EVIDENCE of emails being sent between an American euthanasiast and Rosemary Toole Gilhooley before she committed suicide in a rented Dublin house will be presented before a Grand Jury in the United States on Wednesday.

Details of the communications, along with forensic evidence from the scene of the suicide, will be presented in support of a case that the Rev George Exoo and his partner, Thomas McGurrin, assisted in Ms Toole Gilhooley's suicide.

The Grand Jury will then decide whether or not there are grounds for an indictment in the United States, following which the two could be subjected to extradition to Ireland.

The case is the first of its kind in this State and has involved a detailed and prolonged Garda investigation. Exoo and his partner could face charges here either of murdering Ms Toole Gilhooley or of assisting in her suicide.

The charge of assisting a person to commit suicide carries a maximum sentence of 14 years imprisonment.

The garda detective superintendent in charge of the investigation and a colleague are traveling to the United States today and will attend the Grand Jury hearing in West Virginia.

The gardai will be present to assist the Grand Jury and may give evidence. Exoo and his partner have the option of pleading the Fifth Amendment, refusing to say anything that might incriminate them. Exoo gave a series of interviews to journalists after his return to the United States.

The content of these interviews, which included admissions that he and McGurrin were with Ms Toole Gilhooley when she died, will also be part of the Garda case.

While in the United States the gardai will interview at least three journalists who spoke to Exoo.

Exoo has stated previously that he was involved in 'hundreds' of suicides but always states that he was merely present in a pastoral capacity and did not 'assist'. He is aware that 'assisting' in a suicide is a crime in the United States and here, where it became an offence to aid, abet or procure a suicide under the 1993 Criminal Justice Act.

The gardai have been liaising with the FBI and will also talk to other witnesses, including journalists who interviewed Exoo and his partner McGurrin.

Exoo, McGurrin and another man have been called before the West Virginia Grand Jury which sits on Wednesday. The Grand Jury will assess if there is sufficient evidence for an indictment.

Exoo runs his own church, the New River Unitarian-Universalist congregation, in the former mining town of Beckley in West Virginia.

He has been prominent for several years in the US euthanasia movement and has close links to a 71-year-old Canadian woman, Evelyn Martens, who is suspected of supplying the 'exit bag' which Ms Toole Gilhooley used in her suicide.

The 'exit bag' is a plastic bag with a Velcro-fastening collar which is placed over the head and then filled with helium, usually after the person committing suicide has consumed a large amount of sedatives.

Supplying the exit bag has become an offence in Canada and the United States and Mrs Martens, a grandmother from Vancouver, is currently facing charges of assisting in the suicides of two terminally-ill women in Canada. She was arrested in June by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

It is understood that gardai had wished to question Mrs Martens but decided against it after charges were brought against her in Canada.

In the two Canadian suicide cases, exit bags like that used by Ms Toole Gilhooley were used.

Ms Toole Gilhooley, who suffered from severe depression, went to considerable lengths to procure her own death. She acquired cylinders of helium, large quantities of sedatives and finally the exit bag from the Canadian 'Right to Die' group via the Internet.

Exoo has admitted that Ms Toole Gilhooley paid for his and McGurrin's expenses and paid for a holiday trip the trio made to the west of Ireland prior to her death. They stayed in Westport before returning to the house Ms Toole Gilhooley rented in Donnybrook and where she died on January 26.

There is a dispute over how much money the two were paid for expenses. They say they received $2,500 but may have received up to $6,500. They left Dublin the day after her death and spent another few days holidaying in Amsterdam.

Ms Toole Gilhooley's father, Owen Toole, said her death was 'the end of a long, sad story' and that, while she had been bright and happy as a child, she had suffered a mental breakdown and suffered from severe depression. She had attempted suicide on several occasions before.

Mr Exoo has made many public statements about his involvement in euthanasia. In one article on a website for his Compassionate Chaplaincy Foundation, he said he was once questioned by police in relation to the death of a 79-year-old widow in Florida. But he was not charged with any offence despite admitting that he secured an exit bag over her head to aid suffocation.

"Police fingerprinted me and read me Miranda rights but in the end recommended the State Attorney General take no further action," he wrote.

- JIM CUSACK