SAN FRANCISCO — Advocates for the right of terminally-ill patients to end their lives have enlisted some serious legal firepower for the next phase in a battle to legalize doctor-assisted suicide in California.
Plaintiff Christy Donorovich-O’Donnell, an employment and civil rights defense attorney who is dying of lung cancer, argues her doctor shouldn’t be barred from prescribing her a lethal dose of barbiturates. Her challenge to the law that makes assisted suicide a felony in California was dismissed in July by a San Diego judge who remarked the case “cries out for a legislative fix, not a judicial nix” of the state’s current ban. Lawyers with O’Melveny & Myers, who represented O’Donnell in the trial court, brought in appellate experts from Arnold & Porter and Horvitz & Levy to assist with a 66-page petition for writ of mandate filed with the Fourth District Court of Appeal on Thursday.
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