Mercy killing or murder? The death of a scientist starts a debate on euthanasia in Australia

The incident has tapped into the broader debate in Australia over euthanasia and assisted dying, which has been renewed in recent weeks as Parliament considered a proposal to overturn a two-decade-old ban on the practice in the nation’s territories.

By: New York Times | Updated: August 29, 2018 6:25:54 pm

Mary E White, an environmental scientist, died in Bundanoon, Australia, in early August. (NYT)

Even into her 80s, Mary E White thrived on the expanse of Australian rainforest she had made her home, and she told friends of ambitious plans: She was going to write her autobiography, and there were two other books she wanted to finish.

But dementia robbed her of vigour. White, an accomplished scientist who gained prominence for warnings of desert encroachment and overpopulation, soon moved into a nursing home closer to her family but far from her old home. She could not communicate, friends said, and did not recognize visitors.

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Then, one evening this month, White was found dead. She was 92. Several days later, her daughter was charged with murdering her.

The accusations have stunned people who knew White and her family, as well as Bundanoon, the small town where neighbours remembered an attentive daughter who would take her mother to the salon for haircuts and stop in the cafe across the street. Many insist that whatever happened must have been motivated by compassion and love.

“It would have been done as an act of mercy,” said Jenny Goldie, a friend who had known White for 30 years. “There wouldn’t have been any malice attached to it at all.”

The case has saddened and confused White’s friends. But it has also tapped into the broader debate in Australia over euthanasia and assisted dying, which has been renewed in recent weeks as Parliament considered a proposal to overturn a two-decade-old ban on the practice in the nation’s territories.

The legislation ultimately failed, but last year, the state of Victoria became the first in Australia to legalize assisted dying, allowing someone with an incurable illness and limited life expectancy to obtain a dose of a lethal drug, and other states are considering their own legislation. No such allowance exists in New South Wales, where Bundanoon sits a two-hour drive southwest of Sydney; an assisted dying bill was rejected last year.

Some have viewed White’s case as an example of why that conversation must continue.

It has already stirred a delicate discussion about the toll of ageing and illness, as well as the effect of watching a family member’s decline. It is a subject that especially resonates in Bundanoon, where the population tends to skew older. (The median age, according to census figures, is 56.)

Some have acknowledged that they could recognize themselves and their parents in White’s case. The authorities have indicated that the family had asked at her nursing home about euthanasia, and many here suspect that as White’s health declined, her daughter, Barbara Eckersley, must have felt compelled to intervene.

“It stopped the mother’s suffering,” said Peter Giannakos, who has owned the Primula Cafe and Restaurant on the town’s main street for 25 years.

Some of his customers said such an act could be justifiable. He considered his own mother-in-law, who is 96 and infirm, and said he was less certain. “I can’t do it,” he said. “I can’t do it.”

White, who was found dead at the nursing home, was killed on the evening of August 5, the police said, and Eckersley was arrested on Aug. 8. Local news reports said a lethal combination of medications had caused White’s death.

Eckersley, 66, has been released on bail. Through her lawyer, she declined to comment, as did other family members. Friends said the two women had been close. Among other things, they shared an interest in science.

White, who did not often discuss her religious beliefs with friends, described having a spiritual connection with nature, which was her life’s work.

She was born in southern Africa, in what was then known as Rhodesia, and she studied paleobotany at the University of Capetown. She moved with her husband, a geologist, and their children to Australia in 1955.

While working as a research associate for the Australian Museum in Sydney, she assembled a plant fossil collection that included 12,000 specimens. Sometimes when her husband was sent to Northern Australia for government work he would send home drums filled with fossils for White to study.

Over time, her writing evolved from largely academic texts to books, with titles like “Listen … Our Land is Crying” and “Running Down: Water in a Changing Land,” that denounced unsustainable land and water use in Australia and the threats posed by a booming population.

These were the works that became her legacy. “Mary White’s contribution to our understanding of the natural cycles that drive all life on the planet and of our human impact on those processes is unsurpassed,” Chrissie Goldrick, the editor-in-chief of Australian Geographic, said in a statement.

In 2003, White bought the sprawling property called Falls Forest, a four-hour drive up the coast from Sydney. Conservationists praised her for sparing some 200 acres of forest and preserving its biodiversity and for opening it to the public. She identified and labelled the plants along pathways around the property. Platypuses were sometimes spotted in the creek near the house, where wallabies and eastern grey kangaroos routinely hopped by.

“It was Mary’s concern that we were losing too many of these ancient forests,” said Brett Dolsen, a photographer who befriended White and made a short documentary film about her. “Mary’s work will never be forgotten in scientific and educational fields,” he said, describing much of her work as pioneering. “Her message to humanity is what she lived for in protecting our planet.”

Dolsen spent much time with White at Falls Forest, often sitting with her on the veranda, where she would take the cover off her parrot’s cage, wishing the bird a good morning and insisting Dolsen do the same.

He was astonished by her energy. At 88, he said, she still ran the property, with its conference centre and villas for guests. But he learned that her increasingly methodical approach to life was a way of navigating her dementia.

“Mary had forewarned me that her memory was failing,” he said, “and that there were certain protocols I would need to know, including our arrangements and times for meeting.”

By the time she left the property a few years ago and moved to Bundanoon, where her daughter lives, the disease had accelerated considerably. Goldie said that White’s family had told her that she was essentially incapacitated. “She was the diametric opposite of what she had been before,” Goldie said.

Goldie, who had gotten to know White through their involvement in environmental advocacy, had visited Eckersley’s home about a week before White died. Goldie said she sensed tension.

“No smiling,” she said. “No laughter in the house.” She recognized the strain Eckersley was under. She was reminded of the anguish she faced as her mother’s health declined.

It was not clear if prosecutors pursuing the murder charge would take such issues into account, but they have not yet suggested any ulterior motive in White’s death.

“It’s just very hard when you have to sort of encounter it every day,” Goldie said. “They knew I understood and I think they appreciated that. But I don’t think I understood how desperate Barbara must have been.”