A woman who admitted trying to murder her terminally ill husband in a "mercy killing" has taken her own life at Dignitas clinic in Switzerland, it was reported yesterday.
Vicki Wood, a 67-year old artist and toymaker from Devon, died at the Zurich clinic on Friday, according to Western Morning News, adding that she had been suffering from a debilitating physical illness and had travelled to Switzerland with a friend.
A spokeswoman for the Foreign Office said officials were looking into the report.
In 1999, Wood, a euthanasia campaigner, told a court in Exeter she had tried kill her husband, Tim, who had dementia, by smothering him with a pillow as he slept after she gave him sleeping pills.
Wood was put on probation for two years and banned from being alone with her husband. He died nine months later.
Passing sentence at the time, Justice Toulson accepted that Wood was acting out of compassion and love for a her husband.
In an obituary authorised by Wood, Andy Christian, a journalist and friend of the couple, wrote: "Despite the setbacks, Vicki Wood led a bountiful life."
The tribute, which was sent to the Western Mail, adds: "I remember Tim and Vicki as a happy couple. They were always full of fun and we shared serious conversations and lots of laughter."
The newspaper reported that Wood and her husband had been members of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society, now called Dignity in Dying, and had discussed euthanasia in a BBC documentary.
Vicki Wood wrote letters to the press in support of the campaigner Diane Pretty, who died unassisted in 2002, a year after losing her battle to get her husband granted immunity from prosecution if he helped her to die.
Wood and her husband had written "living wills", saying they wanted to die rather than have their lives prolonged during serious illness.
Last month, the director of public prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, issued new guidelines to clarify the rules on assisted suicide. They set out six mitigating factors against an individual being prosecuted for assisting the suicide of another.