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The Tragic Story of Andrea Yates: A Mother, Murderer, and Victim of Mental Health Neglect | The MurderousMinds Podcast

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A look into the troubled mind of Andrea Yates, a mother convicted of killing her five children. This isn't just a tale of an unthinkable crime, but a deeply moving incident unraveling her struggle with mental health, her loss of grip on reality, and the dire consequences that followed, within the framework of a stern religious upbringing... 

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Thank you for tuning in to MurderousMinds, the chilling true crime podcast that delves deep into the darkest minds. Join us as we explore the captivating stories of notorious killers, analyze their motives, and unravel the mysteries behind their heinous acts. Stay connected with us on Patreon for updates, bonus content, and behind-the-scenes insights. Remember, listener discretion is advised.

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Welcome to Murderous Minds, a documentary series started by the Top 5's YouTube channel back in 2018, dedicated to exploring the twisted minds of serial killers. The following podcast episode is the audio version of our video series over on the Top 5's Patreon page. If you would like to watch the video instead of just listening, and would also like to support our show, then please head on over to Patreon using the link in the show notes. Thank you for joining, and now let's take a journey into the minds of murderers. When the police were called to a house on the corner of Beachcombe, mellaine in Clear Lake, texas, in 2001, they had no idea what they would find Inside. They were treated to a scene that would haunt them for the rest of their lives A mother standing over the bodies of her five children. 36 year old Andrea Yates immediately confessed to the crime and was removed from the home and put in jail without incident, where she would stay until her trial began. But who exactly was Andrea Yates and what had driven her to commit this horrifying crime? In this episode of Murderous Minds, we aim to explore these questions and more, as we look at the life and crimes of Andrea Yates.

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Andrea Yates was born Andrea Pierre Kennedy on July 2, 1964 in Holesville, texas, the youngest of five children. Her mother, duta Karin Kohler, was a German immigrant, while her father, andrew Emmett Kennedy, was the son of Irish immigrants. Duta grew up in Nazi Germany, meeting at Andrew during the British occupation, where he worked as an Air Force B-24 navigator and Duta worked as an interpreter. Back in the US, andrew took up positions as a technician for Ford Motor Company in Houston, later working as a school teacher, while Duta became a manager at JC Penny when the pair ran into some financial difficulties, she remained in a managerial role for 20 years before retiring. Yates and his siblings were raised as Catholics. They attended St Christopher's Catholic Church and the boys attended Catholic school. Duta had converted to the religion upon marrying Andrew and noted that as adults, most of her children shed their religious upbringing, stating we do not know why, maybe we were too strict.

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As a teenager, yates seemed to flourish, at least on the surface, although she was described as shy and studious. She was class valedictorian, the captain of a high school swim team and an officer in the National Honor Society. But even at such a young age, yates' life was marred by mental illness. During her high school years she suffered from both bulimia and depression, and at the age of 17, she discussed the idea of taking her own life with a friend. Yates' family were no strangers to mental illness either. One of her siblings, along with their father, suffered from depression, while her brother, brian, dealt with bipolar disorder. In 1982, yates graduated from Millby High School. From there she moved on to the University of Houston where she spent two years in a pre-nursing program, eventually graduating from the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. She worked as a nurse at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center between 1986 and 1994.

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One thing that seemed to cause Yates' issues in her childhood was romantic relationships. She didn't date seriously until she was 23 and suffered debilitating depression after relationship failed when she was 24. Reportedly, the issue between the couple was the concept of sex before marriage, which Yates struggled with due to her heavily religious upbringing. Then, in the summer of 1989, yates' life drastically changed trajectory when she met Russell Edison Rusty Yates. Raised near Nashville, rusty had previously attended DuPont Senior High School, where he played football and was an active member of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. His classmates even voted him, mr DuPont, an ideal representative of the school. He graduated third in his class and then went on to study at Auburn University on a Navy ROTC scholarship, although he dropped out of the program after realizing that the Navy wasn't for him. By this time, he'd also decided to trade his previous interest in sports for science and eventually began to study engineering. After graduating, he became a NASA engineer.

