Presswatch
Corry, John
by John Corry Dr. Death Kills Mike Wallace How "60 Minutes" romanticized a serial killer. H ow do you like your serial killers? What about dedicated, idealistic, and sworn to public service, with...
...It may also be, and probably is, that Wallace supports some of the same causes Kevorkian does...
...And besides, "6o Minutes" hadn't even filmed it itself...
...Euthanasia, he told Time magazine, was a legitimate topic: "The story we put on the air, exactly as we told it, was a fit and proper one for '6o Minutes...
...Moreover those cases date back to the early 1990's, and since then, the psychologist says, he has found no evidence that Kevorkian ever tried again to consult with a victim's physician or psychiatrist...
...In the past he had always left bodies in motel rooms, along with notes telling police, or anyone else, to call his lawyer...
...The sweeps period sets programs' local advertising rates, although Don Hewitt, the executive producer of "6o Minutes," said that had nothing to do with the program's timing...
...Tom, do you really want to go ahead with this...
...Wallace also accepted Kevorkian's assertion that he was ending Youk's life so he would not choke on his own saliva...
...This suggested, of course, that Kevorkian was the soul of reasoned and humane caution, never hastening anyone toward death...
...Since Kevorkian's medical specialty was in pathology, it may be assumed that he was the professional who had removed them...
...The arteries in the kidneys, meanwhile, were tied off with kitchen twine, and the kidneys were then stored in a refrigerator in the lunchroom in the office of Kevorkian's lawyer...
...Meanwhile, it was soon apparent that the program had been a success...
...And in the remaining four cases, the medical examiner could find no anatomical evidence of disease at all...
...You knew that from the start...
...In the last year, though, he has begun to leave bodies at hospitals...
...William Raspberry wrote an equally solemn, but far more subtle, column in the Washington Post in which he said it was "time to give some thought to enacting the option Kevorkian has been urging...
...Kevorkian has been using videotape for years...
...I could not imagine then how he could do that, but I do know now...
...Frank Rich wrote a solemn column in the New York Times in which he said it could spur "a frank, humane and long-overdue national conversation about the boundaries of life...
...But the story really was not fit and proper, and in fact "6o Minutes" had told it badly...
...For as Jack Kevorkian told Mike Wallace on "6o Minutes," none of this had anything to do with him, it was all about euthanasia, and if he were to be convicted of a crime, he would go off to prison dutifully, and then starve himself to death...
...After performing 53 autopsies in cases involving Kevorkian-assisted deaths, the Oakland County medical examiner found that only fourteen of those who died were terminally ill, or likely to die within six to eight months if Kevorkian had not intervened...
...What about dedicated, idealistic, and sworn to public service, with a commitment to free expression, and a willingness to die for ideas...
...B ut that was hardly true, and "6o Minutes" and CBS should be ashamed of themselves, but probably never will be, for allowing that on the air...
...Then we saw Kevorkian administer potassium chloride...
...As it happened, though, an organization that helps handicapped people adjust to their infirmities had gotten a court order allowing its staffers to meet with him...
...Meanwhile in the last year or so Kevorkian has been moving on, in effect broadening his practice...
...And so it went for virtually the entire "6o Minutes" segment...
...Was this really the first time Kevorkian had videotaped the moment of death...
...Last February he assisted a 21-yearold quadriplegic...
...Thus we saw Kevorkian, who had just given Youk an injection of Seconal, bend over him, and ask, "Sleepy, Tom...
...JOHN CORRY is The American Spectator's senior correspondent and regular Press-watch columnist...
...Clearly he thought that pretty funny...
...The next day in Michigan he dropped off the body of a woman he had helped to die...
...Kevorkian replied, "He's dying...
...Then Wallace asked, "Is he dead now...
...On the other hand, that did add a garnish...
...That was unlikely, too...
...Was Kevorkian the competent and skilled professional he suggested he was...
...The first fellow, a retired psychiatrist, is to help him as he helps other people to die...
...The record on this is frighteningly clear...
