A doctor accused of failing to verify consent before performing euthanasia on a dementia patient has been cleared of any wrongdoing by a Dutch court. It is the first such case since the country legalised euthanasia in 2002. In 2016, there was over 6,000 cases of euthanasia and assisted suicide in the Netherlands, up threefold since the law was introduced. Most of those killed are not suffering from a terminal illness.

The 74-year-old patient, who died in 2016, had expressed a wish to be euthanised if she became sufficiently demented. Her family decided the time had come to administer a lethal injection, but the woman struggled and was held down by her daughter and husband while the doctor administered the poison.

Judges cleared the doctor because they ruled that carrying out the process would have undermined the patient’s original wish.