Posted on 07/07/2006 6:26:30 PM PDT by Extremely Extreme Extremist
(AP) HOUSTON A psychiatrist testified Friday that she warned Andrea Yates not to have any more children after she tried to commit suicide twice within months of having her fourth child in 1999.
"I could pretty much predict that Mrs. Yates would have another episode of psychosis," Dr. Eileen Starbranch told jurors in Yates' second murder retrial.
Starbranch said Yates suffered from postpartum psychosis, which she said causes a mother to have delusions and lose touch with reality, making it much more severe than postpartum depression.
Yates drowned her five young children in a bathtub in June 2001, 6 months after the birth of her fifth child, Mary. She is being tried again because an appeals court overturned her 2002 murder conviction based on erroneous testimony that might have influenced the jury. She has again pleaded innocent by reason of insanity.
Yates' attorneys have never disputed she killed the youngsters but say she didn't know that the drownings were wrong.
Prosecutors say Yates may be mentally ill but does not meet the state's definition of insanity.
They say Yates planned to drown the children when she was alone with them, after her husband went to work and before her mother-in-law arrived. Then Yates called 911 and later told a detective she killed them because she was a bad mother and wanted to be punished, according to witnesses.
Along with Mary, Yates drowned 2-year-old Luke, 3-year-old Paul, 5-year-old John and 7-year-old Noah.
Starbranch said she treated Yates after she tried to kill herself by overdosing on sleeping pills in June 1999.
About a month later, Starbranch said, Yates' then-husband, Rusty, told her that Yates had held a knife to her own throat the previous day.
Starbranch said Yates had a bald spot on her head from scratching it, had not been taking her antipsychotic medication, had filthy hair and could not function. Starbranch said she sent the couple immediately to a mental hospital so Andrea Yates could be admitted.
Under cross-examination, Starbranch acknowledged that the words "filthy" and "catatonic" were not in her notes and said that Yates' nervousness and anxiety may have been a sign that she simply did not want to be at a psychiatrist's office. But Starbranch maintained that Yates was psychotic and not lethargic or exhausted from caring for four young children.
Over the next two weeks or so while hospitalized, Yates steadily improved while on antipsychotic drugs, Starbranch said.
But then in March 2001, Rusty Yates called Starbranch's office trying to make an appointment, saying his wife was getting worse since having the couple's fifth child in November, Starbranch testified.
"I knew that was a very ominous sign ... that lives were at stake, so I asked that she be brought in immediately," Starbranch said.
The couple never showed up, but Starbranch later learned that Yates was admitted to another mental hospital, the psychiatrist testified.
Yates, being tried in only three of the children's deaths, will be sentenced to life in prison if convicted. After the first jury rejected execution, prosecutors could not seek the death penalty again because they found no new evidence.
I remember reading an article about this a few years ago. When Rusty arrived home, an EMS worker insisted on giving Rusty some water...Rusty's comment: "Good luck finding a clean glass." What an odd comment from a man who just found out his wife killed his 5 kids. These words have always haunted me for some reason.
I would have to see a time-stamped series of pictures. My general impression, based on memory from the first trial years ago, is that she slipped farther and farther into disinterest, that she let herself go.
I'm not arguing that middle-aged women should try to look 20-something. Far from it. But if your significant other completely abandons all beauty rituals overnight, well, hello! -- an attentive lover, let alone husband, should have noticed.
To be honest Andrea Yates looked better than most of the poor people I see at Walmart.
What's relevant isn't the snapshot, but the trend. If I was 6'2" at the beginning of this year and I'm 5'11" now, in July, I'm still above average height. You wouldn't notice me as especially short, and might in fact think I'm pretty darned tall. But the fact that I lost three inches of height in half a year is a sign of a critical problem. The kind of thing that someone who shares my bed should notice.
I can't think of any rationale by which Rusty Yates was criminally liable in the deaths of his children, but it's pretty clear he was a world-class d---head.
While his wife was sinking, he was too preoccupied to throw her a line. The more Andrea strained, the more weight Rusty loaded on her back. I hope I never meet the guy, because he'll need stitches and I'll need bail, and my life is better without that level of complication.