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Yates and Rusty met when they both moved in to Sunscape apartments in Houston. Rusty was reportedly enthralled with Yates. He was impressed by her nursing career and described her as the girl of his dreams. Like Yates, rusty had also been raised in a strict Christian household, and he introduced his new girlfriend to his friends and religious mentors. This included a married couple with six children named Michael and Rachel Warren-Eckie.

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Michael and Rachel, with their children in tow, travelled the US at a motorhome, visiting university campuses and preaching Hellfire and damnation to anyone and everyone. Michael is quoted as saying in 1998, I don't care if you don't like me yelling and preaching at you like this today. What I care about is saving you, because you're going to answer to God. His wife was known to parrot similar and nerving warnings, such as seek Jesus not in the church or religion and not in Christianity, and not in the system. The system can't save you because it is based in Satan. Campus students often found their rants disturbing. One individual recalled all I kept hearing are the words Satan and Hell. The pair also preached about the proper place of women, with Rachel who homeschooled their children as she can't fathom sending them off to strangers and strange spirits eight hours a day, emphasising the importance of homemaking, and Michael describing women as helpers. But adding this does not mean a wife, it means a servant, single or married.

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Early in 1992, rusty and Yates moved in together. Like her previous, relationship with sex before marriage had been a massive blockade in the progression of their partnership. Yates struggled with the idea that she and Rusty were living together despite not being married. To remedy this, the couple became engaged in December of that year and they tied the knot on April 17th 1993. Notably, although Rusty was the only man Yates engaged in sexual intercourse with, she was not allowed to wear her veil over her face because she wasn't a virgin. Reportedly, yates made Rusty promise he'd marry her again. On their 20th wedding anniversary, her new husband told her he would if she could still fit into her wedding dress.

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Shortly before the pair married, rusty purchased a brand new four bedroom house in Friendswood, texas. The 2000 square foot home set him back $95,000, and was the perfect house for a newly married couple who wanted to expand their family in the next few years. Things, however, happened more quickly than the pair expected. Yates' own parents had spent five years struggling before they conceived their first child, but for Yates and Rusty it took only two months before she fell pregnant. Yates had stopped taking birth control pills, as the pair had agreed they would accept as many children as God sent their way, regardless of whether that number was zero or ten. She continued working as a nurse until the birth of their first baby, a boy they named Noah, who was born on February 26th 1994. As soon as Noah was born, yates traded her life as a nurse for a life as a stay at home, mother and homemaker. In 1996, she gave birth to their second son, john.

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When Rusty's job required him to move out to Tampa, florida, the family rented out their home, put their possessions in storage and moved to the Sunshine State to live in a trailer. After the six months were up, the family returned to Houston, where Rusty noticed that they hadn't really missed many of the items that were still in storage and decided that perhaps a more minimalist life was better for the family. They purchased a 38-foot JCO 376 FB travel trailer and rented a spot for their new home on the outskirts of the Lazy Days RV campground in Hitchcock, texas, about halfway between Houston and Calvston. The site overlooked empty fields and nearby there was a swimming pool, children's playground, bathing facilities and a laundromat. Many of the residents were full-time and the family eventually decided to sell their four-bedroom home and remain permanently in the campground.

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Many members of the Yates family, as well as some of her friends, were upset by this decision, as they felt that Yates and her children deserved better than living in a trailer. It seems possible that Rusty was inspired by his friend Michael Warraniakis to adopt the untethered lifestyle and in 1998, michael and his wife decided they wanted to sell their own 350-square-foot GMC motorhome as they wanted to purchase a boat instead. Yates and Rusty travelled to Miami to examine the motorhome, but the trip didn't go well. Michael accused Rusty of being a workaholic and didn't believe he would give up materialism to travel in a bus and preach the gospel, stating, I believe Rusty was willing to sacrifice his wife and children for the sake of his job. He also felt that Yates was lonely noting she had the responsibility of all those children and she was all alone in that, you know, and she didn't know how to handle it. Although her family were unhappy with the decision, yates herself seemed to like the idea of living in a motorhome. Noah, now four years old, loved the bus's secret play space, which had previously been a baggage compartment, while rusty noticed there were numerous leaks in the roof and it did not have the same safety standards as the trailer they had back in Texas. Still, the family eventually finalized the purchase of the bus During their visit to Florida.

