This is the moment a mother recalled her son’s heartbreaking last words as he said his goodbyes before secretly travelling to a Swiss clinic where he ended his own life.
Chemistry teacher Alastair Hamilton, 47, paid more than £10,000 to die at the suicide clinic – which then kept his death a secret from his family.
He made the decision despite having no diagnosed illness – although he had dramatically lost weight in recent months – and the clinic later apologised to his family for how the situation was handled.
His distraught mother Judith, 82, broke down in tears as she visited Pegasos clinic in Basel.
The Hamilton family only learned Alastair had taken his life at the clinic after police examined his bank account statements and found that he had transferred thousands of pounds to Pegasos.
The clinic initially refused to speak to them about his remains, saying it was ‘against our lawyer’s recommendations’. Eventually the family received his ashes in the post – two months after he died.
Before he left for the last time, his mother told ITV her son ‘put his arms around me and gave me a big kiss, and just said, ‘Always remember Mum that I love you very much, I always have, I always will, no matter what’.
Alastair’s family said they were prompted to talk about their experience amid discussions around assisted death in the UK, where it is currently illegal to help someone kill themselves
Judith Hamilton, 81, broke down in tears as the held the rail of the stairs up to where her son’s body was carried down after he ended his life
Chemistry teacher Alastair Hamilton, 47, told his parents he was visiting a friend in Paris when instead he was flying to Basel in Switzerland to end his life by lethal injection
His distraught mother was overcome with emotion when she visited the Pegasos site
The building (top, grey) is next to an asphalt factory in Switzerland. His mother said: ‘It’s not the best place to be for your last view of Earth, is it?’
On August 10 last year, Alastair’s father Edward, 85, drove him to Gatwick Airport. He had no reason to suspect his son was not travelling to meet a friend in France.
His mother said: ‘I was so chuffed to think he was picking up his life and getting some enthusiasm, and he was always very affectionate and loving towards me, so it didn’t register that these words were his final goodbye.’
His family became concerned when Alastair stopped responding to their calls, texts and voicemails over the next week.
Mrs Hamilton phoned the police to report him as a missing person. Scotland Yard soon established that Alastair had in fact caught a flight to Switzerland.
An analysis of his bank transactions then revealed four payments totalling £10,310 to the Pegasos Swiss Association, a small clinic run from an office in central Basel.
Officers contacted Pegasos but, other than confirming Alastair had died there, the clinic failed to provide police with the date of his death or any other information.
As the days dragged on, Toby persistently emailed the clinic, saying: ‘I urge and beg you to please reply to my email as soon as possible.
‘Can you imagine what this is doing to our family in an incredibly traumatic time?’
However, he says the clinic did not reply for another week when an email asked Toby to provide scans of his passport and to sign an affidavit in order to receive information about his brother.
Despite Toby doing this immediately, he says another week passed by before they finally confirmed Alastair had died on August 14.
Last night, Toby said: ‘If you had the slightest bit of empathy, and you are the slightest bit of a decent human being, you would pick up the phone and actually talk to the grieving family.’
Mrs Hamilton added: ‘I would have remortgaged the house and had his body flown home if I had known what happened, but we never got that chance.’
He said: ‘We weren’t given that chance to either be with him or in my case, drag him home, tooth and nail if I had to.’
His distraught mother Judith Hamilton, 81, warned other families should be aware of Pegasos
Alastair Hamilton with his grandmother Doris Robinson in 2017
Judith said: ‘We weren’t given that chance to either be with him or in my case, drag him home, tooth and nail if I had to’
It is believed Alastair ended his life in one of the upstairs rooms on the far right of the building, ITV News reported
Under Swiss law, since 1942, people are allowed to help others to die as long as their motives are not selfish, such as for financial gain. Pictured: Alastair’s mother Judith and brother Bradley
Standing in front of the building where he died, she added: ‘It’s not the best place to be for your last view of Earth, is it?
‘Bless him. I just keep saying to myself, ”Oh Alastair”.’
Shockingly, it took the persistence of Mr Hamilton’s devastated family, the Metropolitan Police, the Foreign Office and Interpol to discover what had happened to Alastair after he vanished last summer.
The family still hasn’t received the goodbye letters the clinic said he had left for them, or his personal belongings he had with him.
