Yates lived by rigid schedule, according to husband
Posted on 03/01/2002 1:45:51 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
Yates lived by rigid schedule, according to husband
Husband also testifies she was allowed 3 hours a week without her kids
03/01/2002
HOUSTON - Russell "Rusty" Yates told jurors Thursday about how his wife, Andrea, lived by a rigid schedule as housekeeper and teacher and was allowed three hours each week to do whatever she wanted, alone, without her children.
"Man's the breadwinner and the woman's the homemaker," Mr. Yates said Thursday during Mrs. Yates' capital murder trial. Mrs. Yates pleaded insanity after admitting that she drowned her five children in June.
While he talked proudly of the couple's decision to toe a higher ethical line based on biblical teachings and lessons gleaned from a conservative newsletter called "Perilous Times," Mr. Yates coincidentally painted a picture for jurors of a bleak life bereft of any outlet for Mrs. Yates besides her children.
AP "A scared animal" is how Debbie Holmes testified that her friend Andrea Yates behaved in the days before she killed her children. |
Mr. Yates, 37, told the jury that he and his wife agreed before their wedding in 1993 to a "traditional" marriage in which he would serve as sole breadwinner and she would be homemaker.
The pact included being a stay-at-home mother, primary caregiver and, eventually, home-school teacher. Mr. Yates said that he controlled the cash and that she stuck carefully to an allowance.
Therapist Earline Wilcott, who met with Mrs. Yates after her suicide attempts, testified that her client felt overwhelmed and trapped.
Ms. Wilcott said Mrs. Yates felt criticized for the way she ran the household. Ms. Wilcott said Mrs. Yates told her that her husband bought her a book on how to get organized.
When pressure from raising their children appeared to be getting to Mrs. Yates, she could always look forward to Thursdays. Mr. Yates testified that for three hours once each week from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Mrs. Yates could do whatever she wanted, alone, without the children.
The free time was to provide some relief for his wife, Mr. Yates said. "I guess that's what we decided," he said.
Mrs. Yates is a diagnosed schizophrenic predisposed to pitch-black depressions that followed the births of her last two children. Testimony has shown that the 37-year-old registered nurse with perfectionist tendencies and a solid Christian faith went along with the home management plan she and Mr. Yates hammered out before marriage.
During a second day of testimony, this time during questioning by Harris County prosecutor Joe Owmby, Mr. Yates, a NASA engineer, said he and Mrs. Yates agreed before marrying that she would give up her job at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center at Houston.
"We thought it best that Andrea be home," Mr. Yates testified.
Prosecutors say Mrs. Yates was fully aware of what she was doing when she drowned Noah, 7; John, 5; Paul, 3; Luke, 2; and 6-month-old Mary in the family bathtub.
Mrs. Yates' trial, which began Feb. 18, is expected to go through next week. She faces life in prison or lethal injection if convicted.
During questioning, Mr. Yates said his wife was quiet and remarkably modest. After they were married, Mrs. Yates wouldn't undress in front of her husband. "That's a pretty personal question, but generally that's true. She's shy," he testified.
While Mr. Yates found time for interests such as biking to work, joining a gym and working in the garage, Mrs. Yates had the children and home-schooling to keep up with.
Their life also included some unusual experiments and choices.
Almost as soon as their first home was built, they rented it out, trading it for a 38-foot trailer to live a "simpler life."
"I think a lot of it was that Andrea was generally happy in the house, I probably wasn't as happy in the house," he said.
After being married 41/2 years, with three young children and another on the way, they sold the trailer for a $37,000 converted Greyhound bus.
"I didn't view it as a hardship," Mr. Yates said. "We like it better than a house."
After the 1999 birth of their fourth child, Luke, the close quarters appeared to get to her. She summoned her husband home one day. He found her sobbing and shaking in the back of the bus.
The next day, she took an overdose. Less than a month later, she held a knife to her throat.
Mr. Yates told jurors how he faithfully drove his wife to therapy after her two suicide attempts.
He also told jurors that his wife opted for natural childbirth.
Although he conceded that the newsletter he and his wife read advocated natural childbirth for a "humbling experience for a woman," Mr. Yates said it was his wife's idea to go without local anesthetic.
"It was her choice," he said. "Sometimes Andrea liked to take the hard road instead of an easy road."
Despite warnings from at least one psychiatrist who said having more children would bring Mrs. Yates a harsher version of the depression that sent her to try to kill herself, they had a fifth child on Nov. 30, 2000.
They knew that Haldol pulled her out of the depths in 1999, after the birth of Luke. When Mrs. Yates faltered again, particularly after her father died in March 2001, they asked for the drug again.
"I knew she was sick," Mr. Yates said. "She wouldn't have tried to commit suicide if she hadn't been sick."