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Yates had become pregnant with the couple's fourth child, a son whom they would name Luke. Shortly after his birth, however, yates' depression resurfaced and she began to sink deeply into it. It was so overwhelming and had such a vicious hold on her that she attempted to take her own life. This is when things began to go steeply downhill. On June 16th 1999, rusty discovered his wife shaking uncontrollably and chewing on her fingers. Yates' family believed that her mental health was worsened by extremist sermons carried out by Michael, as Yates had been so captivated by his words and appeared to take them deeply to heart. Mustering up the courage to ask her husband for help. Rusty decided to take Yates to visit her family the following day. He hoped being surrounded by her loved ones would help bring his wife some comfort, but it seemed to only make things worse.

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Yates now 35, took her father's medication an antidepressant named Trazadone and overdosed, taking as many as 40 pills. She was found on time, however, and rushed to Houston's Bentorbe General Hospital before being admitted to Methodist Hospital's psychiatric unit, where she was officially diagnosed with major depressive disorder. She was noted as being at high risk for suicide and self-harm and was placed on one-to-one suicide observation every 15 minutes. Yates has also prescribed 0.5 milligrams of Attervin for sleep. Her responses when speaking with the doctors were often monosyllabic, but he managed to determine that she had been well until the birth of her fourth child. On June 18th, yates was then prescribed a starting dose of Zoloft, an antidepressant. She was taking 50 milligrams a day and the doctor ordered that she may leave the unit with family during visiting hours to see her children, as long as she was accompanied by her husband or other family members.

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The night following her overdose, yates slept just three hours. The next night she slept eight, and the nights afterwards she slept intermittently. In the days following her suicide attempt, yates was upset and ashamed. She continued to struggle with feelings of worthlessness and was greatly aware that she was a trained nurse who had failed at taking her own life. On June 18th she told a nurse that she had her family to live for. She also expressed concern to another nurse that her overdose would make it unsafe for her to breastfeed, but still she contained her feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness, never letting her true feelings be known to anyone. Her doctor reported that she commented very little on her suicide attempt, but only able to ask if she'd done any permanent damage to her body.

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A week later, a social worker named Norma Turiak carried out a joint counselling session with Yates and her husband. In her notes, norma described the mother of four as unwilling or unable to identify any recent life stresses. She added that Rusty was aware and accepting of Yates' illness, but referred to it as post-Martin depression and seemed strangely uncomfortable giving it its proper name major depression. He also claimed his wife was struggling with the concept of salvation. Furthermore, turiak discovered that all of the couple's children had been born naturally, without the use of medication, and that John, their second-born, who was three and a half at the time, had difficulty focusing and staying with one thing very long. She noted that Yates made friends easily but had drifted apart from many of her closest relationships over the years. Meanwhile Rusty described their marriages close and called their children beautiful, but said he felt that his wife had lost her identity. He stated that their strong points as a couple were similar values, honesty and trust.

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During this time Yates became almost mute, advancing to a disorder called catatonia loss of voluntary movement, notably speech. On June 20th Yates' daily dose of Zoloft was raised from 50 to 100 milligrams. The following day her doctor wrote instructions to push Zoloft dose as fast as possible. It will probably need to remain impatient. The week he felt that Yates was showing no sign of progress. But Zoloft can take one to two weeks before a patient will see any improvement and four to six weeks before they feel the full benefits of the medication. The same day her dose was upped.

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A nurse who had regular contact with Yates noticed that she'd become withdrawn, vague and guarded and expressed concern about paying the hospital bill. On June 23rd, yates' doctor noted she seemed emotionally detached, withdrawn and minimally verbal. Depression remained severe. Yates was discharged from the hospital armed with a month supply of medication, a list of follow-up care providers and the recommendation that she visit a psychiatrist named Dr Aleen Starbranche. Notably, yates was discharged because of insurance restrictions. After seven days in the hospital, her family and husband were informed that she would need to be watched around the clock and that she was still at a high risk of harming herself.

