Court 'will decide my future', says partner of terminally ill woman

In an emotional statement outside the court, Tom Curran said he would act according to Ms Fleming’s wishes.

“The court has ruled on Marie’s future as far as they’re concerned and we will now go back to Wicklow and live our lives until such a time when Marie makes up her mind that she has had enough,” he said.

“And in that case, the court will have the opportunity to decide on my future.”

Asked if he would help Ms Fleming to die, he said: “That will only come up when Marie makes a decision herself.”

Mr Curran said he felt deeply let down by the court, but added that taking the case to Europe had not yet been ruled out.

He said the family and its legal team would have to examine the judgment to determine if it were possible, adding it would also depend on whether they have the necessary resources and the stamina to do so.

“It’s very difficult to understand how a person with a disability could be deprived of something that is legally available to everybody else,” Mr Curran said.

“For that not to be discriminative under the Constitution, that’s something we fail to understand.

“The Constitution is there to protect people like Marie and to give them solace that they will be looked after.”

Mr Curran, flanked by his family, had a tear in his eye as he paid tribute on his partner’s behalf to staff at the courts for how easy they made it for her to attend in the past.

He added that he would continue to lobby the Oireachtas for a change in the law, despite the setback at the Supreme Court.

“The thing that is very clear is that even though the court didn’t see fit to instruct the Oireachtas to change the law, the Oireachtas can have the power to change the law itself and there are other people who would like to see that law changed,” he said.

Earlier in court, as the judgment was delivered, Mr Curran squeezed the hand of Ms Fleming’s daughter Corrinna.

He wept as he heard the court’s decision. And, afterwards, as he clutched a copy of the judgment in one hand, he made a phone call to deliver the news, saying: “It was as we expected.”

Ms Fleming had appealed for the seven-judge court to allow her to die peacefully at home in Arklow, Co Wicklow in the arms of her partner without him facing the threat of being prosecuted and possibly jailed.

Mr Curran was supported by Ms Fleming’s children, Corrinna and Simon, and his son, David, as the judgment was delivered.

Delivering the ruling, Chief Justice Susan Denham described the case as “very tragic”.

Ms Fleming, in the final stages of MS, can only move her head, lives in constant pain and cannot swallow.

She suffers choking sessions which she fears will eventually kill her, the court was told during a four-day High Court hearing in February and March.

She has been suffering from a chest infection in the run-up to today’s judgment.

In her case against Ireland, the Attorney General and Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), the mother of two claimed Section 2.2 of the Criminal Law (Suicide) Act, which renders it an offence to aide, abet, counsel or procure the suicide of another, is unconstitutional on grounds that it breaches her personal autonomy rights under the Irish Constitution and European Convention on Human Rights.

Her legal team argued that the ban is discriminatory and deprives an “entirely innocent” group of the severely disabled of suicide, and that she should be given the same right to die by suicide as an able-bodied person.

The court rejected Ms Fleming's case that the right to die would be limited to a small group of people.

“It has not generally been the jurisprudence of the Irish Constitution that rights can be identified for a limited group of persons in particular circumstances no matter how tragic and heart-rending they may be,” the court found.

The court found no constitutional right to commit suicide or to arrange for the determination of life at a chosen time.