share: Kristin Davis: The Andrea Yates Case And The Insanity Defense
Andrea Yates' case was an especially gripping one for me personally because of the timing of it. I gave birth to my fourth baby on June 18, 2001 (see my beautiful baby in the photo to the right giving me a big smooch). She was born just two days before Andrea Yates killed her five children. Having barely survived PPD with my third baby, and knowing well the grim statistics of having it reoccur, I was slightly nervous, to put it mildly, that I would experience it again. Being bombarded with the Yates’ case on the news shortly after giving birth didn’t help my nerves to say the least…
Anyway, during that time, I was furious at the ignorance of the media on the subject of postpartum psychosis, or rather postpartum insanity. Every reporter who covered the story said she had postpartum depression, which is a completely different disorder from postpartum psychosis. I felt that this ignorance seeped its way into the Texas court system. Or perhaps it was already there to begin with. Regardless, no one, including the judges, seemed to understand the psychosis that she had to have experienced to have done what she did. Her case should have been an easy one for insanity defense. Insanely easy. However, the Texas court system has this crazy insanity standard that even Andrea Yates' illness was no match for. Unbelievably, she was found sane and locked up.
However just last week her conviction was thrown out (six years later!) and she will have a new trial. A great article was recently posted by Jonathan Turley of the LA Times about this as well as the various and weirdly conflicting (let's just call them insane!) insanity laws we have scattered around the country. It's an interesting read. But even more interesting will be how the Yates case ends up after all of these years and how Texas will come to terms with it.
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I hold Andrea's husband to be just as responsible for the death of their babies. He chose to look the other way. Andrea needed help. She needed therapy, a housekeeper, time to herself and medication. And he looked the other way. If there were justice, he would be in jail for failing to help the mother of his children. I hope she gets help and gets out of prison on insanity. Her husband has got to be held accountable. And we need to educate ourselves about PPD. The deaths of these children could have been prevented.
But too many people want to look the other way. No one wants to admit that something as wonderful as a baby can make a woman depressed. Women feel guilty if things are not all rosy and perfect. Husbands just don’t always understand. It takes courage to share personal experiences like Post Partum Depression. Thanks Kristin!
If I chose to have a baby someday, I know that because of women like you, there will be help and awareness if I need it.
March 24, 2008 - 3:32amThis Comment
I am so glad you mentioned this topic, regarding Mr. Yates and his lack of knowledge (even support?) for his wife during her Post Partum Depression.
Forgive me, as I don't usually quote TV shows, but one of the hospital-related shows had an episode (House?) with the woman going through Post Partum Psychosis, and the husband had multiple chances to save their baby...but looked the other way. The husband was furious and heart-stricken; could not even look at his wife after she hurt their son. The leading-man doctor told the husband that his son's death was his fault, too...he looked the other way when obviously there were many, many signs that his wife was hurting and in trouble.
So...I repeated this just to say: maybe this topic is getting out into the mainstream, and also that the male's in the family DO have some responsibility! Not even in learning about something as complex as PPD, but being more in-tuned with their family and communicating with their wives.
Thanks for helping to talk about this important topic!
March 25, 2008 - 12:59pmI do not understand why he impregnated an obviously mentally ill woman over and over.
The day she killed her children, she was obviously very sick. She was sitting at the breakfast table, silent and psychotic. And he left her there, alone for an hour with the children.
Andrea Yates, in my non-medical opinion, knowingly killed those children. It was planned. She had one hour to do it and she began as soon as her husband left so she could kill all 5 of them before her mother-in-law arrived. Killing 5 people takes time. This had been rehearsed both in her head and in the practical sense - she had been found filling the bath tub with cold water in the days before their murders.
However, I do still believe she was psychotic.
Her husband knew she had scars all over her body from picking at her skin incessantly and had bald patches from pulling out her own hair. She rocked back and forth, was incomprehensible at times, and spoke about Satan like he was literally in the room. She moaned about her children going to hell. She had a medical diagnosis of having post-partum psychosis for heaven's sake! Rusty Yates had been warned by doctors to never, ever get her pregnant again! But he did, within months! Because the bible says...
And yet she was left alone with 5 innocent children. One person killed them but many share the blame.