Four days before she drowned her children, Mrs. Yates awoke screaming that she was trapped. As her husband comforted her, she told him about her nightmare. "Something about in her dream she was trapped in her bed," Mr. Yates said.
"A scared animal" is how Debbie Holmes later testified that Mrs. Yates behaved in the days before she killed her children. The women met about 16 years ago at M.D. Anderson.
Mrs. Holmes said Mrs. Yates spoke only three complete sentences to her in the four months before the children died. Her hair greasy and matted, her body reeking, Mrs. Yates was a walking zombie then, Mrs. Holmes said.
"I was appalled," said Mrs. Holmes. "She looked like a cancer patient." When she heard that the children were drowned, a teary Mrs. Holmes said she collapsed.
"I fell on the floor, and I just cried," Mrs. Holmes said. "I was screaming. It can't be my Andrea."
There's nothing "necessarily" wrong with that.....unless your putting in a 45 hour work week, but expect her to work 24/7 with 3 hours off a week! Signed, A homeschool mommy who appreciates her husband's SERVANT leadership; he would never ask "What's wrong with that?"
I agree with your assessment, install Andrea in a mental institution for the rest of her natural life, then put Mr. Yates on trail and fry him. What an absolutely useless creature. I hope that public tide turns against him and that every person that expressed sympathy for him turns their back on him.
But then I am a bloodthirsty type and he needs to be removed from the field.
Oh, I agree. This man is sick, and it seemed like he wanted to see how far he could push his wife. They are both guilty. BTW, I'm a stay at home mom also, to three kids and had "natural childbirth" of MY choice.
I believe you have to hold that person accountable for that first choice, however small it is and wherever it leads. You have to also hold them accountable for all the times they failed to resist that master, especially when the consequences as are severe as Yates'. Granted, that master led her to a place she probably never aniticipated, but one which she chose, and she helped strengthen her master's chains every time she refused to take responsibility for her own and her children's fate. And she did not call the police afterward because she was blind to the differences between right and wrong, but because she wanted to turn herself over to yet another authority that would tell her what to do and dole out control over her. She finally found a way to run off with a new man and called up her husband to rub it in. Sorry if this sounds harsh, but it's what I think is the case.
Okie, i do not disagree that she deserves the needle. i don't think anyone on this thread is seeking to EXCUSE her, but her husband had the power to stop the murder by getting those kids out of that situation. period. i am most definitely not faulting the Christian family lifestyle for this crime. it was Randy Yate's perverted version of it and Andrea Yate's mental state that accounts for the crime. BOTH GUILTY, both deserving of the needle. You simply MUST separate defense of the traditional Christian lifestyle from defense of Randy Yates to have any credibility. There are quite a number of women on this thread, living happily within the confines of this arrangement, THEY and THEIR husbands are the witnesses to the desirability of that lifestyle.
An example of this is my husband's recent order form the Dr. to eat a "no-sodium" diet for his hereditary high blood pressure... he was in the hospital with potassium depletion from the diurectics, and when my youngest daughter was visiting, the dietician was trying to tell him which "no-salt" tomato products and soups he would have to buy... My daughter said, there is no need for that... my mom gorws her own tomatoes and cans them, and makes all their soups from scratch, and will have no trouble with a "no-salt" diet...
I am not bragging here, but pointing out how skills developed by being at home can be valuable without being "paid" for in the marketplace.
The skills, knowledge, and talents that make my present "retired" from childraising years full of interesting things to do, and a sense of worth that no gold watch and 401k could ever provide, but it is VERY IMPORTANT to remember that many women have a "calling" to a career, and must honor that call. They are also to be respected and supported in their choices, and not disparaged for having talents best expressed outside the home environment!
My ability to stay at home, and develop my skills are in large part because of my husband's constant support and respect... He encouraged every effort to learn a new skill, and made sure the money was there for materials and encouraged me to try again when something didn't turn out the way it was supposed to...
When I was teaching myself to bake bread from scratch before "bread machines" were a twinkle in some inventor's eye, he complimented me on each and every heavy dry loaf, saying that it was much better than the one before... and that he was sure I would get the next loaf even better...
So, those of you who have chosen to stay at home, please know that you will have an opportunity to develop and grow in all kinds of ways, and as the children grow older, you will have talents and skills that they will highly value and appreciate. ...
Then you have never met this type of "Christian". There is a fine line between a Christian family where the man is the servant leader of the home, and a family where the man takes great PRIDE in his complete subjugation of the woman.....and children, I might add.
On a different subject. I suspect that the Yates' were pentacostles(sp).
You are 100% correct. However, the legal issue here is what insanity was the driving force that put her hands there......He has no such claim.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
