Diane Pretty has died at a hospice near her home. Family members made the announcement after Mrs Pretty passed away at 4.25pm Saturday 11th May.

Mrs Pretty, from Luton, Bedfordshire, had begun experiencing breathing difficulties ten days ago, just three days after she lost her right-to-die court challenge. She was 43. Mr Pretty was at his wife's bedside. He says she is 'free at last'.

The mother-of-two, who lost a legal battle for her husband to help her commit suicide, suffered from motor neurone disease. Mrs Pretty had always said she wanted her husband to help her commit suicide because she feared the choking and asphyxia often caused by her disease. Her husband Brian said: "Diane had to go through the one thing she had foreseen and was afraid of - and there was nothing I could do to help."

He said in a statement issued by the Voluntary Euthanasia Society (VES), which supported the couple in their legal fight: "On Thursday May 2, Diane asked me to call the doctor as she was having trouble with her breathing. "She had no chest infection and her airways were clear. The next day she went into the hospice and started having breathing problems again. The doctors and nurses managed to get her stable for a few days but she was still in pain. "The staff were wonderful at their job and there was always someone there with her. They had trouble getting her comfortable and pain-free until Thursday evening, after which she started to slip into a coma-like state and eventually died.

"Out of this, Diane had to go through the one thing she had foreseen and was afraid of - and there was nothing I could do to help. I was with Diane most of the day and was about to come home when I was stopped and told it was time. And then for Diane it was over, free at last."