Attorney Susan Elizabeth Van Note, 44, was arraigned this week on charges of forgery and first degree murder of her father William Van Note. Both William B. Van Note, 67 and his longtime companion Sharon L. Dickson, 59 died from gunshot wounds received at their home in October 2010. The case has an interesting twist: police allege that the father died as a result of Van Note presented a forged medical form allowing her to terminate life support.
It took three days for William B. Van Note to die. He was able to call police and try to help Dickson, a former flower shop owner, before passing out. Sharon L. Dickson was found in the master suite with her husband nearby. They had just returned to the house when they were shot that evening. They were planning to leave for Florida for the winter.
Susan Van Note was charged with forging an Durable Power of Attorney for Health Care form that would allow her to terminate life support for her father.
Susan Van Note practices in the Kansas City area. Two accomplices, Desre Lechele Dory, 42, and Stacey Nicole Dory, 43, were also arrested and charged with second degree murder and forgery.
The medical form allegation raises an interesting causation question. The father’s wounds probably would have resulted in his death eventually, but the forms allegedly caused the hospital to actively terminate life support. That becomes something akin to murder by medical form.
Notably, Susan Van Note advertises that she completes the medical form for a fee of $600 (which seems quite high given that these forms can be completed without an attorney).
Source: Lake News
Kudos: Julia Wilcox
It has been a long time since these comments, above, were made by Attorney Jonathan Turley. I have been hoping that there would be some follow up on this concept of “Murder by Medical Form” or at least some comments by other attorneys —but, of course, nothing so far and the case, strangely, has not come to trial or even been scheduled by the court —why?
As an elderly Missouri Resident, it appears to me that Missouri law would treat a unilateral covert DNR Code in the hospital chart of a patient in Missouri as either “murder” or felony “elder abuse” –especially when the motive of the Hospital and the treating specialist appears to be to hide a medical error and limit or withhold expensive life-extending or life-saving treatment that the hospital KNOWS will not be reimbursed by CMS and the private GAP and Advantage Insurers. The shortening of life by means of a forged medical Power of Attorney and Medical Directive would certainly be murder, wouldn’t it?
However, I have reported the covert unilateral DNR placed in my late husband’s medical chart to the state Dept. of Health authorities, to the Police Department and to the Attorney General’s office of Missouri after the hospital refused to disclose or to even discuss the results of the “ethics” investigation that they promised would be held concerning the matter of the unilateral covert DNR in the hospital chart of my husband in 2011.
In my research, I see that there is no case law anywhere in the US that treats the unilateral DNR as either a crime or a tort and the Bioethicists choose to treat the unilateral DNR as merely an “ethics” lapse because, of course, the physician who places the DNR in the hospital chart unilaterally is presumed to be doing so for compassionate reasons and not for private gain.
But, of course, there is an epidemic of unilateral covert and overt(default)DNR code status being extrapolated into the charts of elderly/disabled patients on Medicare that hastens the death of patients when the hospitals KNOW that errors have been made and that there will be NO Further reimbursement to the hospital for any further treatment.
Isn’t this “Murder by Medical Form?”
Cannot next of kin make the decision to pull the plug? Or was her father not in a state where that was reasonable?
I had a relative who was in an auto accident. He was being kept alive by machines. His sons made the decision to pull the plug out of compassion.
idealist707 1, September 13, 2012 at 4:15 pm
Matt,
Can I use her presciptions in Sweden?
Ask her how long the penicillin cure for Lyme disease is there. Here it is only 10 days. Forth time I have had it.
Gotta cut back the bushes on the lot at the cottage. Deer have broken down the fence which kept them out before.
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Too bad for you. No, you can’t use the prescriptions in Sweden.
Found it. Learning more about “advanced searching”.
http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/campaign_money_patterns_entering_new_phase_in_2012_judicial_races/
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ElaineM,
I’ll never catch up. In more ways than one. Smile.
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First they buy Congress, and now they buy the courts at state level. SCOTUS we have covered before.
“Ironically, the cumulative effects of a decade of record-setting spending could lead to less spending in some states. Early reports suggest that some traditionally high-spending states will see less competitive elections, due to the increasing domination of their state courts by a single party after a decade of record spending.
At the same time, traditionally low-cost retention elections will see high levels of spending as interest groups pour money into unseating judges. Super PACs are also poised to inject money into judicial races, with the potential to transform how campaigns are fought.
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At what point do we declare a tyranny? And immigrate or have a general strike?
It is your country. I gave up long ago. Would have liked to enjoy the American dream. ´But it would have been a nightmare—for me NB. Your situation if you are reading here, is OK I would guess. But that is your secret.
OT OT OT
But it is a justice issue, sort of…..
“Judicial candidates spent more than $4.6 million in television advertisements this primary season, according to data released by the Brennan Center for Justice and the Justice at Stake Campaign, in an election cycle where changing spending patterns could signal a new phase in the decade-long spending battle to influence America’s state courts.”
http://www.brennancenter.org/
Unfortunately, the quote above is taken from an email in the form of a press release. Search using study title and author names do not turn up the report. Patience is advised.
Bad coordination. Incomplete knowledge of source by me.
Brennan Center for Justice at NYU is chockfull of info in the meanwhile. All sorts of stuff.
Matt,
Can I use her presciptions in Sweden?
Ask her how long the penicillin cure for Lyme disease is there. Here it is only 10 days. Forth time I have had it.
Gotta cut back the bushes on the lot at the cottage. Deer have broken down the fence which kept them out before.
This blonde does not appear to be having more fun.
It looks from the story that police think she shot her father as well. It would be quite an interesting case if she had nothing to do with the shooting, but had forged the medical form out of compassion for her father. I suppose that could technically still be murder, but I might be hard pressed to convict if I were on the jury.
And, as an interesting legal hypothetical, if she had not been the shooter, would her forging these medical forms preclude a murder charge against the actual shooter even if the medical evidence is that the father likely would have eventually died from his wounds?
One of my sisters is a Nurse Practitioner. She can write prescriptions. For $4.00 each.
I have to give her credit for her premeditation with the medical form.. The idiot has to have a lot of smarts.
It is a rather interesting legal issue with regard to the DPA forgery and the death. Had the DPA been executed legally, the hospital would have performed the same action and the patient would have died just the same. Interesting how it can be legal to cause another’s death but doing so by forgery is a murder.
But I suppose it boils down to definitions of murder, that are essentially Unlawfully causing the death of another person. Forging the DPA is certianly unlawful, so by definition it seems to have the elements of the crime.
One sick woman. She needs to spend the rest of her sick life behind bars.
It looks to me the citizens of Missouri may be paying for her sexual reassignment surgery in prison. NTTAWWT.
Maybe that $600 for a boilerplate form includes her forgery fee.
Time for her to dump the rose colored glasses.
did she shoot he father too?
She looks like a lawyer I would not want to retain.
Seems like she’s gonna he singing notes in the key of D…..dummy…..