How is it possible that Andrea Yates was found not guilty by reason of insanity?

Question

I just can't believe it. How could this happen?

Answer 1

Well to clarify any misunderstanding of the law. She has been found not guilty by reason of insanity and will be placed in a mental institution; however, if she is later found to be mentally competent, she will NOT be retried for murder. The fact that she might become mentally stable does not change the fact that the jury concluded that at the time this happened, she was not. I too am somewhat shocked by the verdict but most likely from an emotional level as a mother of four; however, having been a therapist who worked with psychiatric patients for over 9 years, I do know of many cases when someone is psychotic that they actually don't know what they are saying or doing and afterwards (once stabilized) are often shocked and horrified when told what they did. So rational logic tells me that the jury was right but my emotional mother side is still having a hard time dealing with this. More importantly I'm having a hard time figuring out why no one felt the father wasn't somehow responsible for what happened by leaving his children with a woman that he knew wasn't mentally stable. I understand that he felt he had to work but if she was that mentally unstable, she could have been found eligible for social security disability that would have among other things made it possible to have an additional care giver in the home when he wasn't there. Maybe he didn't know of this option but surely one of the many "professionals" that she was supposedly seen by would have.

Answer 2

Her first trial was a miscarriage of justice, hence another trial. There was overwhelming credible medical evidence that Mrs. Yates was seriously mentally ill long before she acted. She was misdiagnosed, under-medicated and sent home to "care for" her children when she should have been hospitalized. Maybe the doctors should be held to account for this tragic event.

Answer 3

Because good people find it incredibly difficult to believe someone could be that evil. And lets face it, it is pretty hard to get a grasp on!

You can't get much more evil than a mother holding her children underwater while they struggled against her.

I feel sorry for the Jury, but they made the wrong decision.

Answer 4

Does it matter. Not guilty by reason of insanity means that she will spend the rest of her life in an insane assylum.

IF she is ever found to be competant at a future date, she will them be charged with murder.

She is not getting off

Answer 5

Personally, I think that you would have to be mentally insane to do what she did, but I also feel that there should be no such thing as not guilty because of mental defect. They should be found quilty, and then sent to an institution for the rest of their lives.

Answer 6

I agree that she could have been discovered no longer in charge via reason of insanity. i think of that she should be at a psychological medical institution for an prolonged time in line with risk something of her existence. I mean she is mentally ill. She had or has voices in her head and that i do no longer think of she is extra proper now. i think of it exchange into an excellent verdict.

Answer 7

i think there is a lot going on here that people don't know about. research this case. this woman lived in a motor home with her five children and her family, husband, friends and the psychological community failed her in the most horrible way. sane people do not murder their children. she's already in prison, a prison of the mind.

Answer 8

the court system may have found her not guilty, but God didn't. she will have to see the look on her childrens faces for the rest of her life, over and over and over.

Answer 9

Then she should be institutionalized for the rest of her life, if she is that crazy.