– A man has pleaded guilty to 14 counts of aiding suicides in Canada after he sold toxic chemicals online.

Kenneth Law, 60, entered the guilty pleas in an Ontario court on Friday, as part of a deal with prosecutors, who withdrew more serious murder charges. Authorities said the former chef also sold about 1,200 packages of the toxic substances to recipients – who he met in online suicide forums – in 40 countries, roughly a quarter of which were sent to the UK. The charges all relate to Canadian victims – but families of British victims have said they were angry UK prosecutors would not charge Law over the deaths of 79 Britons, which authorities say are linked to products he supplied.The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said it had agreed to the Canadian plea bargain on the basis Law’s sentence take the British deaths into account.

A letter from the CPS, seen by the BBC, said Law would not face charges in the UK because he could challenge the extradition after being convicted of similar offences in Canada.Specialist CPS prosecutor Andrew Hudson said that including UK victims in the Canadian sentencing process was the “quickest and most effective route” to justice.

Hudson said a successful extradition was “far from guaranteed and would have taken years to conclude”, while any UK prosecution “could have been blocked under double jeopardy principles”.Ontario man Ashtyn Prosser-Blake, 19, was one of Law’s victims who died by suicide in March 2023.”He was just such a super happy, really gentle soul, always looking to stand up for the underdog, the kids that got picked on,” his mother, Kim Prosser, told the BBC.