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
FYI
"well he is sane as anyone...but does not seem to have cared enough and once the problem was found, I would have thought he would stop having children since his wife was severely compromised to care for them over the long haul...."
EXACTLY! It's not like Andrea was healthy one day and then started killing on the next. That makes it so much harder for me to support the verdict or her or even her husband.
In my kingdom,murderers,either "sane" or Insane would never be let out of a high security facilty until their burial. We have a foolish and weak policy towards the wolves and mad dogs. Neither can be trusted.
its whatever the paid shrinks can convince 12 dolts on a jury of. that's all. with enough cash, these "experts" will say anything. add the other factors to this case - her being a woman - and you have the formula for acquittal.
I guarantee you, a father with the same mental state, and the same circumstances - would not have been acquitted.
http://www.crimelibrary.com/criminal_mind/psychology/insanity/1.html
WRONG. "Insanity", which can be described in medical terms and is established in law by a contorted legal interpretation, is in NO WAY a legitimate excusable as a defense in a court of law, where JURORS are allowed to make the medical decision/legal decision.
JURORS are incapable of understanding the medical issues, let alone the legal issues. (I've spent more than 100 days on juries, and the observation I have as a result is: you don't wanna be on trial in front of ANY jury, as they are a crap-shoot as far as outcome, at best).
In the Yates case, we have 12 individuals voicing THEIR interpretation/sympathy/amateur psychiatrist/amateur lawyer views and finally coming to consensus on a verdict. The strongest personality in the Jury Room prevails, or the hung Jury results).
The conviction of Yates now is not possible, at least in terms of the three children she was on trial for, and she will "walk" in a few years (far fewer than the life term with no possible parole that she previously had been sentenced to).
What SHOULD happen, is for the Prosecutor to now charge her with the murder of the two un-included children she murdered, and strive to get a Jury that will answer with common sense the question:
"Did Andrea Yates, with knowledge of right and wrong, murder her children"....simple, common sense, no victimhood excuses; just a simple question of law-breaking.
....and most insanity defenses are B.S. But there really are true episodes of insanity or delusion etc....I have no problem though with locking them up forever...just in the appropriate place......
That is the most ridiculous thing I've read in a while!
Sorry. I was being sarcastic.
Until my dad's generation, my ancestors routinely had over 10 kids each generation.
I agree with you. I have no problem with this verdict as long as Andrea Yates never breathes a free breath the rest of her life. If she somehow gets out in five years, then I'm going to have a big problem with it.
I'm sympathetic with what you're saying, but the thing is, for better or worse, whether they're geniuses or drooling morons, juries get to make this call in our legal system.
Don't be silly. I am speaking of how the world works. There is nothing ... nothing ... some Texas hospital administrator wants less than to be accused of letting sane killers off scot free by people like you. They aren't gonna let her out no matter what the state of their health, they have political concerns because this is a high profile case.
get ready to have a "big problem", 10 or so years from now.
she is the poster child for the US "mental health expert" community, the feminist movement, you name it - they will be doing everything they can to game the system to get her out.
FREE ANDREA!
yup, she'll be the "Tookie" or "Mumia" for the mental health expert community, and the rest of the special interests who are joyous at this acquittal.
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