AIDS Murder Conviction Upheld : Supreme Court: State justices refuse to hear the appeal of a man who was found guilty of helping another to commit suicide.

The state Supreme Court on Wednesday let stand the second-degree murder conviction of a San Diego man who said he helped in the suicide of a despondent AIDS victim.

The justices, in a brief order, refused to reconsider a 32-year-old legal doctrine that allows murder charges for “actively” assisting in another’s suicide, even with the victim’s consent.

The action came in the case of John Cleaves, 44, a transient found guilty and sentenced to 15 years to life in prison in the strangulation of Dennis Eaton, a 40-year-old nurse, in 1988.

Cleaves’ conviction was upheld this year by a state Court of Appeal. The high court’s refusal to set aside the appellate decision leaves it binding on trial courts throughout the state.

The case emerged in the wake of widespread debate over the proper roles of physicians and others in assisting people who want to die. In one well-publicized dispute, Dr. Jack Kevorkian, a retired Michigan pathologist, faced murder charges--later dropped--for allowing a terminally ill Oregon woman to use a device that administered lethal chemicals.

A lawyer for Cleaves had contended that someone who overtly acts to help a competent, consenting victim in a suicide should be subject to no more than manslaughter charges.

The attorney, Stephen J. Perrello Jr. of San Diego, expressed disappointment with Wednesday’s action, noting that such cases may likely recur with the spread of the AIDS epidemic and a population increasingly dependent on costly extraordinary medical measures for survival.

“The (legal standard) we have now leaves us with no clear test for evaluating a case based on moral blameworthiness,” said Perrello. “At some point the court is going to have to take a new look at the facilitation-of-suicide question.”

Cleaves claimed that after he met Eaton and the two engaged in sex, Eaton revealed he had AIDS and said he previously tried suicide and wanted to die. The two used a bathrobe sash to bind Eaton by the neck, wrists and feet in a manner that would enable Eaton to strangle himself by straightening his body as he lay on a bed, Cleaves said.

According to Cleaves, his role was to steady Eaton as he rocked up and down on the bed.

At trial, a pathologist testified that Eaton had tested positive for the AIDS virus but showed no other symptoms of illness. Prosecutors contended it was unlikely the victim would ask a relative stranger to help him commit suicide. The jury foreman said after the verdict was returned that jurors believed Cleaves’ claim of assisting Eaton in the suicide but because he had become an active participant, he was guilty of second-degree murder.

Last April, a state Court of Appeal in San Diego upheld the verdict, citing a 1959 ruling by the high court authorizing murder charges for actively assisting in a suicide. A separate law says that people who merely provide the means of suicide, taking a passive role, may be found guilty of a lesser crime, punishable by a maximum of three years in prison. By holding Eaton on the bed, Cleaves actively participated in the suicide, the appellate panel said.

In an appeal on behalf of Cleaves to the state Supreme Court, Perrello said it was time to abandon the 1959 decision and the “active-passive” test. If a victim effectively “controls” the suicide, one who assists should be guilty of no more than facilitating a suicide, he said. If one performs an overt act resulting in the suicide of a consenting, competent person, he should be charged with no more than manslaughter, the attorney said.