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.
What is your legal background?
I think we'll discover that the mind is more than just machinery
A very complex machine is still a machine.
ROFLOL. That is a completely irrelevant question.
Do you have any legal training or do you just enjoy making up crimes out of whole cloth?
I am glad that unbelieving people like you will not be the One to judge us in the end.
I have delt with cases like this and worse working with the County Attys.
Then you clearly need a new line of work if you have devolved into the position that you think Mr. Yates committed a crime.
"delt"???
Husband isn't guilty of a crime, but did show incredibly bad judgement in all respects. Fortunately or unfortunately bad judgement is not always a crime.
Correct. Husband ... did show incredibly bad judgement in all respects. Fortunately or unfortunately bad judgement is not always a crime.
Did he now? When did he show bad judgment?
Leaving an emotionally unstable person in charge of a bunch of kids isn't great judgement.
So do I. Unfortunately many FReepers don't show much compassion for anyone.
I have known someone who was literally a walking nervous breakdown for months before anyone else realized the problem was so serious. Once the depression, or extreme anxiety sets in it can be too late for the ill person to ask for help. Even if they do ask for help they make not be able to express themselves well enough for well-meaning family and friends to "get a clue". In a situation like this things can escalate out of control very quickly. What seems like a simple decision to an unknowing participant can in reality be a life or death decision.
That being said, I do think Andrea Yates' husband is more at fault than she was. He had seen her condition and been told by her doctors that she should not have more children. He kept her barefoot and pregnant year and year knowing that she became progressively more depressed at each pregnancy. At one point they even lived in an old school bus and home schooled all her children. That would drive many people over the edge even without the hormonal changes caused by pregnancy.
That being said, I do think Andrea Yates' husband is more at fault than she was.
I agree, you don't show much compassion for anyone. Another "THE HUSBAND DID IT" idiot. Why don't just do away with prosecuting all murderers, burglars, rapists, etc. and just jail their victims.
You are only able to make that assessment based on 20/20 hindsight. What real evidence do you know he had available to him before she murdered her children that she was emotionally unstable?
You are very defensive.
From your web site, your agenda shows.
Calling people names shows you are desperate.
For not having a dog in this hunt, your back is sure up.
I would think the hair would only be part of it. I have seen some of the pictures of her that were posted on one of these threads. There is a huge difference over the years in her appearance. Her eyes even have an odd look to them in pictures taken not long before the murders.
You are only able to make that assessment based on 20/20 hindsight. What real evidence do you know he had available to him before she murdered her children that she was emotionally unstable?
From all the information available the husband had been told by psychiatrists in no uncertain terms that his wife should not have any more children due to repeated psychotic episodes after childbirth. She walked around like zombie and showed signs of severe depression even when she wasn't psychotic. If that doesn't show that she was emotionally unstable, I don't know what would.
I do not always blame the husband; however, it certainly seems appropriate in this case.
Sure they did. The same shrinks that recommended she needed to be hospitalized because of her condition. Oh wait, they didn't recommend that.
I do not always blame the husband; however, it certainly seems appropriate in this case.
All this anger towards the husband and none toward the treating physicians or shrinks?
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.
You are willing to blame the husband for the wives actions. Why do you also not blame the mother-in-law?
We all have a dog in this hunt.
Accusing people of being an accmplice to a murder when they had not part in it affects us all.
when they had not part in it / or is it no part
You need to read the article and
You need to leave out your agenda
so is it "delt" or "dealt"?
Why don't you leave your agenda out of it and stop blaming men for all your problems.
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