>> they'll deal with that storm for a while with the cold weather. thank you. those are the headlines. "america tonight" is next. and you can get the latest news on aljazeera.com. i'll see you back here tomorrow night.

can be quite painful. last week a new mexico judge ruled that terminally ill patients have the right to physician assisted suicide. it represents a turning point for the community. adam learned more about the right to die in vermont which was one of the first states to accept the controversial prevention.

>> reporter: ben underhill knows he is living on borrowed time. ten years ago he was diagnosed with a rare and deadly blood cancer. he moved to vermont after college, drawn to its small town charm and natural beauty, he found it the perfect place to live. now he is planning to die here. >> i don't fear death at all. i actually -- you know, as they say death is easy, life is hard. >> reporter: you were only given a couple of years to live, and later? >> when i was diagnosed i was 44, and the life expect pansy was three to five years. >> what is that like? >> you don't have a lot of choice you give up or move on. i have had to have people bathe me. i have had to have pick me up for quite a while.

but there comes a point where you know it's going to get so bad that you can't do anything for yourself, and so somebody is keeping you alive, or keeping you in existence, and for what? three extra weeks? to me i have had seven extra years already. so three weeks is nothing. >> reporter: the 54-year-old insurance agent was a driving force behind a new controversial law. he lobbied state lawmakers to suicide. >> if this bill passes i'll be comfortable knowing in my last few weeks if things become too unbearable, i can end my life. [ applause ] >> we now lead an area where other states have not gone. >> reporter: vermont's governor signed the death with dignity bill into law in may.

it allows doctors to prescribe a life-ending pill. >> i have no fear that i will ask for the medication. will i get to the point where i will take it or i feel that i'm so bad that i have to take it? i don't know. >> what is it about dying this way that is more comforting to you? >> it's on my terms. >> reporter: vermont is one of five states where physician-assisted suicide is permitted. new mexico could become the sixth state if a recent court ruling is not appealed. but it is happening in other states often involving a controversial group operating in the shadows. it's called the final exit network. >> the difference between me and kevorkian, well, he liked the publicity. ours is a private thing. >> reporter: this doctor used to be the medical director of the

final exit network. he keeps an office in this small home in baltimore, maryland. >> reporter: you make the patient plug it in, pull the bag nozzle. >> yeah, all of those things. >> reporter: so you are not physically doing anything? >> i physically do nothing. and each of those go to a tank. >> reporter: he showed us what he uses to help people die. modified turkey cooking bags filled with tubes that hook up to helium tanks. >> i asked a patient one time, i said would she mind -- be willing that some other person use is this? >> reporter: he has used an exit hood like this one to help many people end their lives. >> and she thought it was a marvellous idea. the fact that she would be giving a gift to somebody else. and i have done that.

>> reporter: recycled them? >> recycled led them. reused them. >> reporter: has this one been used? >> yeah. >> reporter: oh. what is that process like? >> the person doesn't feel any pain or discomfort at all and they just go to sleep. >> reporter: you hold their hands sometimes. >> yeah. >> reporter: how many times have you held a person's hand. >> about a hundred. it's an honor. do you want me to put it on? >> reporter: iing don't want you to suffocate? >> well, don't worry about that. >> reporter: the doctor has faced criminal charges in a handful of jurisdictions, but has yet to be convicted. critics argue he will help anyone die whether their medical condition is terminal.

>> i do not think terminally ill is a reasonable criteria. i think it's better to say a person has a chance to think about their life. i have a man who is 84 years old. he is totally deaf. he says this is living? i don't want to do this anymore. >> reporter: he wants to go? >> he wants to go. >> reporter: and do you think he should have that choice? >> yes, i do. you can go down and buy a rifle and blow your brains out. you have that right. >> reporter: but in the end it's somebody pulling a helium balloon over their head, and some would say that's not very dig anified. >> you can get the pills it's up to you. >> he is pulling balloons over people's heads. i think it's creepy. >> reporter: this woman is helping to lead the repeal

law. >> i think it's the exception not the rule that death is ugly and scary. they want you to think that the only way to make it pretty is to plan it and take a pill for it. and i don't think that mother nature is that cruel. >> reporter: how old was your mother when she passed? >> 90. she really had a good life. >> reporter: she recently sat at her mothers side as she died a natural death. >> reporter: what is your concern? >> i want to make sure i have the option to die naturally. i don't want an environment in our future where people are pressured into ending they lives prematurely. >> do you think people want to live? i think people want to live basically. until they can't live anymore.

