Canadian Man Pleads Guilty to Assisting Suicides of 14 People

Canadian Kenneth Law has pleaded guilty in an Ontario court to assisting in the suicides of 14 people aged between 16 and 36. He is due to be sentenced in September, when prosecutors say they will also seek to have murder charges dropped.

Court documents show that between 2021 and 2023, Law operated four internet companies through which he sold sodium nitrite and other materials that customers used to end their lives. Sodium nitrite is a substance used in food preservation but can be fatal in high doses. He shipped more than 1,200 packages to 41 countries, including Britain, the US and Canada, and admitted his products were linked to the deaths of 79 people in the UK.

Prosecutors said murder charges could no longer proceed following a 2024 Court of Appeal ruling that the final act leading to death had been carried out by the victim. Law faces up to 14 years in prison for assisting suicide. Families of the victims described the hearing as extremely painful.

(reuters, lud)