NO HELP FOR DR. KEVORKIAN

The Supreme Court refused Dr. Jack Kevorkian's last-ditch plea to avoid prosecution forassisting two suicides and three attempted suicidesby terminally-ill patients. The Justices, without comment, rejected the retired Michigan pathologist's appeal of a Michigan Supreme Court ruling that the Constitution creates no right to assisted suicide.TIME law reporter Andrea Sachssays the doctor's setback will have minimal impact on the movement, which will continue to seek to expand legal rights in this area: "Dr. Kevorkian has ricocheted in and out of court so much that people now see him as a lone ranger." Kevorkian, who has aided or witnessed 21 suicides since 1990, had argued that the Constitution gives people a right to "end intolerable pain, suffering or debilitation" through assisted suicide.