Alistair’s brother Bradley told ITV he was ‘robbed’ of the chance of going to the clinic and ‘cuddling him whilst he did it’, and of ‘giving him a kiss goodbye’.
A representative of Pegasos apologised for failings around the way Alistair’s case was handled, according to ITV.
The representative told the Hamilton family that its procedures would now be brought closer into line with guidelines set by the Swiss Medical Association in 2022.
These say a family should always be informed if a relative intends to die.
But the representative said Pegasos doesn’t believe in many of the guidelines.
The guidance also states that a life should be unbearable before someone is assisted to die.
In emails to Alastair’s family, a frustrated Met Police sergeant criticised Pegasos’s ‘lack of compassion and lack of transparency’ as ‘completely unacceptable’.
Mr Hamilton told his parents he was visiting a friend in Paris when instead he was flying to Basel in Switzerland to end his life by lethal injection.
Alastair’s family said they were prompted to talk about their devastating experience amid discussions around assisted death in the UK, where it is currently illegal to help someone kill themselves.
His brother Toby, 52, said: ‘I’m not against assisted dying but you can’t let someone who is not terminally ill turn up and do this on their own, completely alone, and then completely disregard the family or next of kin.’
Mrs Hamilton added: ‘Why Pegasos acted the way they did and agreed to help Alastair do this, I don’t think I will ever understand.
‘We’re all still heartbroken and still have so many questions, but I’m not sure we will ever get all the answers.’
His family were unaware and were stone-walled for weeks by the clinic before finding out what had happened to Alistair
Alastair Hamilton (second on left) and his brothers in 2007
The 47-year-old schoolteacher with no diagnosed illness paid more than £10,000 to die at a Swiss suicide clinic – which then kept his death a secret from his family
Alastair Hamilton pictured with his niece in 2015
Alastair Hamilton (centre) in 2007 with brothers Rupert, Bradley, Alastair, Toby and Russell, at Russell’s wedding
Alastair Hamilton with his grandmother Doris Robinson in 2017
Portrait of a young Alastair Hamilton is seen above
Sweden’s most famous clinic, Dignitas – where at least 540 Britons have died in the past 20 years – has strict rules that its clients must be terminally ill, suffering extreme pain or living with an ‘unendurable disability’.
But Pegasos, run by activist Ruedi Habegger, says its users do not need to be ill to kill themselves. Its website says it will approve someone’s death request ‘in as little as a few weeks’ as long as they are aged over 18.
Alastair’s family said he had been battling with low moods since 2022, when he began losing weight and feeling increasingly tired.
He had given up working full-time and moved back into his parents’ home in Hampton, south-west London, but doctors could not work out what was wrong with him.
His worried family paid for multiple private health checks, including tests for cancer and HIV, to understand Alastair’s weight loss. But doctors were still unable to diagnose him with any condition.
Toby, who owns a lettings agency, said: ‘Alastair started talking about suicide like he was talking about going for a pint down the pub.
‘I begged him not to say the ‘S word’ to our mum and said we would throw money at the problem, whatever he needed, until we figured it out.’
Only in October – two months after Alastair died – did the family receive his ashes in the post
The family have still not received goodbye letters that the Pegasos clinic (pictured) said he had left for them – or his wristwatch, clothes and other personal effects
Only in October – two months after Alastair died – did the family receive his ashes in the post.
They never received any goodbye letters, despite Pegasos claiming Alastair had left some for them.
They have also never received his wristwatch, clothes or any of his belongings. Toby said: ‘We eventually found Alastair’s application to Pegasos which was literally just like a two-page covering letter for a job application.
‘It doesn’t seem like they do any of the checks that Dignitas do. They’re not liaising with doctors for medical records or psychotherapists to make sure a person is ill.’
ITV also met with Sean Davison, who said he spoke to Alastair repeatedly before his death.
He doesn’t work for the clinic, but for Exit International,m which advocates for the right to assisted dying.
He told ITV he was the last person Alastair called. He told the news organisation how he said he told his family but ‘they didn’t want to talk about it’ and claimed ‘they didn’t support him’.
Mr Davison said he didn’t know the family weren’t coming ‘until the very end’.
In Alastair’s deathbed phone call, Mr Davison told his friend ‘you’ve got such a life ahead of you’ and ‘really pleaded with him’ to reconsider.
