claiming he took no action to assist in his patient's suicide. He had invented a machine that was designed to be operated by the patient using the machine. Therefore, Kevorkian argued he had no hand in causing the death of his patients. His patients had complete control of the suicide from start to finish. Kevorkian's role in the deaths was to simply help attach his patients to his machine. The rest was up to them. Some called Kevorkian a raging madman who lost his mind, while others called him an angel for helping to end the suffering of his patients.