What Is The Insanity Defense Of Andrea Yates

When the police were called to Andrea Yates suburban Hudson Texas home in June 20th 2001 they were not prepared for what they were about to see. The police were shocked to see Andreas five children dead while Andrea acted completely calm and admitted to drowning them one by one in the family bath tub. Andrea had previous mental health issues which she had been hospitalized including suicide attempts. She had been suffering with very sever postpartum depression and post part partum psychosis, two illnesses that would make Andrea very dangerous to herself and those around her, especially her children. Andrea went to trial against the Harris County Texas District Attorney who were convicting her of capital murder and asking for the death penalty,

Who was the law named after? Caylee Marie Anthony, a two-year-old girl, lived in Orlando, FL with her mother, Casey Anthony, and her grandparents. In July 2008, Caylee's grandmother, Cindy, called 911 to report her granddaughter missing, stating she had not seen her for 31 days. Casey, Caylee’s mother, continued to provide conflicting alibies and stories as to the whereabouts regarding her daughter. It took until December 2008 to find Caylee's remains inside a trash bag in a wooded area near the family home.

Andrea Yates conviction was a unjust trial at first and later on the conviction changed to a just one. She was convicted for the murders of her children (Chan). She suffered from depression and had tried to commit suicide (Chan). Yates was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to life in prison (Chan). This convictions was later over turned and she wasn’t found guilty anymore because, of insanity (Chan).

On June 20th, 2001, Andrea Yates killed her five young children Noah, John, Paul, Luke, and Mary in the bathtub of the family’s home in Houston, Texas. The family was Caucasian, and at the time of the crime, Noah was 7, John was 5, Paul was 3, Luke was 2, Mary was 6 months, and Yates was 36. Yates’s husband Russell “Rusty” Yates was at work at the time of the crime. Yates killed her children as a result of her post-partum psychosis and other mental illnesses that had been developing throughout her life. After she finished the murders, Yates called the police and then called Rusty to tell him to come home.

After reading chapters one and two of the Psychology in Everyday Life book and learning about the four big ideas in psychology, and also while trying to figure out the contributing factors of Andrea Yates’ murder of her children. I have to focus in on and think about big idea two, the biopsychosocial approach, that integrates three levels which are biological, psychological and social/cultural; all together these factors influence and give insight into behavior and mental processes. (CITE BOOK) After reviewing these, the psychological factors that I believe to have contributed to Andrea Yates’ murder of her children are, firstly biological, Andrea had a genetic predispositions, which means Andrea had an increased likelihood of developing

Prosecutor Park Dietz had claimed in his testimony that Andrea had gotten her idea to drown the children from an episode of Law and Order, in which a woman drowned her own children but got away with it through the insanity defense. The producers of the television show later came forward and stated that no such episode existed, Dietz simply melded together parts of separate programs. The Texas Court of Appeals decided that was reason enough for a retrial, considering the jury’s difficult primary decision could have been biased by false information. So, on June 26, 2006, five years after her sentencing to life in prison, Andrea’s retrial began. The prime reason why it is so difficult to declare someone not guilty by reason of insanity in Texas is the M’Naghten Rule.

In 2001, the nation was shocked into questioning the systems in which help the mentally ill. On June 20th, seemly picture perfect housewife, Andrea Yates, drowned her five children in the bathtub. Rusty Yates, Andrea’s husband, left for his job prior to his mother being able to arrive to the Yates household to help oversee Andrea and her children. For several years prior, after her first child, Andrea had come down with postpartum depression. With each and every pregnancy, it became far worse until she had develop postpartum psychosis.

Doing this, in her mind, was the only way she could protect her children. In her first trial, she was found guilty and was sentenced to life in prison. She found herself being allowed to have a second trial, and after deliberating her mental state at the time of the crime, the court had found her “not guilty by reason of insanity.” She would find herself being committed to a psychiatric facility to be treated, rather than being sent to jail for life. This is where the guilty of insanity plea gets tricky.

After a 10 and a half hour meeting, they absolved her on the charge of murder and only found Casey Anthony guilty of perjury. The verdict exasperated American society. America felt pity towards Casey and had no sympathy for her mother. Everyone who listened to the case all over the world was shocked by this verdict of the jury, all of the evidence, the surrounding the murder of the child was indicated only one person, the girl's mother, Casey therefore, this evidence was just enough for the jury to plead a guilty verdict. After this case, many americans believed that the justice system in America failed completely and In this case it was almost impossible to bring forward charges under articles regarding the death penalties It wasn’t optional to produce the first degree murder.

In June of 2001, the entire nation was deeply disturbed by the horrific acts committed by a suburban Texas housewife, and mother of five. Andrea Yates had drowned all five of her young children in the bathtub of their home. Yates called the authorities and her husband Rusty Yates to the home, where she confessed to killing her children. According to Faith McLellan of the Lancet Medical Journal, Andrea Yates’s bizarre reasoning behind this horrific act was because she believed to have been marked by Satan, and that in order to save her children from hell she needed to take their lives (McLellan, 2006). Yates pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity on the basis of mental defect due to postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis.

Many people may think of Andrea Yates as the disgraceful mother who murdered all 5 of her children. Also many people do not know that she was severely ill. In fact she was found guilty of first degree murder and sentenced to life, but a court of appeals reversed the conviction and found her insane. She was diagnosed postpartum depression and psychosis. For the people who do know what postpartum depression mean is that each time she gave birth she got more depressed due to hormone change or fatigue.

Insanity is an illness an individual cannot overcome and will make decisions without thinking. Lacking the further knowledge of a criminal's mental state does not endorse the fate of acquiring the death

This article talked a great deal about how the rules and procedures when it comes to the insanity defense are inconsistent and unclear. United States v. Hinckley showed the public how inconsistent and unclear the criminal procedures are. The article provided a statement from a juror involved in the Hinckley case. The gist of the statement was that even the experts used in the trial could not determine the defendant’s sanity, which made it even harder for the jurors to determine as well.

The courts were not convinced and still sentenced these individuals with the death penalty. In my opinion, this criminal defense is often raised a lot today, because individuals are aware of the insanity defense and will try to use it to get out of

The Andrea Yates Case: The Insanity Defense On June 20, 2001, in Houston, Texas, Andrea Pia Yates was charged with the murder of her five children, which she drowned in the bathtub one at a time, and was found not guilty by reason of insanity under the Texas Law Insanity Defense. The legislative history of the Texas Law Insanity Defense begins with the British test for right and wrong, known as the M’Naghten, being adopted in the majority of American states. The M’Naghten test for right and wrong required a mental disease that kept the defendant from controlling their actions and that cognitive impairment is the cause for the defective reasoning of what is right and what is wrong. Beginning in 1973, Texas adopted the American Law Institute’s