Latest news with #BBCActionLine
Yahoo
03-06-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Euthanasia activist arrested over 'suicide pod' dies
A pro-euthanasia activist who was arrested following the death of a woman using the world's first so-called suicide pod has died. Dr Florian Willet, 47, was reportedly the only other person present when a 64-year-old American woman took her own life using the device in a forest in Switzerland last September. The pod's inventor Philip Nitschke told BBC News that Dr Willet died by assisted suicide in Germany. In a separate statement, Mr Nitschke said Dr Willet had suffered psychological trauma following his arrest and detention in connection with the Switzerland death. If you are experiencing any of the issues mentioned in this story you can visit BBC Action Line for a list of websites and helplines that can offer direct help at any time. "In the final months of his life, Dr Florian Willet shouldered more than any man should," he said. The Last Resort - an assisted dying organisation founded by Dr Willet to facilitate the use of the pod - said the arrest had left him "broken". The activist was held in pre-trial detention for 70 days while police investigated whether he had intentionally killed the woman - an allegation he was not charged with. Prior to his death on 5 May, Dr Willet fell from a third-floor window, the group said, leaving him requiring surgery and needing to be "cared for by a full psychiatric team". While assisted dying is legally protected in some circumstances in Switzerland, it is strictly regulated, and the pod has encountered opposition. Advocates say the device - manufactured by Sarco - provides an assisted dying option which is not reliant on drugs or doctors and expands potential access. Critics fear the device's modern design glamorises suicide, and that the fact that it can be operated without medical oversight is concerning. Assisted dying is illegal in the UK and in most other European countries, but thousands have travelled to Switzerland over the years to end their own lives. BBC News has contacted the Swiss prosecutor's office for comment.
Yahoo
01-06-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Abuse was normalised in our home
"I had a pristine frontage of a middle-class home - no one thought it could happen behind those doors, but it did." David Challen successfully campaigned to free his mother, Sally Challen, from prison in 2019, almost nine years after she had killed his father, Richard, with a hammer. She had suffered decades of coercive control at the hands of her husband, which David said had become "normalised" within the family home in the wealthy suburban village of Claygate in Surrey. David, now a domestic abuse campaigner, has now written a book, called The Unthinkable, about the family's experiences, and said more needs to be done to protect victims. Speaking to Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg on BBC One, he said: "She'd done the worst act anyone possibly could do. [She] took away my father. "I couldn't understand it, but I knew something had been rolling... something was happening and I just didn't have the words." A law passed in 2015, which recognises psychological manipulation as a form of domestic abuse, helped secure Mrs Challen's release from prison after she had been jailed for life for murder in 2011. Coercive control describes a pattern of behaviour by an abuser to harm, punish or frighten their victim and became a criminal offence in England and Wales in December 2015. David said this description had set him and his mother "free". "It gave us a language to describe what was going on in that home, to describe the insidious nature that is mostly non-physical violence," he said. Not having a name for the abuse had "robbed us of our right to have an ability to protect ourselves," he added. He now uses his experience of "intergenerational trauma" to help others, with a book telling the family's story being released on Thursday. "I buried my childhood with my father, so I had to dig up the past to find the child I had left behind," he said. "It was the child that I always hid because I didn't know how he experienced that world. "But I knew I was born into this world with a gut feeling that [there was] something inherently bad about my father, and I never knew why. "I normalised the coercion and control in my home, this life of servitude that my mother lived under... sexual violence was routine." If you are affected by any of the issues raised in this article, help and support is available via the BBC Action Line. He said he wrote the book to "give voice to what it's like to grow up in a home where domestic abuse wasn't the word - it was coercive control and it didn't appear on my TV screens". But, a decade on, "we're not tackling it enough", he added. "I continue to speak out because I don't want these events to happen again." Wife's murder conviction quashed 'My mum killed my dad but I want her freed' HM Courts & Tribunals Service
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Kara Tointon has double mastectomy after gene test
