A man who once served as a doctor in Arizona has pleaded guilty to manslaughter following charges that he helped a woman commit suicide in a motel room in upstate New York.
The 85-year-old Stephen Miller was arrested earlier this year and charged with manslaughter in the second degree. New York state law includes a provision that allows authorities to charge people with second-degree manslaughter if they intentionally aided or caused another individual’s suicide.
The guilty plea was part of a deal Miller and his lawyers struck with prosecutors. In exchange, Miller will receive five years probation.
Miller traveled all the way from Arizona to be with the woman in a motel in Kingston, New York, while she died.
Housekeeping staff at the hotel found her body on November 9 of 2023. At the time, the district attorney’s office in Ulster County said that police, emergency and fire workers determined that the woman died “by means of assisted suicide.”
In February, Miller was arraigned on the charges, as well as two additional counts of assault. He voluntarily surrendered to authorities and initially entered a plea of not guilty.
On Tuesday, Jeffrey Lichtman, who is serving as Miller’s attorney, said that his clients only provided comfort as well as “very slight technical assistance” to the woman, who he said couldn’t live any longer with debilitating pain that she suffered from for many decades.
Lichtman said that the woman contacted Miller because he did a lot of work with Choice and Dignity, which is an advocacy group. As the attorney said to reporters this week:
“Technically, he violated the law. We accept that, but with the understanding that morally, Stephen Miller did nothing wrong.”
Miller spoke softly in court while he was answering questions from presiding Judge Bryan Rounds. At one point, the judge asked him:
“Are you pleading guilty because you are, in fact, guilty of manslaughter in the second degree?”
Miller then responded:
“By your definition, yes.”
Rounds then explained to Miller that the definition they were using was on the books in New York as a law. He then asked him the same question again, with Miller just responding “yes” this time.
Miller didn’t answer any questions from reporters after he appeared in court to enter his guilty plea.
At one point, Miller lost his license to practice medicine because he was convicted of tax fraud in Texas. In 2006, he was convicted of that offense, and was sentenced to a little less than four years behind bars.
There are several states that allow for legal assisted suicide. In New York, though, there is no law on the books that allows that. There have been some efforts to make assisted suicide legal in the Empire State, but none of them have made their way through the state Legislature just yet.
It’s an issue that’s gaining some popularity around the country for people who are suffering from certain conditions or are at a certain age facing a terminal illness.