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Social worker Norma Turiak believed that there was something terribly wrong with Yates, but she was out of her depth as a social worker and not a medical professional. She was not equipped to identify or treat Yates' issues. Disturbed by the fact that the mother of four was due to be released back into the world, Turiak focused on what she could affect her household and living conditions. It wasn't long before she became concerned that the family of six were living on the converted bus they purchased from Michael and Rachel back in 1998. On June 23rd 1999, following Yates' release from care, turiak called Houston's Child Protective Services abuse and neglect hotline to report the family's living arrangement and the fact that the patient's husband allows the three and a half year old son to use a power drill. A week after she made her complaint, the CPS supervisor thanked her for her concern but wrote in response, because the situation does not appear to involve the occurrence and or substantial risk of abuse and neglect, we plan no further inquiries. The CPS noted that Norma could take her concerns to the Houston Police Department. As the CPS stated that the police department do appear to have jurisdiction in such matters.

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But things for Yates did not improve. They only got worse. On July 21st 1999, three weeks after she was discharged, she attempted to slit her own throat in her parents' bathroom. She begged her husband to let her do it, but he took the knife from her and drove her to the emergency room where she was admitted to Spring Shadows Glen Hospital, a psychiatric facility. Dr Aline Starbrunch practiced at this hospital and rusty set up an appointment for the two to meet.

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Yates told a hospital psychologist I had a fear I would hurt somebody. I thought it better to end my life and prevent it from happening. She described hallucinations that she had too. There was a voice, then an image of the knife. I had a vision in my mind get a knife, get a knife. Additionally, yates admitted that she had obsessive thoughts over our children and how they turned out. She struggled with them all being so young and was nervous about raising them right. Noting it's a big responsibility. I do not want to fail.

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Dr Starbrunch discovered several things during her first few encounters with Yates that she didn't feed her baby until she was repeatedly actively encouraged to do so. That she barely interacted with her other children. That she often retreated to the bedroom and frequently scratched her head. And that she was failing to regularly take her antidepressants. Starbrunch, along with a colleague, felt Yates was a good fit for electroconvulsion therapy, but Yates and Rusty were against it. Instead, she was prescribed an injectable drug cocktail which included Haldol, an anti-psychotic, and Codgentin, which is to help with some of Haldol's side effects, which included twitching, stiffening limbs and blurred vision. She was diagnosed with postpartum psychosis at this time, a disorder that endangers both the mother and the child's lives and effects about one in 1000 mothers. At this point, yates seemed to stabilize. 19 days later, she was discharged to a partial hospitalization program which continued for 11 days. Meanwhile, rusty purchased a three bedroom house on Beachcombe Elaine in Clear Lake, texas, and the family moved in.

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At her first post-hospital visit, dr Starbrunch told Yates that she would need to keep up with her medication. She had a history of skipping or taking half doses previously and told her PHP therapy group that needing medication made her feel like she's weak. But then things grew worse again when, on August 16th 1999, starbrunch discovered that Yates wanted to come off her anti-psychotics and she wanted to get pregnant, having more children and homeschool them. In her patient's notes she wrote apparently patient and husband plan to have as many babies as nature will allow. This will surely guarantee future psychotic depression and unfortunately Starbrunch was right. Despite Starbrunch urging that the couple have no more children, yates was pregnant by March 2000. She had stopped taking Haldol and was homeschooling Noah while caring for the other children and the home. Rusty took care of the children one night a week.

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Starbrunch's last documented appointment with Yates was in January of 2000, when she and Rusty visited the psychiatrist and discussed how Yates wished to be off her medication unless she became symptomatic, something Rusty agreed with. That same winter, yates spoke to a friend and former nursing colleague about her suicidal tendencies. The colleague said that when Yates was sick all she saw was the darkness, even when the lights were on. When she attempted to slit her throat in her parents' kitchen, she saw not her own face in the mirror but another. She said that with her first attempt she didn't swallow all the pills she put in her mouth, as she didn't have a desire to truly kill herself. Instead, she was struggling with religion and her ingrained beliefs. She felt Satan was possessing her. She confessed to having thoughts about hurting someone or something harmful being done to her children, but she didn't admit that in her head it was she who was the one causing harm.