Former EastEnders actress Kara Tointon has revealed she has undergone a double mastectomy following a gene test. The 41-year-old, also known for her work in dramas including The Teacher and Mr Selfridge, revealed that tests showed she carried the BRCA gene - which can put her at very high risk of cancer. Tointon, from Basildon in Essex, posted an Instagram video on Wednesday to raise awareness of the preventative measure she had taken. She said: "You may have heard of the BRCA genes 1 and 2 and as a carrier it means I am at a greater risk of both breast and ovarian cancer." In 2018, the soap star said she was asked to take a genetics test when her mother Carol was undergoing treatment for ovarian cancer. She is working with gynaecological cancer charity the Eve Appeal, of which she is an ambassador. "There is a history of both cancers in my family on my mother's side, but for various reasons, including generational trauma of which I'll talk more about another time, we hadn't looked into it until that point," she said. "But it was put to us, we took the test, and it was confirmed that my mum and I both carried the gene." Ms Tointon's mother died in 2019. If you need any advice or support on issues relating to this story, information and contacts are available on the BBC Action Line "Last year, having had my second son in 2021 and deciding that our family was complete, I underwent two preventative surgeries," she said. "The first a double mastectomy and the second a two-part protector study, a trial. "They believe that ovarian cancer begins in the fallopian tubes so by removing them first, checking them out, you then remove the ovaries later, and closer to menopause," she added. Hollywood star Angelina Jolie underwent a double mastectomy after she discovered she carried the BRCA1 gene, leading to greater awareness of the gene defect. Around one in 1,000 women across the UK have a BRCA1 variant, but most breast and ovarian cancers happen due to chance damage to genes. After several tests, including biopsies and MRIs, Tointon said: "I decided that this was the right decision for me and my family. "It wasn't an easy decision, but one I'm very glad and lucky I made, and I can now, with hindsight, talk about it properly." Follow Essex news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X. New hope for patients with breast cancer gene A family tree gene revelation may have saved my life Eve Appeal
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Charity gets 'record-breaking' support to help boy
A charity that supports construction workers and their families is about to embark on its next project to help a disabled boy, with a record amount of tradespeople offering to help. Band of Builders, based in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire, will be helping Norfolk teenager Toby, 15, who has quadriplegic cerebral palsy and dystonia. Renovation work to make Toby's home more suitable for his needs were started by his father, but he died on Christmas Eve. Dozens of trades have since put their names forward to help finish the work. Charity operations director Tony Steel praised the support being offered. "The more people we've got, the more we can guarantee to get this over the line," he said. The charity was started by Addam Smith in 2016 after one of his workers was diagnosed with an incurable cancer. Since then it has helped many people with practical assistance such as providing home adaptations, financial grants and wellbeing support. In its latest endeavour, the charity called for tradespeople to help with "Toby's project" in Foulden, near Swaffham. It said the boy's father, Shaun Fletcher - an electrician - was doing renovations on his home that included building a wet room, so the 15-year-old did not have to be carried up and down the stairs. Mr Steel added: "Unfortunately things became a little bit too much for him and he took his own life on Christmas Eve." He said the group's intention was to complete the work that was started. If you have been affected by the issues in this story, help and support is available via BBC Action Line. The charity regularly uses social media to call for tradespeople to help with its builds, but the response to Toby's Project had been "absolutely incredible" and "record-breaking" with about 150 applicants, Mr Steel said. "The people in Norfolk have just been absolutely stunning, really, and within two days we had something like 130 volunteers apply to come and give us a hand to make this project work. "Without them we wouldn't be able to do these sorts of things." Follow Norfolk news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X. Builders finish extension for man who had aneurysm Over 70 builders come together for double amputee Man keen for 'dignity and privacy' in new bedroom Band of Builders
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Yahoo
Teen tried to strangle woman and killed hamster
A teenager who tried to strangle a woman and killed her pet hamster has been given a custodial sentence of nearly three years. Max Roberts, of Eastfield Road, Peterborough, attacked the woman while she was sitting on a bed playing Xbox. Police said the 18-year-old elbowed her to the face, attempted to strangle her, and chased her into the kitchen where he punched and kicked her face and body. At Cambridge Crown Court on Friday, he was given a 32-month term at a Young Offenders Institution. Det Cons Joshua Crown said: "Roberts behaved despicably, aiming to inflict the most emotional pain possible by killing the victim's hamster." Cambridgeshire Police said the victim was forced to hand over her mobile phone and keys to Roberts following the attack on 25 November. The force said that after targeting the hamster and kicking the cage of a second hamster - causing it to shatter - he then told her he would "kill everything she loves". He eventually left the property and sent a message claiming he would "be back to finish her off", police said. Roberts admitted intentional strangulation, causing criminal damage to property, failing to prevent the causing of unnecessary suffering to an animal and causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal. He was also issued with a restraining order not to contact the victim and not to visit any address where she may be staying or visiting. If you have been affected by this story or would like support then you can find organisations which offer help and information at the BBC Action Line. Follow Peterborough news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X. Cambridgeshire Constabulary