March 26, 2008 - 1:34pmAndrea Yates and her children became victims of a medical community who endless other woman have becomes victims of. We are not here to judge one another or be judged. I know your comment is based on a total lack of understanding of what really happened in this case. I also know that you are not alone. I will tell you thought that there have been studies ongoing in Finland since 1999, two years before this happened, in which estrogen was used in the treatment of post partum psychosis successfully. So why weren't these studies presented in her defense? That could be a trillion dollar question for the drugs companies in the country. Did you know in the UK if a woman kills a child within the first year of life, due to hormone changes related to pregnancy, the maximum sentence is manslaughter. The majority of cases are decided with suspended sentences and counseling. Why do they have such a different understanding of this condition than we do here? All you have to is follow the money to understand the real underlying cause in this case. Andrea Yates was being tried for the death penalty. Until Andrea Yates killed her children there had not been one single study done in this country to determine a cause in this condition. Do you need to do studies on the obvious. Andrea loved her children and her husband. Her family loved her. She was a good mother. No one in her family saw this coming. This is a most tragic case that could have been prevented. The psychiatrist in this case, who should have been the person who was on trail, should have hospitalized her. He knew she was experiencing psychosis. This case in not just about the death of her children it's about insurance companies, psychiatry and the side effect of psychiatric drugs and quite honestly the entire medical community. People judged everything about her life style and marriage without knowing anything about them. This case brought out our greatest human fault. We judge people based on our fears, insecurities and lack of knowledge when we should be providing comfort, love and understanding to those most in need of it.
Thank your for sharing your comment. It inspired me to think about the challenges I am going to face in my effort to once and for all end the myth that women somehow suddenly become mentally ill while trying to have children.
Be Well. The tide is about to change.
April 30, 2008 - 5:48amHi, Sheila,
Are you saying that Andrea Yates is/was not mentally ill? From what I've read on the case, it appeared that she had a long history of mental illness, from the time she was young, and that her life experiences of having to raise her five children in a school bus, etc., put her over the edge. It's my understanding that she didn't have a chance because she didn't have access to the medical/psychiatric help that she so desperately needed.
What do you think?
April 30, 2008 - 11:04amAndrea (Kennedy) Yates was born on July 2, 1964 in Houston, Tex. She graduated from Milby High School in Houston in 1982. She was the class valedictorian, captain of the swim team and an officer in the National Honor Society. She completed a two-year pre-nursing program at the University of Houston and then graduated in 1986 from the University of Texas School of Nursing in Houston. She worked as a registered nurse at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center from 1986 until 1994.
As I stated before, there is a total lack of understanding in what took place in this case.
May 6, 2008 - 4:50pmwhy do you think she did what she did? There was no financial motivation...
I guess like many people, I simply assume she had a raging mental illness/disorder (whatever one wants to call it) because wouldn't one have to? In order to kill one's children? Or is that hopeful naiveté?
The other is too scary to contemplate...that she killed them for some cold, calculated reason.
I know that she had been institutionalized several times and had been on very strong medication and had displayed bizarre behavior that was documented for several years and it all seemed to stem from post-partum psychosis. Even though she was educated and had been successful in life, there are many people who achieve great things before they are struck down by mental illness.
I just cannot imagine anyone killing 5 children like that, it's so sad and disturbing.
I feel like I almost HOPE she is mentally ill because anything else is too difficult to digest.
Shelia, if you can give more info on why she did this, I'd be interested. I saw a book about it for sale but didn't have the stomach to read it. I'm a True Crime fan but don't think I could handle this story, not with 3 lovely babes of my own. Either way, such a sad and terrible tragedy for those 5 innocent children.
May 7, 2008 - 12:42pmI have hundred of links to sites related to my research but I could not find the one for this study so I cut and pasted for you to read.
It always helps to understand where someone is coming from when discussing a topic such as this. First, I want you to know that I think this case is incredibly tragic and could have been prevented if the psychiatrist in her case had done the right thing and committed her to protect her and her children but not only did that not happened he also took her off all the medication right before she killed the children.
When I was twenty four I had the my first of three psychiatric hospitalization that occurred while I was trying to have children. After this first hospitalization occurred as a result of a sever depression I experience which developed over the year following a very difficult miscarriage during the second trimester. I consulted a psychiatric who put me on an antidepressant drug by the name of Elivil. Shortly after he put me on the medication my mood started to change very quickly. I felt really good. Then my period was late and I discovered I was a few weeks pregnant. Well my moods became so elevated I could not sleep and very busy taking book out of library and becoming delusionnary. My husband at the suggestion of one of my friends called the psychiatric and they took me off to the hospital. I discovered during my research that a side effect of Elivil is mood swings. So after I got out of the hospital where I was diagnosed as bipolar, my psychiatrist told me that women become mentally ill during their childbearing years and I should not have children. I thought he was out of his mind. I knew that my pregnancies has something to do with what happened and I was not going to let some psychiatric tell me that I should not have children. My husband and I decided to try and have another baby. I had the doctor take me off the medication which took a few months. I was never concerned about having an issues because I had never had any kind emotional of mood swing issues prior to that pregnancy. Eight months went by and I became pregnant. This would be my fourth pregnancy. I had some bleeding and cramps in the beginning and my doctor told me that he felt I had a 50/50 change of having the baby. If I was unable to carry this pregnancy he was going to send me to see a fertility doctor in Boston. Well everything turned out well. I felt better than I had ever felt. I loved being pregnant and watching my body change. I had a great sense of becoming a real women during this pregnancy. I experienced a great sense of peacefulness as the baby grew. I had a very easy labor and delivery which took only 3 1/2 hours and I instantly bonded with my son. I was the only mother who breast. I loved being a new Mom and had a loving and supportive husband, family and friends. Then about six weeks after he was born I started to feel really good again. I was having a great time and then something changed. I recall being in a church parking in our car with my husband and my younger brother. I got out of the car because I was afraid of my husband. I thought he was the Devil because he had blue eyes. I never had any feeling about harming my son, thank god, but my life was in danger. I have a great deal of memory loss surrounding this time due to the shock treatments I had. I will be advocating the end of the use of shock treatments expect in the most severe cases because all they do is wipe out memory. I was in the hospital for 2 1/2 months. Even though I had experienced this type of episode before my husband did not have any idea this was coming.
