David Hunter is due to appear in court in the coastal town of Paphos on Monday, almost nine months to the day he admitted suffocating his 75-year-old wife Janice to death. “He’s 76 years old and he’s desperate for the case to go to trial,” said Michael Pollack, a lawyer at the UK-based legal aid group Justice Abroad, who traveled to the hearing. “He has been in custody for a long time and it is clear, after visiting him in Nicosia Central Prison, that he is very anxious to get off the ground.” Adjourned by a three-judge court in June, court proceedings are expected to begin with prosecution witnesses taking the stand. The former Northumberland miner, who shares a cell with 11 other men in an overcrowded prison, faces the prospect of spending the rest of his life behind bars if found guilty. The couple, who were teenage sweethearts, settled in Cyprus for what they hoped would be a dream retirement life abroad. But in the run-up to Christmas last year – fearing she would suffer the same fate as her sister Kathleen, who had suffered an agonizing death from the same disease – Janice reportedly begged her husband to end her life as the her health deteriorated due to the leukemia she had been diagnosed with in 2016. Hunter says he finally gathered the strength to respond to her pleas on the evening of December 18 as she sat in her favorite armchair in the living room of the maisonette they rented in Tremithousa, a village outside Paphos. He then tried to kill himself by overdosing on prescription pills. The couple’s daughter Lesley Cawthorne, 49, said it was vital her father returned home where he could begin to properly mourn her mother and be cared for. “I can tell you he’s very depressed,” said Cawthorne, who has stood by her father since learning he had ended her mother’s “terrible pain and suffering.” “His mental health is probably the worst.” The Paphos yard is less than three miles from Tremithousa, where Janice is buried. Hunter has repeatedly expressed his disappointment and upset at not being allowed to visit his wife’s grave. Euthanasia is illegal in Cyprus. In a Mediterranean society dominated by the Orthodox Church, the subject has long been considered taboo, with parliament only recently beginning to debate whether it should be legalized at all. The island’s attorney general rejected a call to reduce the premeditated murder charge to assisted suicide in line with legislation elsewhere in Europe. Achilleas Dimitriadis, a candidate in next year’s presidential election, told the Guardian that the mercy killing had highlighted how unexpectedly Cyprus remained with the rest of the EU on dying with dignity. “The laws of Cyprus do not provide for euthanasia and this clearly needs to be amended,” said the leading human rights lawyer, who is contesting the February vote as an independent. “Society has come to accept that assisted suicide should be allowed under certain circumstances. After all, people have the right to life, but they also have the right to die with dignity.” Officers rushed to the maisonette after being tipped off by Hunter’s brother, who had himself been called by the pensioner before his own suicide attempt. In circumstances that raised further questions, the Briton was questioned without a lawyer or interpreter present moments before he was rushed to hospital to have his stomach pumped. He then spent 10 days in a psychiatric clinic in Nicosia before being admitted to prison. Polak, who is co-ordinating Hunter’s defense team, said: “This is a historic case because it is the first involving euthanasia in Cyprus. “David is determined to fight every step of the way. He goes on to talk about how he and Janice did everything together and the pain he felt. It is very difficult to see what the public interest is in prosecuting him for murder.” Pollack claimed that the attorney general had rejected objections to reduce the charge to assisted suicide for political reasons. “It seems they don’t want to make a decision before parliament legislates on the matter,” he said. “And now we expect the trial to last several months.” The pensioner’s plight has sparked an outpouring of communal sympathy from locals. In Tremithousa, many said the sentence already imposed in the form of a lengthy prison term did not fit the crime. “They shouldn’t be in jail,” said Christofis Petrou, who heads the village’s community and knew the couple as its owner. “I spoke to David in the courtroom [in June] and told him we are all with him. He is a good man. Our old fashioned laws are wrong, not David.’
In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is 1-800-273-8255. In the UK, you can contact the Samaritans on 116 123. In Australia, the Lifeline crisis support service is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found here
