"Not guilty. Amen. If ever there were a case where someone was not guilty by reason of insanity, this was it."
I have to agree to this, though I know this will not be the majority view. I base my opinion on my personal experience of post partum depression. I suffered, tremendously, after the birth of my first son, a much wanted, loved, and desired child.
For almost one year, I could NOT function, think, or even care for my child properly. Many days were spent in tears, and depression so deep I could hardly raise my head some days. It made no sense to me, and for a long time I could not shake it. Very scary time.
SHE suffered depression MUCH more debilitating and extreme than mine. My experiece lets me understand HOW this formerly loving and attentive mother COULD have so lost touch with reality that these HORRIBLE crimes could have been committed by her.
I could be wrong, I just don't know. God will sort it out eventually. Our lifetimes are so brief in the overall scheme of things. If this verdict was unjust, He will have the final say.
She, hopefully, will be hospitalized for many, many years, and hopefully, for the rest of her life.
pattyjo
Nicely, eloquently, said.
Well that's a reasoned well though out post BUT what about her whacko husband??
The fact is that this jury blew it. The Texas insanity law requires only that the defendant knows right from wrong, not whether they were powerless to resist the urge to commit the crime.
She obviously knew what she did was wrong. She waited until she could get away with it. She called the police afterward. She didn't call them to chat about the weather.
I only hope that they now prosecute her for the other two murders and hope they get a jury who can understand the law.
Thanks for sharing pattyjo. I too somewhat understand due to some scary personal experiences -- depression and mental illness can be so devastating. I agree with your post, as well. I'm glad she is in the hospital getting the help she obviously needs, and I am confident God will sort it all out in the end...
- LR
I had a similar experience postpartum. Many women do, but we don't do what she did.
I'll never forget when this story first came over the radio. I was rocking and nursing our third, just a newborn at the time, while the older two were running around the house. I was beginning to panic. And, at that moment, the story aired. All I could do was imagine the horror those children went through, and think, Could anyone just snap like that and not know what she's doing? Could I snap too? The whole way the story was presented made me afraid of myself, and I think other new mothers had the same experience.
But, then more info came out. This woman had plotted and planned. She did the deed systematically one at a time. She knew exactly what she was doing. She's no more insane than any other killer who commits mass murder all in one day.
"I suffered, tremendously, after the birth of my first son"
Sorry to hear that, seriously.
The difference is you didn't butcher you child. You were able to maintain. Anyone who cannot cope, should never be free to roam again. EVER. You can either hate them for what they did, or make excuses for it. But you cannot disagree with the fact that if they did it once due to circumstances, they could possible do it again. Allowing her to ever be free again would be nothing short of negligence on the part of the law.
Did you think about murdering your child?!? If you did, then you had/have a much bigger problem than depression!
You either have the capacity in you to murder someone or you don't. It's that simple.
I have suffered from severe clinical depression, too. Yes, I had could not function normally and I acted irrationally and my life fell apart before my eyes, but I never intentionally tried to harm anyone because I did not have that capability in me to begin with.
If she had accidently killed a child, for example, by putting them in the bathtub and leaving them, then this would be a whole nother discussion, but she planned out their deaths. She held a child down under the water until they died right in front of her eyes and then she reached for another child and did the same thing again.