Right-to-die activist Sean Davison gets three years' house arrest for murders

Right-to-die activist Sean Davison made a plea and sentencing agreement on Wednesday which means he will not go on trial for three murders.

The agreement, which entails three years of house arrest for the University of the Western Cape (UWC) academic, was approved by Western Cape Judge President John  Hlophe.

Davison, 58, was also sentenced to eight years' imprisonment, which was suspended for five years.

The conditions of his house arrest mean he will be allowed to leave home to go to work, church and the doctor.

Davison was arrested in April 2018 in connection with the death in 2013 of Anrich Burger, a quadriplegic.

A second charge of murder was later added in connection with the death of Justin Varian, who had motor-neuron disease.

When Davison appeared in Cape Town magistrate's court on April 29 he was charged with a third murder, for allegedly "administering a lethal amount of drugs" to Richard Holland in 2015.

Davison, a professor in UWC's biotechnology department, shot to prominence when he was charged in New Zealand with murder after helping his 85-year-old mother, Patricia, die in 2006.

She was terminally ill with cancer and had tried, but failed, to starve herself to death. Davison then made her a drink containing crushed morphine tablets

He entered a plea bargain whereby he pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of assisted suicide. He was sentenced to five months' detention, which he served under house arrest.

In an interview with the Sunday Times in 2016, he said he was often asked for assistance to die, adding: "This is a world I don't want to be in.”

This was why he had co-founded Dignity SA, which is campaigning for a change in the law on end-of-life decisions.

Davison was in court on Wednesday with his wife, Rein Pan, and one of their three children.