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On November 30th 2000, yates gave birth to the couple's fifth and final child, their first little girl, whom they named Mary. At the time of her birth, yates had been offered medication for around a year and appeared to be managing well, but in March of 2001, her father passed away. Having dealt with Alzheimer's disease for seven years, this appeared to be a trigger for Yates, whose illness returned with a vengeance. She held her newborn baby in her arms 24-7, afraid to put her down. She stopped eating, stopped drinking and stopped speaking. She began to self-harm and read the Bible feverishly and eventually, as with Luke, she stopped feeding the baby.

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Rusty took her to Devoryu Hospital in League City, telling doctors and nurses that his wife could not survive another night at home. The attending psychiatrist, mohamed Said, and an examining physician named Patricia Cork attempted to have Yates committed to Austin State Hospital. They indicated that the 36-year-old was a danger to herself, unable to make a rational treatment choice. Notably, neither doctor believed she would cause harm to others. They weren't the only ones who felt this way either. None of Yates' friends, family doctors, nurses or mental health professionals who saw her ever thought that she would be a danger to others, only to herself. After all, she was a doting mother who showed her children love, attention and affection. It didn't seem possible that she could harm her own offspring. The doctor's plans were foiled, however, when Rusty convinced his wife to voluntarily sign herself into Devoryu. Her health insurance meant that she could only stay 12 days before she would be released back into her family's care. Notably, had Yates been admitted by professionals, she would have been able to stay longer. Although she was discharged from the hospital after 12 days, she returned shortly afterwards. Dr Saeed wrote the patient was near catatonic, sat in the chair and did not move at all. At this time we decided to try the Haldor again, at the husband's request. 10 days passed inside the hospital walls and then a further 7 passed when Yates participated in another partial hospitalization program. Finally she was discharged, according to her family, in early June. Dr Saeed took the mother of 5 off her antipsychotic medication.

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Just before 10am on June 20th 2021, rusty received a phone call from his wife. He'd left Yates alone with the children less than an hour ago and his mother was due to arrive in just a few minutes to help care for the little ones. But he was surprised when he heard Yates' firm voice on the other end of the phone telling him you need to come home. When Rusty asked why, yates told him it's time she repeated that phrase again. Then Rusty realized that something was wrong and dashed out of the building telling his co-workers that he had a family emergency. At the couple's shed home on Beachcombe lane, yates was waiting. Rusty asked if anyone was hurt and his wife told him yes. When he asked who, she replied the kids, and when he asked which ones, she chillingly informed him all of them. Eight minutes before she'd called Rusty, yates had notified the police that there had been an incident at their residence Just after Rusty had left for work that morning.

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Yates had sunk to her lowest point. Although he'd been warned not to leave his wife alone with the children, rusty wanted Yates to gain some independence and arranged for her to look after the children alone for an hour until his mother showed up. Rusty was confident she could handle it, but was proven wrong in the worst way possible. In the hour that occurred, between 9 and 10 o'clock that morning, yates drowned all five of their children in the bathtub Chillingly. When she had broken down just before her last hospital visit, she had filled up a bathtub of water. Dr Sayid thought that she had planned to drown herself, but Yates later admitted to the police that she had intended on taking the children's lives.

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Before changing her mind, yates took 5 year old John into the bathroom first, followed by 3 year old Paul and 2 year old Luke. Once the 3 boys were dead, she laid them out on the bed. Mary, who was just six months old, was the next victim. Yates left the little girl floating in the tub. Seven-year-old Noah asked what was wrong with his little sister before, seeming to realize that he was in danger, that his own mother wanted to harm him. He fled the bathroom but was quickly caught and he too was murdered. She left Noah in the tub but took out Mary's body and placed her in the arms of her older brother, john.

