westlaw KeyCite results can

be limited to a particular date range, so that only the most recent cases citing a particular precedent are displayed They also can be restricted by jurisdiction, so lawyers in one state can focus on legal authority in their home jurisdictions, without being sidetracked by cases from foreign jurisdictions Finally, Key-Cite allows headnotes (i.e., summaries of legal rules and principles established by courts that are added by West Group editors to cases published in the National Reporter System) from particular cases to be traced through subsequent opinions

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