SWITZERLAND: The inventor of a “suicide capsule” has rejected allegations that the US woman who was said to be its first user may in reality have been strangled.

Philip Nitschke of advocacy group Exit International said today that he wasn’t present at the woman’s death in a forest in northern Switzerland on September 23, but he had seen the event involving the capsule live by video transmission.

The head of a Swiss affiliate group, Florian Willet, was present at the woman’s death and was immediately taken into police custody, where he remains.