Previous Post: Globe and Mail: Rasouli Case – Supreme Court upholds family’s right to continue life support
Click here or on top Blog logo to return to Blog front page.
Menu
45 St. Clair Ave. West, Suite 600
Toronto, Ontario, M4V 1K9
Tel: (416) 925-7400
Will, Estate, Trust Disputes
Advising Fiduciaries
Dependant Support Claims
Passing of Fiduciary Accounts
End-of-Life & Treatment Decisions
© 2025 WEL Partners, practicing as WEL Professional Corporation. All rights reserved.
WEL Partners is committed to providing accessible customer service. If you require communication supports, please contact us by email at admin@welpartners.com or by telephone at 416-355-3253 or 416-925-7400.
Please note: Our Firm does not accept retainers via e-mail; and sending an e-mail to our Firm does not constitute a retainer. You will not be considered a client of the Firm unless and until we have agreed to act for you according to our usual procedures for accepting clients which includes a signed written retainer agreement. Do not include any confidential information in your e-mail. Any confidential information will be deleted immediately by our Firm.
Written by: Kimberly A. Whaley
Posted on: October 20, 2013
Categories: Commentary
Mark Handelman, Firm Counsel, Whaley Estate Litigation has written a paper reviewing the recent Supreme Court decision in the Rasouli case entitled “Consent to Withdrawal of Life Support: What the Supreme Court Said in Cuthbertson and Rubenfeld v. Rasouli.”
Brief excerpt:
“It may be necessary to hang a man or pull down a house. But we take good care not to make the hangman and the housebreaker the judges of that. If we did, then no neck would be safe and no house stable.”
George Bernard Shaw The Doctor’s Dilemma
Introduction
When Mr. Shaw wrote that a hundred years ago, it would not have occurred to him that his precise question would be before Canada’s Supreme Court, with a life [or death] hanging in the balance. Those were the stakes when the Court heard Cuthbertson and Rubenfeld v. Rasouli on December 10, 2012. The Judgment was released October 18th, 2013.
Click here to download Mark’s paper (PDF, 30 pages)
Disclosure: Mark Handelman litigated or adjudicated some of the cases referred to and was co-counsel to the Intervener when this case was in the Court of Appeal.
Author
View all posts