Andrea Yates Case Study

Early, June 20th, 2001, a phone called was made to the Houston, Texas police department by Andrea Yates, a wife, and mother of 5. While the call seemed to lack urgency, it wasn’t until two officers responding to the call arrived at the Yates resident, where Angela Yates admitted to the gruesome killing of her five children, ranging from ages 6 months-7 years of age.
Angela arose at 8:10 that morning, patiently waiting on her husband to leave for work, following her husband’s departure, Angela immediately begin to draw water in the bathtub so that she could drown her children. Angela begins with her middle child, Paul who was 3 years old, Luke who was 2 years of age, John, 5 years of age, Mary 6 months of age, and finally, Noah whom was the oldest
Rusty’s remarks regarding his estranged wife entailed that not only did Rusty support his wife, he was also sympathetic towards her. Upon enclosing his gut-wrenching statement, Rusty continued on to exclaim that his wife was suffering from depression as well as a mental illness, which confounded the public. The police, as well as the public, begin to question whether Andrea was a cold-blooded killer, or whether her actions were the result of a severe mental illness.
Three months after Angela’s arrest, a jury deemed Angela Yates competent to withstand trial. While in custody, Andrea being receiving psychiatric treatment, and medication for her depression. During a session with the psychiatrist, Angela implied that she murdered her children to save them. Angela stated, “maybe in their, their innocent years, God would take them up.” Angela was indicating that her children would be taken up to heaven. Furthermore, followed by another question from her psychiatrist Angela exclaimed that if she hadn’t killed her children they would have continued stumbling and would end up in