X-Message-Number: 2500
From: whscad1!kqb (Kevin Q Brown +1 201 386 7344)
Subject: CRYONICS Legal Protection from Autopsy

One of the major risks for a cryonic suspension patient is the
threat of autopsy.  If the local Coroner or Medical Examiner
determines that an autopsy must be done on a person (after legal
death, of course), it is difficult to prevent, and the "leavings"
remaining after an autopsy generally leave little hope for revival.
(Alcor did succeed in preventing a full autopsy, but, as I recall,
it required a sympathetic judge, and one cannot count on having a
sympathetic judge readily available.)

Messages 15 1393 1396 1401 1617 concern potential legal protections
from autopsies, including the "Certificate of Religious Belief"
forbidding autopsy that the Venturists distribute.  Alvin Steinberg,
of Alcor New York, recently pointed out that we now have greater
legal support for the religious objection to autopsy.  That support
cames from the "Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993", which was
passed on Nov. 16 of this year and applies to all government bodies
and officials within the USA.

Although this Act still allows a government official to "substantially
burden a person's exercise of religion" (i.e. do an autopsy) when there
is a "compelling state interest":
  (a) it requires the government to *demonstrate* that "compelling state
      interest" rather than proceeding without any such justification,
      and
  (b) it requires the government to use "the least restrictive means
      of furthering that compelling governmental interest."
This could make the difference between a viable suspension and
freezing chopped meat.

For the full text of that law (only about 6K bytes), send email to
me with the Subject line "CRYOMSG 2500.1".

                              Kevin Q. Brown
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