Posted on 07/26/2006 9:35:01 AM PDT by cajunman
HOUSTON -- Jurors reached a verdict in Andrea Yates' murder retrial Wednesday morning. The jury's decision will be announced at about 11:25 a.m. KPRC and Click2Houston will air the verdict live.
After deliberating nearly 11 hours, jurors returned for a third day Wednesday to determine if she was legally insane when she drowned her five children in the bathtub.
Before court ended Tuesday, the jury of six men and six women asked to review the state's definition of insanity: that someone, because of a severe mental illness, does not know a crime he is committing is wrong.
State District Judge Belinda Hill said jurors, who were sequestered for the second night, , could see the definition Wednesday morning.
Jurors have already deliberated longer than the nearly four hours it took a first jury, which convicted her in 2002. That conviction was overturned on appeal last year.
Yates, 42, has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity. She is charged in only three of the deaths, which is common in cases involving multiple slayings.
As court was to end Tuesday, jurors asked for one more hour to deliberate. But then the panel immediately passed another note rescinding that request. Hill quoted the note, which read, "We need some sleep," prompting laughs from those in the courtroom.
The jury earlier asked to review the videotape of Yates' July 2001 evaluation by Dr. Phillip Resnick, a forensic psychiatrist who testified for the defense that she did not know killing the children was wrong because she was trying to save them from hell.
Resnick told jurors that Yates was delusional and believed 6-month-old Mary, 2-year-old Luke, 3-year-old Paul, 5-year-old John and 7-year-old Noah would grow up to be criminals because she had ruined them.
Jurors later asked to review Yates' November 2001 videotaped evaluation by Dr. Park Dietz, the state's expert witness whose testimony led an appeals court to overturn Yates' 2002 capital murder conviction last year.
Dietz, a forensic psychiatrist, testified in her first trial that an episode of the television series "Law & Order" depicted a woman who was acquitted by reason of insanity after drowning her children. But no such episode existed. The judge barred attorneys in this trial from mentioning that issue.
On Tuesday, after jurors asked for the trial transcript involving defense attorney George Parnham's questioning of Dietz about the definition of obsessions, the judge brought the jury back into the courtroom.
The court reporter then read the brief transcript, in which Dietz said Yates "believed that Satan was at least present. She felt or sensed the presence." Dietz had testified that Yates' thoughts about harming her children were an obsession and a symptom of severe depression -- not psychosis.
Earlier Tuesday, jurors reviewed the slide presentation of the state's key expert witness, Dr. Michael Welner, a forensic psychiatrist who evaluated Yates in May. He testified that she did not kill her children to save them from hell as she claims, but because she was overwhelmed and felt inadequate as a mother.
Welner told jurors that although Yates was psychotic on the day of the June 2001 drownings, he found 60 examples of how she knew it was wrong to kill them.
If Yates is found innocent by reason of insanity, she will be committed to a state mental hospital, with periodic hearings before a judge to determine whether she should be released -- although by law, jurors are not allowed to be told that.
Yates will be sentenced to life in prison if convicted of capital murder.
A capital murder conviction in Texas carries either life in prison or the death penalty. Prosecutors could not seek death this time because the first trial's jurors sentenced her to life in prison, and authorities found no new evidence
...what a wonderful mother you have been to your dtr...
..I hope someday you'll see the total fruits of your good works if not thru your own dtr, thru your grand-dtr and eventually, I think God has a special spot saved for the caregives of this world.....
I suppose most freepers like most people in this country have perfect, normal children.....they don't realize not for one minute what devastation occurs when your children are not the picture perfect offspring we all want....
Yeah and that cad is breeding again...
None of the Christians on this thread mentioned the possibility.
It took a non-Christian to bring it up.
I still think he is GUILTY by putting the children in harm's way...I hope the poor woman gets some help.
I hope she never gets pregnant again.
She DID get away with murder. Her little plan worked. In five years or less she'll be out and about.
At that time, I'd expect you to go and give her a big hug and kiss and tell her how you "understand".
Me thinks you doth protest too much. Have a little trouble dealing with your own kids somewhere along the line?
I have no trouble with any kids.