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When Yates called the police, she didn't give any information about what they might find. Walking inside the suburban home, officers found an extraordinarily ordinary house. On the fridge, photos of the children were held up by magnets On the table, numerous empty cereal bowls lay On the floor, children's toys were scattered haphazardly and in the bathroom and the bedroom was a scene from a horror film. Yates made no attempt to cover up the crime. She confessed right away to the police officers who responded to her call. She later told Dr Michael Walner that she'd purposely waited for her husband to leave for work before she began to fill up the tub, because she knew he would attempt to stop her. She also made it clear that this was not the first time she'd considered taking the lives of her children. Officers who attended the scene noticed that the family dark had been locked in his crate, which was unusual. It was theorized that Yates had done this to prevent the canine from interfering with her plan.

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At 1 30 am on June 21st, yates appeared before Magistrate Carol Carris, who found probable cause for further detention. Yates was to be held with no bond and was returned to an isolated cell. She was naked as she was still a threat to herself and could use her clothing to take her own life. The overhead lights remained on during the night as another precaution against her committing suicide. The following morning, the uncle psychiatrist, melissa Ferguson, met with Yates. Yates requested that she be allowed to attend her children's memorial service and that her doctor cut her hair in the shape of a crown. She wanted to see whether the number 666 or the mark of the beast was still there. She also asked for her husband and stated that she wished to see a religious person, preferably someone Catholic.

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Ferguson asked Yates how all this had happened. The 36 year old vaguely spoke about a prophecy, but couldn't explain what she meant. Hitting herself in the head with a fist, she said I am so stupid. Couldn't I have killed just one to fulfill the prophecy? Couldn't I have just offered Mary? When told by Ferguson that her mind is playing tricks, yates replied no, it's not. I'm not mentally ill, it's real. The state will impose the death penalty on Satan. The drowning was the way. Are they in heaven? Ferguson had treated over 6000 patients during her career. When she saw Yates in 2001, she described her as one of the sickest patients she'd ever seen.

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Yates was represented by a family friend, george Panham, and was charged with the drowning of Noah, john and Mary. She attempted to plead not guilty by reason of insanity, and in Texas law, a defendant must prove that they are unable to discern right from wrong at the time of the crime in order to successfully assert the insanity defence. While experts testified that Yates was suffering from post-Martin psychosis and was psychotic at the time of the slayings, it was not enough to convince the jury, who rejected her insanity plea and found her guilty in 2002. The prosecution had been seeking the death penalty, but the jury didn't agree with this and Yates was sentenced to life in prison in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, where she would not be eligible for parole until she'd spent 40 years behind bars, at which point she would be in her late 70s.

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On January 6th 2005, however, a Texas court of appeals overturned the convictions. This is because forensic psychiatrist Dr Park D'Yetz, who provided testimony for the prosecution, admitted to giving false information. His testimony included that shortly before Andrea carried out the murders, the popular TV police drama Law and Order aired an episode about a mother who drowned her children in the bathtub and was acquitted on all charges by reason of insanity. Using this information, the prosecution implied that Andrea, an avid watcher of the show, had taken inspiration from the episode and used it to carry out her own crimes. However, an author named Suzanne O'Malley, who had been closely following the case and who had previously worked as a writer for Law and Order, noticed that no such episode existed, at least not until 2004,. And that episode was based on Andrea's case, not the other way around. From this, it was determined that the jury may have been affected by D'Yetz's testimony, and a new trial was ordered. Over a year later, on January 9th 2006, andrea ended the same plea as she had previously not guilty. By reason of insanity, on February 1st she was granted release on bail on the condition that she admitted herself into a mental health treatment facility.

