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Details emerge of killing spree
23/06/2001 09:02 - (SA)
C Bryson Hull
Houston - Houston mother Andrea Yates, who drowned her five children, killed four of them one-by-one before she chased 7-year-old Noah through the house and dragged him
to the bathroom after he figured out what she was doing.
This has emerged from a report in the Houston Chronicle.
A later report in The Dallas Morning News online edition quoted an unidentified police official as saying Yates
had thought about killing the children for several months. "She essentially said she had realised that she was a 'bad
mother' and she felt that the children were disabled - that
they were not developing normally," the official told the
newspaper. "She told us that she had thought about doing this
for several months." The Chronicle report, citing a police official who listened
to Yates' taped statement to investigators, said the mother and
former registered nurse recounted the events in a "zombie-like
fashion." "What's wrong with Mary?" Noah reportedly asked his mother
when he saw her placing 6-month-old Mary in the tub. Yates said her son ran from her, but she chased him through
the house, dragged him back to the bathroom and drowned him
alongside his infant sister, the report said. Before that, Yates said she killed, in order, Luke (2), Paul (3), and John (5). After drowning them, she carried the
bodies onto a bed and covered them with a sheet, where police
said all but one body, Noah's, was found, according to the
paper. She reportedly left Noah in the tub before calling police
and her husband, Russell, who was at his job at the nearby Johnson Space
Centre.
He visited her in jail for the first time on Friday and said he would stand by her. Andrea, 36, started Friday giving short, barely
audible answers as she stood with crossed arms before State
District Judge Belinda Hill. The judge granted her indigent
status and a court-appointed attorney to defend her against a
charge of capital murder. By day's end, the former registered nurse who admitted
killing her children had a private attorney and a jailhouse
visit from the victims' father and
her relatives. Russell Yates, who was not in court during his wife's
appearance, arrived along with several relatives and attorney
George Parnham after planning for the burial of his children
next Wednesday. "The family standing behind me is very supportive of
Andrea, and this includes the father of these children and the
husband of their mother," Parnham said after the visit,
gesturing to Russell Yates and the other relatives. "They are
unified in seeing her through this." She faces a single capital murder charge that could bring
her the death penalty. Prosecutors have not yet said whether
they would seek that punishment. Yates said on Thursday he loved his wife and would continue to
support her because it was the "psychotic side effects with her
depression that led her to do this." Andrea Yates had been taking drugs including the
anti-psychotic Haldol to combat postpartum depression, a 1999
bout of which led her to attempt suicide, Russell Yates said.
Postpartum depression in its most severe form can include
violent psychosis, doctors said. Parnham deflected questions about whether he would pursue
an insanity defence. "I want the service for these children to take place before
any pronouncements, announcements or discussions take place
relative to a defence or her current status," he said. Killing details emerge The children's memorial service will be held exactly a week
after Yates made her confession to police just moments after
drowning the last of her five children. "This is the most horrendous thing I have ever seen,"
Harris County Assistant District Attorney Joe Owmby said after
the morning hearing, which the judge postponed to July 24 so
Yates could consult her lawyer. He would not discuss details of
the killings.
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