Childline founder Dame Esther Rantzen revealed that she had joined the Dignitas clinic after her diagnosis of stage four lung cancer, and urged ‘lawmakers to catch up with the public’.
After hearing about Alastair Hamilton’s case, Dame Esther told The Mail on Sunday: ‘Obviously, any new law in the UK will need precautions built in.
‘We can learn from other countries where such laws are already in place as to what is the most practical and humane way of legalising assisted dying without making people vulnerable.’
Pegasos said in a statement: ‘As conveyed by Mr. Habegger during the meeting, we would like to tell the family once again that we are very sorry that our communication caused them further distress last year.
‘We were not sure how to deal with the situation in terms of communication and legally and therefore did not act as we would today. We hope that our meeting helped them to understand better the decision and path of Alastair.
‘Pegasos has always respected the applicable Swiss law without exception and continues to do so… we always require reports from medical specialists.
Only based on these reports, other documents and direct contact with the concerned person, a decision can be taken.’We are conscious of our great responsibility. This is why, in those rare instances where we have reason to assume that no information has been provided to close family by the person seeking voluntary assisted death, we will abort the procedure on the spot.
‘In 2022, the Swiss Medical Association revised its guidelines regarding assisted dying. It is important to understand that these guidelines are not legally binding for the associations but are policies for the medical professionals. Several organisations for assisted dying, including Exit, Dignitas and Pegasos, publicly spoke out against the revised guidelines, because they are putting at risk the self-determination of people planning a voluntary assisted death and the freedom of choice in Switzerland.’
It came as on Thursday, a Dutch woman who was granted permission to end her life via euthanasia despite being a physically healthy 29-year-old dismissed public backlash and declared she will die within weeks.
Zoraya ter Beek, who suffers from depression and borderline personality disorder, received the approval for assisted dying last week and expects to be ‘freed’ from her torment soon.
This week she hit out at critics, declaring their protest ‘insulting’.
‘People think that when you’re mentally ill, you can’t think straight, which is insulting,’ she told the Guardian.
‘I understand the fears that some disabled people have about assisted dying… but in the Netherlands we’ve had this law for more than 20 years. There are really strict rules, and it’s really safe.’
Euthanasia has been legal in The Netherlands since 2002 for those experiencing ‘unbearable suffering with no prospect of improvement’.
Zoraya ter Beek, (pictured) who lives in a small village in the Netherlands, suffers from depression and has autism and a borderline personality disorder. She has decided to end her life by euthanasia after a psychiatrist told her ‘there’s nothing more we can do for you’ and that ‘it’s never gonna get any better’
It is understood that a doctor will give her a sedative before administering a drug that will stop her heart. Ter Beek is pictured in 2017 with her do not resuscitate badge
Ter Beek decided she wanted to die after a psychiatrist told her ‘there’s nothing more we can do for you’ and that ‘it’s never gonna get any better’, The Free Press reported.
It is understood that a doctor will give her a sedative before administering a drug that will stop her heart.
She previously said she will be euthanized on the sofa in her home with her boyfriend by her side.
Ter Beek said her crippling depression and anxiety caused her to self-harm and feel suicidal for years, claiming that no amount of mental health treatment – which to date has included talking therapies, various medications and even electroconvulsive therapy – has worked to reduce her affliction.
When she was just 22, Ter Beek opted to get a do not resuscitate badge, something that is typically worn by elderly people.
She had on many occasions contemplated killing herself but resisted after seeing the devastating impact of a school friend’s violent suicide on her family.
Instead, she decided to begin the process of obtaining permission for assisted dying three and a half years ago after doctors reportedly said they could not do anything else to help improve her mental health.
The 29-year-old last month told The Free Press she has always been ‘very clear that if it doesn’t get better, I can’t do this anymore’.
Her boyfriend will scatter her ashes in ‘a nice spot in the woods’ that they have chosen together, she said.
‘I don’t see it as my soul leaving, but more as myself being freed from life,’ she said of her expected death, admitting: ‘I’m a little afraid of dying, because it’s the ultimate unknown.
‘We don’t really know what’s next – or is there nothing? That’s the scary part.’
For help call Samaritans for free on 116123 or visit Samaritans.org