You don't go through a pregnancy feeling the way I did and then end up in a psychiatric hospital at six or seven weeks after giving birth and not know that hormone changes are the core reason this happens.
When I read Andreas story in the book "Are you There Alone?" by Suzzane O'Malley who is a journalist that followed the case, it brought back so many memory for me. It's a very tragic story about what happened. She was on many drugs it's beyond me to understand why the psychiatric did not admit her. The book is very difficult to read. I just read it last summer when I also read Brooke Shield book. My son turned 29 yesterday. How could they have not done the research to prevent the deaths of women and children. I am not anger or do I want to point a finger because I received the best care that was avaialbe and it saved my life. I am passionate about changing the perception pregnancy. We are born with the gift of bring forth life. It's nothing less than a miracle and that's they way it should be perceived.
I have contacted the publishing company that published this book and they have forwarded and email I sent to her asking to speak to her. There are some question I would like to ask her that have to do with this case. There is more to this case than meets the eye. There is more I could disclose about a link that I have uncovered that is key to having a deeper understanding of other related links to the causes of PPD and PPP .
We all come into this life with a purpose. My purpose became clear to me when a psychiatrist told me that women become mentally ill during their childbearing. Did you know that the highest rate of psychiatric hospitalizations occur related to pregnancy. Did you know almost every day in this country women kills themselves or their children in a post partum state. I would like to see this end and the only way that can happened is if women stop being afraid of loosing their children because of their thoughts and seek out help. Had I been alone going through what I went through of course my son and myself would have been at great risk. Though I was traumatized by my psychiatric hospitalizations, no one died. I am advocating for change in the perception.
Did you know the reason Andrea Yates kept on getting pregnant was not only based on religious reasons she also stated she was symptom free when she was pregnant.
I hope what I have shared and this study provides you with some insight.
Psychiatry. 2000 Mar;61(3):166-9.Links
Positive treatment effect of estradiol in postpartum psychosis: a pilot study.
Ahokas A, Aito M, Rimón R.
Department of Psychiatry, Helsinki City Hospital, Finland. antti.ahokas@kolumbus.fi
BACKGROUND: Postpartum illnesses with psychiatric symptoms and serious adverse sequelae are highly prevalent during the childbearing years. Despite multiple medical contacts, these illnesses often remain unidentified and untreated. To study the association between estradiol and puerperal psychosis, we measured serum concentration of estradiol and performed an open-label trial of physiologic 17beta-estradiol in women with this disorder. METHOD: Ten women with ICD-10 psychosis with postpartum onset consecutively recruited from a psychiatric duty unit were studied. Serum estradiol concentration was measured at baseline and weekly during sublingual 17beta-estradiol treatment for 6 weeks. The treatment effect was evaluated by a clinician-rated psychiatric symptom scale (the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale [BPRS]). RESULTS: The baseline serum estradiol levels (mean = 49.5 pmol/L; range, 13-90 pmol/L) were even lower than the threshold value of gonadal failure, and the patients exhibited high scores on the psychiatric symptom scale (mean BPRS total score = 78.3; range, 65-87). During the first week of 17beta-estradiol treatment, psychiatric symptoms diminished significantly (BPRS score decreased to a mean of 18.8, p < .001). Until the end of the second week of treatment, serum estradiol concentrations rose to near the values normally found during the follicular phase, and the patients became almost free of psychiatric symptoms. CONCLUSION: The reversal of psychiatric symptoms in all patients by treating documented estradiol deficiency suggests that estradiol plays a role in the pathophysiology and may have a role in the treatment of this condition. There was a rebound of psychotic symptoms in the 1 patient who discontinued estradiol treatment. Given the small number of patients, this area deserves further study.
PMID: 10817099 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
May 12, 2008 - 1:55pm