Noelia's euthanasia is postponed again: the TSJC supports it but recognizes the father's right to relocate

BarcelonaMore than a year later, Noelia must continue waiting for a court decision to qualify for a dignified death, even though the courts consider her entitled to it. The High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) issued a ruling this Friday rejecting the appeal filed by her father, represented by the ultra-Catholic group Advocats Cristians (Christian Lawyers), to halt the euthanasia procedure authorized by the Catalan Guarantee and Evaluation Commission, the body responsible for assessing requests. However, although it concludes that the case meets the requirements for a dignified death, the high court also recognizes the right of a family member to exhaust legal remedies to halt the dignified death of a relative, as it ruled in another case last April.

The high court supports the young woman's recourse to this benefit, but at the same time legitimizes Noelia's father to continue the judicial process to try to stop her until a final judgment is issued, according to the ruling released by Cadena SER and consulted by ARA. This does not mean, the TSJC clarifies, that the legitimate interest of the parents "necessarily" overrides that of their daughter. "Recognizing the legitimacy of the parents of a person who requests to end their life to judicially challenge the resolution agreeing to help them, when they understand that the most basic requirements of the legal procedure have not been followed, does not in any way imply, as a necessary consequence, that the decision will uphold that challenge."

Noelia's father can prolong the process through judicial appeals, and Abogados Cristianos has already announced that it will exhaust all of them until reaching the European Court of Human Rights. Now, the young woman's family can appeal the decision to the Supreme Court, which should then decide whether the relatives of a person requesting euthanasia are entitled to block it in court, according to legal sources. In parallel, the Supreme Court is still deliberating a similar case, that of a 54-year-old man, whose father also managed to block the euthanasia in court.

Noelia, 24, suffers from paraplegia and was due to receive euthanasia in August 2024. Although she is an adult and had completed the necessary procedures, the dignified death procedure was suspended due to her father's judicial intervention three days before it was administered. The 12th Administrative Court of Barcelona already rejected the father's appeal against the decision of the Guarantee and Evaluation Commission of Catalonia in March, and now the High Court of Justice (TSJC) has upheld the decision.

She meets all the requirements.

The judges considered that the young woman had full capacity to request a dignified death and that all legal and medical requirements established by the euthanasia law were met. They also considered that parents and other authorized persons should be able to appeal the decision, in case all requirements were not met. In this specific case, they noted that father and daughter maintain an almost daily relationship, and therefore, the father has the right to request the suspension of the euthanasia.

The court also recognizes that the family's legal action could delay the execution of the euthanasia agreement, but "given the irreversibility" of assisted death, it is likely that it will be suspended as a precautionary measure until the end of the judicial process. The young woman, born in 2000, has engaged in self-harm and attempted suicide several times since adolescence. In October 2022, she jumped from a fifth-floor apartment, which left her with serious after-effects, caused her to lose independence, and forces her to use a wheelchair. The girl can no longer walk because she has lost strength and loss of feeling below her knees. Furthermore, the medication to relieve the pain has many side effects.

Before the judge, the young woman reiterated her desire to have a dignified death and denounced coercion from her family and those close to her to back down. A dozen witnesses appeared at the trial, mostly doctors from different specialties who had treated the girl in recent years. All of them supported euthanasia because it was proven that she had the mental capacity to make a free decision and met the requirements established by law: constant physical and psychological suffering, described as intolerable and with no prognosis.

The family's representatives, however, argue that the young woman's psychiatric history invalidates her wishes.