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Hi, I'm Vinny Polytan and welcome to the Court TV Podcast.

This week we have an audio edition of our original series,

Judgment with Ashley Banfield,

where we look at the most compelling trials

from the Court TV Archives.

Dr. Jack Kavorkian, a proponent for physician-assisted suicide, thought it was an act of

mercy to help over 130 terminally ill patients die a peaceful, pain-free death. But Michigan prosecutors said it was

murder. They would spend years trying to convince multiple juries to convict on

murder charges, a case that asks difficult ethical questions regarding a

terminally ill patient's right to die.

This is judgment of Dr. Jack Kavorkin. This is the court TV podcast. I stated emphatically that help Thomas Hyde in his merciful suicide.

I supplied the van, which was my personal van.

I supplied the gas, I supplied the tubing and the mask and all necessary

equipment. I put the mask over on Mr Hyde's face. I turned on the gas on the main valve on the tank. I instructed him then if he was sure,

then all he had to do was move his left forearm a bit and pull, he then pulled the string and the clip

came off the tubing. He then went on and died. The 1990s saw their fair share of salacious crimes and gripping trials from O.J. Simpson to the Menendez brothers.

Tupped into that decade was a series of trials that raised tough questions about the right to die.

At the center of the conversation was a quirky pathologist from Michigan named Jack Kavorkian, a man who would earn the dubious moniker Dr. Death.

Over the course of that decade, Kavorkian assisted over 130 sick and terminally ill patients in their requests

to end their lives.

...