ALMOST 20 years ago my mother nursed her best friend through the final weeks of cancer. I visited often, and can still remember the terrible sounds of agony that sometimes emanated from the room.

These painful memories came flooding back as I read about the case of Ian Gordon, the 67-year-old cleared last week of murdering his terminally-ill wife, Patricia, after he admitted smothering her with a pillow at their home in Troon in April last year. Mr Gordon is awaiting sentencing after the Crown accepted his guilty plea to the lesser charge of culpable homicide.

The lesser plea was only accepted after the court heard evidence from the couple’s daughter, Gail Whyte. As Mrs Whyte explained, this was a painfully sad case. Her mother suspected she had lung cancer, but anxiety and a deep fear of hospitals prevented her from seeking diagnosis or treatment. Instead, she suffered at home, month after month, cared for by the man she had loved for 50 years, who supported her as best he could until he believed the only way to help was release her from the pain forever. Mrs Whyte said her parents had made a pact.

She told the court in harrowing detail how she last saw her mother just a few hours before she died, screaming in agony. Following her death, Mr Gordon - who gave up work to look after his wife – told his daughter the truth and made clear he had no regrets; he said he knew jail awaited. Mrs Whyte told the court she fully supported her father’s actions and loved him very much.

It’s hard to imagine the pain and distress this family must have suffered in the last months and years, not least during the murder trial. And it’s important to note that this was actually an open and shut case: Mr Gordon was no murderer. Indeed, when he killed his wife, he was clearly acting out of a deep and profound sense of love and mercy. He felt he had no choice but to help his wife die.

When accepting the change of plea, even the prosecuting QC made a point of saying how credible and moving the evidence their daughter provided was.

I can’t be the only one who believes that Mr Gordon should not be sent to prison. Not only has this loving husband and father suffered enough, but society has nothing to gain from locking him up. If anything, we should be offering this man the full range of bereavement services to help him recover from this trauma, and rebuild his life.

Yet the current state of the law means the Crown had no choice but to prosecute Mr Gordon - only blunt tools were available to deal with this most painful and sensitive set of circumstances. And because of this it is entirely possible that this bereaved elderly man may spend the rest of his life in prison.

In my mind this devastating case reveals just how out-of-date Scots law remains, how ill-equipped to deal with the realities of terminal illness at a time when people rightly expect to be able to make more profound choices about their lives and healthcare options ever before.

Perhaps the saddest aspect of this entire affair is that Mrs Gordon never felt able to seek treatment for her pain and suffering. Even if she had, however, the available care options to treat her terminal lung cancer may not have been enough. And since Scotland does not have an assisted suicide law, she may still have been begging her husband to end her pain for good.

As a supposedly modern, progressive society, can we, indeed should we, really continue to prevent terminally-ill people from getting help from the medical profession to end their own lives peacefully and at a time of their choosing?

My own feeling is that we should stop hiding our heads in the sand and finally confront, once and for all, the challenges inherent in bringing such a law to the statute books: we must make it happen.

Now that six states in the US, alongside countries such as Switzerland, Germany, Australia, Japan and Canada allow the practice, we simply cannot continue to argue that there is no reasonable legal framework to work within. Generally in these countries and states only people in sound mind with around six months to live are allowed to choose to die, and they administer the drugs themselves.

The evidence of all of these jurisdictions is that in reality few people actually choose to end their lives in this way - people are not queuing up to kill themselves as the critics often like to pretend they would be. And, since human instinct usually drives us to keep on hoping, even when all hope is lost, this surely comes as no real surprise.

The Scottish Parliament has twice voted against legislating for assisted suicide, despite polls consistently showing a majority of Scots support it; public opinion is yet again way ahead of politicians. There are continual calls for a new Bill to come before Holyrood, and the case of Mr and Mrs Gordon only highlights this need further.

For me, this issue comes down to the will of the state versus the will of the individual. Ultimately, however, only the individual can choose what quality of life means. And surely that must include the possibility of not living it at all.