Canadian who sold lethal chemical online pleads guilty to aiding suicides, avoids murder trial

Kenneth Law, 60, appeared at the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in Newmarket, Ontario, north of Toronto. Wearing tan pants, a white shirt and a dark suit jacket, Law showed no emotion as he stood in a prisoner's box and pleaded guilty to aiding the suicides of 14 Ontario residents, aged 16 to 36. He will be sentenced in September.

Prosecutor Peter Westgate told Justice Michelle Fuerst that prosecutors would ask that 14 first-degree murder charges Law was also facing be withdrawn after his sentencing.

Family members of victims, some wiping their eyes with tissues, were visibly upset as prosecutor Cheryl Nadler read out the circumstances of each victim's ⁠death.

"Today has been heavy," said Kim Prosser, mother of victim Ashtyn Prosser.

"I carry forward his legacy in my heart and my soul."

Law also admitted that 79 people in Britain died as a result of consuming or using products he sold, according to an agreed statement of facts spanning more than 60 pages.

Britain's Crown Prosecution Service said it had decided against seeking Law's extradition to stand trial in the UK, concluding that doing so carried a risk of refusal on double-jeopardy grounds.

Salt Can Be Deadly 

According to the statement of facts, Law operated four companies with websites through which he marketed and sold sodium nitrite and other items, including masks, hoods and regulators, that were used by the purchasers to take their own lives.

Sodium nitrite, a salt used in low concentrations as a food additive to cure processed meats, can be deadly when ingested in high concentrations.

Law sent 1,209 packages of the salt and other goods to customers in 41 countries between January 2021 and April 2023, the court heard. The shipments included 330 sent to addresses in Britain, 431 to the United States and 157 within Canada.

The statement described victims who vomited, collapsed in their parents' arms, were found unresponsive ‌in bed ⁠by family members or friends, or who died alone in hotel rooms and vehicles after consuming or using products shipped by Law.

"Many, many, many, many," Law told a reporter who was posing as a potential customer and asked how many people have been successful in killing themselves using his products, in a recorded phone call played in court.

Financial records showed more than C$296,000 ($215,000) in deposits to Law's bank account from Shopify and PayPal accounts associated with his businesses between 2020 and 2023, according to the statement of facts.

"I genuinely thought that I was helping people to alleviate their suffering while making a small, modest profit," Law said in a personal ⁠letter found in his home.

The statement of facts said the parties in the case did not agree on what Law's statements meant about his motivation.

Murder Prosecution 'Impossible,' Prosecutor Says 

Westgate told the court that prosecuting Law for murder was no longer viable after a 2024 Ontario Court of Appeal ruling in an unrelated case involving a nurse who injected herself, her mother and her young daughter with potentially lethal doses of insulin.

In that case, the ⁠appellate court "described the standard of causation that applies in a situation like we have here, where a victim performs the final acts leading to death," Westgate said.

Prosecutors asked the Supreme Court of Canada to overturn that standard, Westgate said, but the majority did not rule on the issue, leaving the appellate decision as binding authority in Ontario.

"This decision makes a murder prosecution in this case impossible," ⁠Westgate said.

Law, a trained engineer who worked as a cook before his arrest, has been in custody since his arrest at his home west of Toronto in May 2023.

A conviction for counseling or aiding suicide carries a prison sentence of up to 14 years, according to Canada's Criminal Code. First-degree murder in Canada carries a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment with no chance of parole for a minimum of 25 years.

($1 = 1.3785 Canadian dollars)