Tragically, it was neither Rusty nor Andrea, but rather their innocent passengers, who paid the price for their dysfunction.
I think you are making the same mistake Russell Yates made. Hind sight is twenty-twenty. She went after Russell Yates with a knife.Russell Yates tried to cure Andrea's red hot hatred for himself with modern psychiatry. Of course, Andrea became more insane. The object of her hate was still alive. All the worse, he was showering love and pity on her.She could not kill Russell ,so she killed his children.
In retrospect, he should have had attempted murder charges filed against Andrea Yates ,and he should have divorced her when she went after him with a knife.I do not think Russell Yates is a battered husband though. Andrea Yates must have been far prettier than she is in those pictures.If Russell were a female he would be in prison as an accessory ,and if Andrea were male , she would be on death row as it should be.
I find all the pity and sympathy directed at that she devil sickening. You want to beat up the husband because you think he abused poor Andrea. That she devil is smiling.You are responding exactly as she anticipated you would.
BUMP
I have tried to find a reference to Andrea Yates attempting to kill her husband with a knife, but I am having no success. I did find a mention of the fact that she held a knife to her own throat and her husband pried it from her hands. Do you have a link that talks about this attempt on her husband's life?
The mentally ill live in a special hell that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy.
I read this either in the "Observer" or "Texas Monthly".
I am not sure which one.
I haven't read any post on this thread that advocates letting her go. I'm not even sure a guy would go to jail for pulling a knife on his wife. Probably get sent to therapy, etc.
No cop wants to toss some mother in jail for a domestic dispute. They mostly don't want to toss the guy in jail, either. And most of the time neither party files a complaint.
Also, the thing is, she's not a typical lard-assed housewife who smashes dishes, flips off her mother-in-law or decides to get a back tattoo at forty. She's nuts. And not just a little nuts, either. She's really, really full-blown, all out, pedal to the emotional metal cuckoo.
Those are nice adjectives for describing crazy people. If you have your way, this woman will spend the rest of her life wearing bunny slippers ,drinking soothing medication in the company of poor, crazy people.That is a nauseating picture. Some of the crazy people she would be placed with are capable of leading normal lives .They can not afford to be around a murderer.Crazy people are vulnerable. Andrea Yates has a track record of killing vulnerable people.
The husband and his "preacher" were mean and domineering towards her. They are legally innocent but bear considerable guilt for the atrocity.
If I had my way, she'd be hooked up to a Thorazine tank the size of a water cooler.
There are facilities for the criminally insane as well as some prisons with psych wards. Makes no difference to me, just as long as she's not a threat to herself and those around her. However, I would say that at a minimal humane baseline, she should get some treatment.
I'm off to work. Will answer your response when I return.
Dysfunctional. Yes they were. They danced a macabre dance.
Russell was a crappy husband ,but he did not beat Andrea physically anyways. I think he tried to turn Andrea into something she was never meant to be. I do not mean sane.It seems like Andrea was incapable of saying, "No"! No! I will not move onto a crappy bus! No! I will not go see a misogynistic preacher! No! I will not live in an ugly little ranch house so you can be five minutes from work. No! You will not leave me alone with a whole bunch of kids so that so you can go play basketball.Most husbands would never dream of doing what Russell did because most wives are not door mats.
So says an alleged... Happy wife, MOMMY, Literary Agent, College English Professor, Roman Catholic, Pro-life and REPUBLICAN!
Now what is the likelyhood of a College English Professor being a Republican in this day and age? About the same in my book as one that thinks that a person who was at work is culpable in the murder of his children. Highly improbable.
Brilliantly said.
Red flags that we should have the police bust down your door and have you arrested for multiple murders? We would probably just assume that you had finally gotten laid.
Oh right. Nothing was done for the poor lady.
He hadn't taken her to see any Dr's -- oh wait, he did.
He hand't gotten family to come over and help with the kids -- oh wait, he did.
There is a d---head here and it isn't Mr. Yates.
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