I WOULD give her a hug after all the misunderstanding and spiteful ignorance she's been through. She doesn't belong with convicts.
Not a chance. Susan Smith had a bona fide motive for disposing of her little darlings - she wanted to marry a wealthy man who didn't want her 'baggage' from her failed marriage.
Andrea was nothing like that, loved her kids all the way up until she snapped, tried to get help, and had no motive at all to kill them. There was nothing in it for her if she killed them. Weird voices told her to do it. Go see the movie 'A Beautiful Mind' to understand how real those voices seem to people who are insane. It's no plot to kill kids - it's mental illness.
Yes. Why?
Exactly how much time have you spent interviewing and examining Andrea Yates to put forth this assertion, and what degrees do you have to qualify your opinion?
I just wondered if you believed in demon possession.
WWJD?
You first. Then I will answer.
As to your first sentence; no problem, I've been there before. :)
Your second sentence I agree with totally.
You know that, because some liberals were upset that Ken Lay had a heart attack and wouldn't have to go to prison where he would be raped by men.
And oddly, the gay lobby didn't complain about the liberals saying that gay sex was punishment.
I agree, they should be locked away, or a better term would be "under constant supervision".
I drive a taxi in New York city, and because I grew up with a schizophrenic, I can literally tell right away with one look if someone is, I don`t care what drugs they are on or what level they are at, I can always tell.. For example, last year I was driving down Central Park west and this guy hailed me so I pulled over. I can`t explain it, but I knew right away. I think it was the body language. Even though he was dressed neatly and looked like your average everyday Upper West side yuppie, I could just tell and I regretted it right away when I pulled over but it was too late.
When he got in he told me to bring him to 86th and York ave which is on the east side. When we hit the first stop light he yelled out "Mister, you have exactly 2 minutes to get to where I want to go or it will be the last thing you ever do in your life!" So that comment pretty much confirmed what I suspected, and I prepared myelf.
Then we hit another stop light and he started getting very VERY violent! "What the hell are you doing! Why are you stopping! Get your ass f-ing going now or you are f-ing DEAD!" So what I did is simply close the partition (there is a bullet proof partition between the back seats and the front) and I just tried to ignore him. Actually what I did as well was tell him to "stop it" like you would tell a kid to stop misbehaving.
Then we hit another red light, and he started getting violent, very violent. Punching the partition, kicking the doors (I thought he was going to break the the window of his door) and he then started screaming bloody hell, threatening to kill me, stab me, shoot me, strangle me, just every murder method you could imagine.
When I finally got to where he wanted to go, he jumped out (without paying me) and out of curiousity I got out as well and followed him. Do you know where he went? To a video store to return a video. That was his huge emergency. This was someone who if I did not have protection from, could have very well bashed my head in or much worse, and for what? Simply to return a video.
The point is, these are people who should not be left by themselves. On one hand they are not to blame for what they do or say as they are mentally deranged, but on the other hand, they should not be allowed the same freedom that me or you have. These are people who are literally out of control, they have no grasp on basic common sense or logic, and this is what gets people killed.
It happens so often it is sickening, I read about it all the time, pushing people off of train platforms into oncoming trains, or stabbing people for no reason. These are people who should not be jailed, but people who should be under supervision 24 hours a day 7 days a week. But the problem is who pays for that?
There was a guy last month here in NYC who if you can believe it stole a power saw from some carpenters working in the subway and literally power sawed a guys chest. He survived, but the question has to be asked why did this happen in the first place? Why was this lunatic walking around unsupervised? Is it his family refuses to commit him or did he escape? And this was a few weeks after another one went around stabbing people at random!
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/07/06/D8IMK8H00.html
I'm not professing to know the mind of this demon, you are. I see only a calculating multiple murderer who should get the needle.
If, as has been asserted, she is going to be on drugs and doing the "thorazine shuffle" on the cold, hard tile of an institution floor for the rest of her life, what purpose is served by treatment? The death penalty is appropriate here.
Very intelligent post. I agree with you.
She is in the clutches of the state either way. The insane asylum is a branch office of the pen. Compare to the judicial decision to force that kid to have a particular cancer treatment: the state owns both of them.
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