>> reporter: gene mallory was married to vermont's former congressman dick mallory. the republican represented the state in the 1970s, and then returned to vermont as a leader in state politics. state. come. >> reporter: after being diagnosed with aggressive prostate cancer in 2004, mallory and his wife began the effort to bring physician-assisted suicide to vermont. >> we just hope it's in time for us that's all. >> reporter: but despite their televised appeal, early versions of the law failed. dick mallory took his own life in 2011. >> reporter: it was a beautiful fall day, and i came home and found a note on the door. >> reporter: can you share what

it said? >> to jeanie and my family, the time has come. i have done everything that i wanted to do, and i don't -- i don't regret my life. he knew it was going to be a shock to me, but i feel that this is what people who make this decision go through. they weigh the benefits, and -- and the burdens. he certainly didn't want to put us through watching him become helpless and -- and he didn't want to be nursed, you know? he was a very proud -- proud man. my hugest regret is that i could bbt with him, and that's because it was not legal. >> reporter: with the new law in vermont if ben underhill chooses physician-assisted suicide, we can be surrounded by family at the end.

>> i would much rather go out on the terms that i want to go out, feeling good, being happy, being comfortable, being with the people i love than lying in bed suffering. and i think it's almost an enlightened position of not having to suffer at the end. >> reporter: the avid baseball death. >> initially i thought i would have a nice meal and watch a red sox game, but now i found out you have five hours between eating a meal and taking the medicine. so i'll have a nice meal and wait five hours and watch a game and then fall asleep. >> this is such a gift to people, such a gift. they just don't know it yet. >> our correspondent tells us there has been plenty of much

back against these laws and not just from the church. many argue this could encourage people with disabilities to embrace death instead of trying life-sustaining treatments. it is a clear that this is a fight far from over. ♪ we'll look at new ways to support the gravely ill on our next program when technology offers the answer to what seems like an unbearable existence. >> he described to me once, i feel like i'm a ghost looking in on my family. he begged me to take his life. begged me. he had it planned out that i was to shoot him and bury him in the backyard. it was a huge change because it gave him a purpose in life. it could be something as small as holding a plastic device so that henry could rub his head on

it and scratch his head for the first time. >> robots for humanity, in ways large and small. how they can make all of the difference. jacob ward brings us the story wednesday on"america tonight." and coming up next, pressure mounts on an ancient tradition a dolphin hunt in japan. and why leaders there say u.s. e being unfair.

>> coming up, brutal pictures from syria, and you can't show

them. and the government is hurting more than helping, and plus, super bowl tickets are twice as expensive as last year, and why are they so pricey? and why so many women in that could be a terrible box office move. we'll see you at the top of the hour. >> depending on your culture, has either a slaughter of dolphins. created by the social media from the new ambassador to japan, caroline kennedy. and now japanese leaders are hypocritical, not because of that, but they feature many

dolphins that come from the wild. featured in an oscar-winning documentary, the cove, and it's enraining environmental activists. these are the scenes that have activists seeing red. fishermen attacking bottle-nosed dolphin, the water crimson with their blood. they run to april every year. this hunt, with hundreds of animals in the cove, was the biggest roundup in years. the anti-whaling group said that just over 40 were killed for their meat. and another 152 were kept for sale around the world. you can see the dolphins picked out for sale. ambassador kennedy's tweets raised diplomatic loops, inhumaneness of dolphin killing,

they oppose dry hunt fisheries. japanese fisheries point out that the hunt is within the international seas. >> it is a tradition in our country and it has been carried out appropriately and in accordance with the law. >> the japanese say that u.s. hunters and meat eaters kill dolphins in this country, making them hip quickly. they allow dolphin capture for entertainment purposes as long as it's done humanely. most of the surviving dolphins will end up in mexico, turkey, tie wine and korea, but it remains the method of the hunt that raises the greatest outrage. >> a metal rod was put into their spinal cord, where they were left to bleed out and have suffocate and die, and after a

traumatic four days, they experienced violent captive selection, and separated from their family, and were eventually killed today. >> it's certainly a provocative story. with more perspective on how dolphins are captured here and abroad, billy hurly, president, of the marine animal parks and alliance. thank you for being with us, and we want to know first, are we going to see any of these dolphins end being up in the animal attractions or zoos in this country. >> absolutely not, and none have come into this country in the last 30 or 40 years. we have laws in place according to the marine protection act that would prevent us from bringing them in, because of the inhumane slaughter which we condemn, but also because it's not a sustainable fishery.

you would never see these animals in this country, and that's the deceiving side for the activists that want to claim that they're worldwide, when they're not. >> there are several hundred dolphins in captivity in the united states? >> yes, ma'am, there are 400 in the united states, comparing that to the 70 million dogs in the united states or the 92 million horses here, it's a very small number. it's a very well cared for number, these animals, with the finest care and greatest of love. strict policies and continued production of what's going on. >> i did want to understand, these mammals are bred in captivity. >> they were born in our care, and 5% come from a small group

from strands of animals that are not releasable. but most importantly, those animals collected in 1972, that are nowlistic to be 50, 60 years of age, so at this point, all of them will be born in our care. >> so where will the animals end up? >> some of the middle eastern countries are desiring these animals, and i think its important to note that the aquariums here in the united states and the zoological community is absolutely against that type of practice over there, and we have said so for many years. and we have tried to help those organizations lacking to collect animals by helping them improve the way they care for their animals and the reproduction production of the animals. >> would there be a humane way to draw them out from the wild and put them into facilities, say in other countries that want to start?