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During her 2006 trial, her most recent doctor before the murders, dr Said, told the court that Rusty had been advised not to leave his wife alone with the children. The weekend before the horrific crime had been carried out. Rusty had also announced that a family gathering that he was going to start leaving Yates alone for an hour every morning so that she could be a mother and homemaker on her own. Yates' mother had been shocked at this notion and pointed out that the 36-year-old was nowhere near ready to be left by herself. She noted that Yates had almost choked Mary by trying to feed her solid food as evidence of this. Furthermore, brian Yates' older brother, who suffered from bipolar disorder, told talk show host Larry King in 2001 that Rusty had said that all depressed people really need is a swift kick in the pants to get them motivated. When he'd said this to Brian, he'd been driving Yates to a treatment facility. Rusty, for his part, claimed that, contrary to the testimony of Yates' psychiatrist, he had no idea about her post-Martin psychosis diagnosis and said that had he known, he never would have had more children with her. He also added that he wasn't aware that she may have on the children and would not have left her unsupervised if he had been told that. He told the Dallas Observer if I'd known she was psychotic, we'd never have even considered having more kids. Conversely, yates told her prison psychiatrist that before having Mary, she had told Rusty that she did not want to have intercourse because Dr Starbranch had said she might hurt her children. However, rusty had convinced her that she could handle it, complimenting her as a mother and asserting his procreative religious beliefs. During the first trial he believed that Yates would be found innocent, treated with medication and returned home so that they could have more children. He even suggested the possibility that they adopt or have surrogate children, much to the shock and distaste of those around him.

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But it wasn't just Rusty who came under fire during the fallout to this case. The medical community also made a target. Yates openly complained that she was never properly put back on Haldor, even though she wanted to take it again, and the many experts she had seen over the years were pinned with the blame of not noticing a woman in distress. Many felt that if they had been more thorough in their jobs, they may have stopped Yates from killing her own children. Rusty also blamed the strong dose of antidepressants she was given in the months before the murders, claiming a side effect of the drug was homicidal tendencies. However, rusty had previously claimed that he was not a medical expert and that it was down to Yates' psychiatrists to diagnose and treat her properly. On July 26th, following three days of deliberation, the jury found Yates not guilty by reason of insanity. As a result, she was committed to North Texas State Hospital but in 2007 was moved to a low-security mental health facility in Kerville, texas, where she remains to this day.

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During her time in prison, yates confessed that she'd considered killing her children for two years before going through with it. She believed that she was a failure of a mother and felt her children were developing improperly, stating it was the seventh deadly sin. My children weren't righteous. They stumbled because I was evil the way I was raising them. They could never be saved. They were doomed to perish in the fires of hell.

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In 2004, rusty filed for divorce. He remarried two years later and had one son. In 2015. His wife, laura, filed for divorce. In 2012, yates petitioned to attend a weekly church service outside the hospital, but her request was denied. Two years later, she and her doctors requested that she be allowed to attend supervised group outings with other patients. However, they withdrew this request due to the media attention and public scrutiny that tracked.

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In 2021, abc13 released an article to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the murders of Luke, john Paul, noah and Mary. It noted that Yates comes up for review for release every year and waves it every single time. George Panham, her defense lawyer, who was also a friend of the family, said he still thinks of her as a daughter and speaks with her often. He also visits the graves of the children every year. In the aftermath of Yates' conviction, several professional communities have used his story. To try and prevent similar devastations from taking place, the Mental Health Association of Greater Houston established the Yates Children Memorial Fund, which aims to educate the public about issues affecting women's mental health. Around 2003, the Andrea Yates Bill was passed in Texas, which requires all providers of parental care to give mothers information on the resources available for those suffering the likes of post-mortem depression and psychosis. It isn't much, but in the wake of so much horror, it is something good that comes from the Yates case.

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Over the course of the years, blame has been put on many different people and factors involved in this case. Some believe Rusty's extreme religious beliefs and desire for a big family were put above the health and well-being of his wife. Others think that if Yates had been adequately treated for her illness and had received the professional support that she required, then none of this might have ever happened. Some news outlets lay the responsibility at the feet of Rusty's friends, michael and Rachel Waraniecki, whose grim, doomsday teachings instill terror into susceptible religious individuals. Maybe it's one of these factors, or maybe it's several. Either way, it seems that the murder of the Yates children was very likely an avoidable tragedy. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Murderous Minds Podcast. If you would like to vote on upcoming episodes and watch our documentaries, then consider supporting us on Patreon. We hope you found this episode informative. Thank you again for joining us and stay safe everyone.