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The Court of Cassation examines Monday, June 24 the appeal of the French State against the decision of the Court of Appeal of Paris which had ordered the resumption of the treatments of Vincent Lambert on May 20 last.
This is a new episode, undoubtedly crucial, in Vincent Lambert. Meeting at a general meeting, the Court of Cassation will examine at a public hearing the appeal of the State against the decision of the Court of Appeal of Paris which had ordered the 20 May last the resumption of the treatments of this man of 42 years in an irreversible vegetative state, nailed to a hospital bed for almost eleven years.
Did the Court of Appeal have the right to oblige the doctors to resume the care which kept alive Vincent Lambert and thus to hinder their decisions judged, twice already, in conformity with the French law and with the European Convention of the human rights ? Should the French State respect the recommendations of the UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which had asked to suspend the young man's end-of-life protocol?
According to François Molins, the new public prosecutor of the Court of Cassation, the answer to these questions is negative. In the opinion he will defend before the magistrates, he therefore recommends canceling the decision of the Court of Appeal. Because the legal arguments that she uses to declare herself competent in the case are unfounded, because the arrest of Vincent Lambert's treatment was legal and because the requests of the UN committee are not binding for France. If this opinion is followed by the Court of Cassation, the doctors could be again authorized to stop the vital care of their patient.
Given the importance of the case, the decision of the Court of Cassation should be made quickly, probably before July 3. It will have the value of a judgment in principle that will allow decisions to be made in future analogous cases.