...The problem there was that choking can be prevented with proper medical treatment, and Kevorkian's assertion must have terrified any victims of Lou Gehrig's disease, or any members of their families, who were listening...
...After all, proof that he had murdered Youk was right there on the videotape...
...Meanwhile the professional medical examiner who conducted the autopsy on the victim's body said it had been "mutilated...
...There was no hint of any of this, of course, on "6o Minutes...
...And then Wallace said that Kevorkian "says this is the first time he's taped themoment of death...
...6o Minutes" was pleased, too...
...The next day he died, with the help of Jack Kevorkian...
...Wallace called him Doctor Kevorkian, although Kevorkian's medical licenses have long been revoked, and he has no professional status...
...Two more notes now on Kevorkian and the media: When Kevorkian attended Time magazine's 75th anniversary party as an invited guest he was warmly greeted by many of the other celebrities...
...Apparently he just wasn't interested...
...Presumably they were severely depressed or suffering from mental illness...
...It had the videotape, and it simply was determined to show it...
...Let's not hurry into this," he said...
...The audience was waiting to see someone die...
...The cadaver still had the sweatshirt on it that the patient had been wearing when he died...
...Many, and probably most, of Kevorkian's victims died before they should have...
...Kevorkian, however, seems to have just killed them...
...Wallace, 8o years old, told the Philadelphia Inquirer that he had a mutual assisted-suicide pact with his wife in case either of them develops a terminal illness...
...52-year-old Thomas Youk, who suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease, just seemed to go to sleep...
...46 January 1999 The American Spectator And as for Kevorkian, he was charged with murder, just as he had hoped...
...He wanted to be tried for murder, and he taunted the prosecutor in Oakland County, Michigan, where Youk had died, by saying, "Do you have to dust for fingerprints...
...A Chicago psychologist who studied Kevorkian's first 48 assisted suicides —Kevorkian's death toll is now well over loo — found that in perhaps half of the first twenty cases Kevorkian made no attempt to contact the victims' personal physicians...
...The American Spectator • January 1999 47...
...It was discovered, however, that the kidney-removal surgery had been a good deal less than sterile...
...Its household rating for the program, which was shown during the sweeps period, was up some zo percent over its season average...
...In an attempt to at least look balanced, it did give a medical ethicist a chance to criticize Kevorkian, but it gave him only some 90 seconds to do it...
...Press accounts said he was much sought after for joint photo sessions with other celebrities...
...Kevorkian needed more scrutiny than that...
...Shouldn't he wait a month, a week...
...On the videotape Kevorkian asked Youk whether he wanted to delay his death...
...He has a well-documented past, but "6o Minutes" ignored it...
...When we watched the videotape on "6o Minutes," we could also watch Wallace and Kevorkian while they were watching it, too...
...Fine sentiments, of course, but who cared...
...the CBS newsmagazine was only showing Kevorkian's videotape...
...Meanwhile 35 of the deceased were found to be suffering from disease or illness, although not one was in a terminal stage...
...Still, it wasn't much of a death scene...
...For one thing, he has been helping younger people to die...
...He has also established what he calls a "fellowship...
...and soon someone did...
...Meanwhile Wallace, who supposedly is a tough questioner, accepted whatever Kevorkian had to say...
...Besides the move to younger victims—shortly after the 21-year-old quadriplegic died, Kevorkian assisted a 26-year-old paraplegic —Kevorkian has also adopted a change in tactics...
...And then Kevorkian made his brave threat about starving to death in prison...
...For one thing, it was discussed on talk shows and on op-ed pages...
...This second note is more personal: Barbara Walters once told this writer that she thought Kevorkian wanted, perhaps more than anything else, to have us watch while he killed someone...
...That was unlikely...
...After he helped a 45-year-old quadriplegic to die last year, Kevorkian offered the man's kidneys for transplant...
...When the staffers arrived at the hospital, however, they found that some unknown persons had removed the young man from the hospital...
...Other doctors might have helped them...
Vol. 32 • January 1999 • No. 1