say they don't have facilities yet, but they want to begin their own animal attractions and zoos? >> that's a great point, and the answer is yes. it has to be following a strict criteria, so there's no detriment. and there are practices that we use here in the united states with the national fishery serves to do health assessments on the animals, and we will handle those animals safely and carefully, and actually many times, we'll collect data and let them go, so you can do this in a humane way. >> so if you were starting a zoo in china, for example, and you wanted to acquire a dolphin without purchasing them on the market, and i gather it's quite expensive to do so, there's another way to do it, to go into the wild and capture them? >> well, there are certainly ways to study animal populations to determine how many are there. but let's look at mexico, the

porpoise, there are not many left. and there was a time when the animals should have been collected humanely to ensure for the future generations but those are past. so there are places to do so in the wild. but doing it in a humane fashion is critical. >> billy hurley is former president of the parks and aquariums. thank you for being with us. and ahead in our final thoughts this evening. an independent woman and a redwood backyard. an american treasure.

>> finally tonight, a voice from the wilderness. she's just one woman, but a powerful one. strong enough to shape california's giant redwoods herself. a little wisdom from her elders,

she says. our american treasure series continues in humboldt, california. >> every log is a gem, and every log has it's unique character, and there's a value there, and unless you know how to deal with it, most people walk by and say, oh, that's rotten. i get in with the logs, and it's a hunch, it's a gut feeling with me. and i'm not going to say its women's intuition. i'm looking for the bright orange solid chips, and that's a good sign. i recycle the stumps. and i don't know what the true classification of an old drunk tree is, but if you think about

it, a 500-year-old tree, that's pretty old. i work on a lot of stuff that was harvested back in the late 1800s and early 1900s. they wanted the creme de la creme pieces of the tree, so they just left it. being able to recycle this product down to its fullest, that's huge for me. all i'm doing is just taking them, opening them up and creating something beautiful for the rest of us to enjoy. when i first started about 14 years ago, i had a pickup truck, a high lift jack and a lot of determination. as i've goaten older, i've kind of surrendered, yeah, i need more help, but in the beginning i didn't have anybody helping me because i didn't want to. there was something about getting it done on my own, in my own space, time and way, that was perfectly fine by me.

but unfortunately, as we get older, we have to get smarter. so to have equipment, yeah, it's definite grace and ease. but it's nice to know that if i need to move something without all of those fancy tools, there's not a log in this yard that i continue move by hand. old growth is old growth, it speaks for itself. it's the quality wood, the tight grain that it provides. and that's the point of this stuff. you have to understand what you have left to work with, and how to maximize its potential to the fullest.

i get a pretty good grin on my face when i see nothing but vertical lumber. doesn't get much better than that. the value of the product and the quality of the wood, i had that instilled to me by my dad. he was a master carpenter. he could put beautiful pieces of wood together into a final product, whereas i could take the rough tree and turn it into a product. when my dad bought my first mill for me, and taught me how to read logs, and how boards should look. he was very very critical. and that's good. it taught me quality control. my dad was born in the 1920s, and there was a definite pride on how you built things back in those days. how you took your time and made something really special and beautiful. i always try to cut as if my dad was standing behind me, look,

you know, you have to get that better. there's an energy around redwood trees, especially old growth redwood trees. it's an energy that everybody should feel. some of the oldest trees on the planet. you're taught to respect your elders, and i guess that would be it for me. an old growth redwood is an elder. their stories are unique and real, and these trees can't talk. the only way they can talk is to show what they actually have inside of them. when i open them up, it's like they are opening their hearts to me, and embracing me to say, you know, let's see what you got. make me shine even more so than i already do.

>> that was our american treasure, and we'll have more america tonight tomorrow. >> welcome to aljazeera america, i'm thomas grade , and here are the stories we're following at this hour. more information about that west virginia chemical leak. investigators have learned of a

previous undetected chemical material that leaked into the water two weeks ago. and thousands have been told not to drink the water. a snowstorm is slamming the east causing travel problems nationwide. thousands of flights were canceled after five airports had heavy snow. a state of emergency was cleared in new jersey, delaware and parts of new york state piment. >> gathering for a long-awaited peace conference. it will be the first time that both sides of the civil war it in syria meet. and then they move onto geneva on friday. if ooh. >> safety concerns for the upcoming olympics. russians are searching for suspected suicide bombers called black widows. the security officials haven't identified the women, and one made it past security in sochi. violence is escalating in the ukraine. in part because of a new law

cracking down on new protests. thousands are fighting with the police, with gas bombs, and police fought back with teargas. injuries have been reported on both sides. consider this is coming up next, i'm thomas graden in new york.