Affaire Vincent L. : les maux de la fin

Abstract

As called back it June 24th, Council of State in its press release, the Vincent L.’s case “raise scientific, ethical and human questions”. At first, to decide on the fate of this 38-year-old man, the administrative jurisdiction recovered from it in expert opinions asked to establish the existence or not of an unreasonable stubbornness. But the objectivity of the medical science cannot solve only this litigation where the outcome is the life or the death of a patient. That is why the court opened its doors to the ethical speech too. If in this case, the science could not exist without consciousness, if the legal word could not exist without the ethical word, it's because of the human dimension which fills this media and legal affair. So behind this patient's case, called now “the Vincent L.’s affair”, it's a question about the death, that of a young man in the incapacity to express its will. It's also a question of a family disagreement on the future of their son, brother, or husband. In this context, “politically and mediatically charged”, the administrative jurisdiction pronounced four times on the decision of the stop of Vincent L.’s treatment. The educational position of the French judges allowed to clear up statutory provisions of the Leonetti's act.