NATION IN BRIEF : MICHIGAN : Suicide Victim Had Up to 10 Years to Live

A physician who treated Janet Adkins of Portland, Ore., in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease testified that she could have lived up to 10 years if she had not taken her own life with another doctor’s homemade suicide machine. Dr. Murray A. Raskind of the University of Washington said he doubted that Adkins was mentally competent to make the decision that led to her June 4 suicide. Raskind’s testimony came on the fourth day of a hearing before Oakland County Circuit Judge Alice Gilbert in Pontiac, Mich., on a motion to ban Dr. Jack Kevorkian, a retired pathologist, from using the device.