Mother suspected of killing her three children

[ElenorRigby]

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hope the witch rots in hell

poor poor children
RIP sweethearts

Statistically, far more men are abusive (to the point of murder) to their families than women are, so it is more likely that a woman who does something like this is completely out of her mind or that she has been driven to it by abuse (if, for instance, her partner had been sexually abusing the DC but the courts insisted there was no proof and she had to allow unsupervised contact).
This doesn't necessarily mean that a woman would never kill her children because (for instance) her partner was leaving her for someone else and she wanted to punish him. Women are capable of extreme cruelty, selfishness and malice.
But as yet, no one knows what was going on in this case. So less of the 'Bwaah, burn in HELLL' pointless yammering, eh?

Thankfully, SGB, pretty much only the OP has had a pitchfork on this.

Don't even know how much of the post-mortem results will be released.

Or if the mother will cooperate with police or even be capable of speaking with them.

Sorry I xposted!

It is so hard to determine though, when does one stop being sane or starts being sane again. In the case you are talking about the fact that this man realised at the moment he was arrested that indeed he would probably handg for it does not mean that at the very moment he committed the act he knew the qality of said act?

I had never heard of the "irresistible impulse" defence. Did it exist in England at some point and was then stopped because opretty much anything could be defended by "I could not stop myself from ....) or was it just never a valid defence argument in England?

I remember that years ago, when that woman jumped in front of a train with a baby on tow, somebody mentioned that the only way a mother would kill a child she lovingly cared for was if she was convinced that that was the only way to "save" him from a miserable life.

A nasty divorce process brings the worst on the parts, I can imagine that if she was fleeing from one place to another one, was not because she wanted to score points on his ex but perhaps protect the children from him. I guess that she should have been unless a huge amount of pressure, broke down and did that.

So, although I will never condone what she has done, I would not wish her to rot in hell, she must have been under a huge amount of pressure and unsupported to cope with it. So, no, I'm not wishing her, lightly, to rot in hell, at least not until there is more information on what was going on in her life.

SGB, you put what I wanted to say more eloquently than I could.

"In the case you are talking about the fact that this man realised at the moment he was arrested that indeed he would probably handg for it does not mean that at the very moment he committed the act he knew the qality of said act?"
On the facts of the case ( a horrible phrase to all law students in a way because it seems to skip out all the theory on how they found this out but he may well have admitted he knew or it may be from a psychiatric report, brilliant phrase in another way as it means you have less reading) it was found that he did know it was wrong at the time. How this was decided I'm unsure but it was established as a fact.

I had never heard of the "irresistible impulse" defence. Did it exist in England at some point and was then stopped because opretty much anything could be defended by "I could not stop myself from ....) or was it just never a valid defence argument in England?

I don't think it ever existed in England but that is just a guess, don't quote me on it. In Ireland it is merely an extension of the M'Naghten rules so we have 3 types of defect of the mind instead of 2. It is still subject to the first criteria i.e. that they suffered a disease of the mind at the time and this disease caused a defect of reason so it can not simply be used for a catch all defence of "I couldn't 'elp me self Guv, honest."
There's also case law stating that it must be an irresistible impulse not merely an impulse that goes unresisted and also that even diseases of the mind which result in diminished self- control making an impulse more difficult to resist doesn't necessarily make it impossible to resist.

It's not like she overdosed them on medicine or suffocated them, something not so violent you might believe she was malicious or cruel, but to actual stab anyone never mind children you must be pretty out of control and out of your mind.

Nope, quite happy to join the OP on this one.

RIP those poor children

Killing any child is inexcusable.

Although this is utterly different, in that physical violence has obviously been done to these poor children, there was a case here a few weeks/months ago of a woman whose 2 sons were found dead in their beds - she was also ill. Speculation was rife re her mental state, whether or not she had smothered them, how could she blah blah - turned out to be a faulty heater and they had all been affected by carbon monoxide poisoning.

As I said - obviously different in the above case but still - without more facts it's no good speculating, and certainly no point in calling her names and wishing evil upon her.

Such a horrible tragedy. I know (some) sane people do carry out acts like this but hope this woman was not in her right mind. Because it's terrible to think a mother could do this while in full control of her thoughts and actions. (Terrible to think a man could, obviously, but sadly there are plenty of examples to show they do. Women who kill their children are much rarer and in most cases motivated by desperation, not anger.)

very upsetting.
seems more so since the children are a bit older than is usual .. or that could be jsut me

After the birth of DD2 I suffered from post natal psychosis. I had halucinations. I believed than the government were putting something in the food to control us all. I believed the world was an evil place, that I would not be able to protect my DCs and that I should drive off Beachy Head with us all in the car. I believed this would be the kindest thing to do. I wanted my DH to come with me if he had said yes, I would have done it.

I believe that anyone that does this must be mad. I don't think that there are many truly evil psychopaths.

Lynli - very sorry to hear that but not everyone else who thinks about harming their children has the same stuff going on that you did.

You can't work backwards from an act and say, this is so beyond the comprehension of any reasonable human being the person who did it must have been mad. That's faulty logic. You have to look at the person and work out their motivation and thinking capacity involved in committing the act. Someone who hurts someone else may be perfectly sane, or may be as mad as a box of mad frogs.

Well her youngest was 5 years old so highly unlikely for Postpartum psychosis to be the case.

Postpartum is not the only kind of severe psychosis.

what a nasty OP

Thank you mayorquimbly for this little insight into criminal justice. I always had an interest in what goes in the mind of a criminal but very little into the legal system that deals with it. I think I will have to find a way to learn more about it, it is fascinating.

No problem. I'm only studying it myself at the moment and for Irish law it is generally based on English law although recently we have begun to diverge on certain issues, insanity defences being one of them so there may well have been some technical developments since I studied it in English law which I'm unaware of. It is one of the more interesting areas of law though you are right there.

The fact that I get why someone could do this frightens me a little. I've been depressed and suicidal in the past but couldn't bare to put my kids through losing their Mum like that - even a rubbish one It has crossed my mind But then where do you stop? DH would be devestated so kill him too? And my in laws, father, brother, aunts, cousins, friends...? It's when you lose sight of this that you really need to worry.

Obvious I know, but thinking and doing are very different things... and whilst I'm ashamed to have even had those thoughts, I'm comforted by the fact I didn't (and hopefully never would have) acted on it.

The method bothers me in this case thouh. I think you'd have to be seriously psychotic to stab your own children. That's not a mercy killing, it's just horrific. It's so, so sad to think what those kids went through

My fther was a policeman for 30 odd years and he reckons there are three main reasons for killing , madness ,badness and monetary gain. he also says that the three can and often are mixed up ,ie someone who kills their spouse to claim on the life insurance is bad but also doing it for monetary gain. He also says there are rare occasions where people genuinely lose it ,like the man who killed his dad and then drove over 100miles and presented himself to my dad ,5 minutes before he was due to finish his shift ,sying he had killed his dad. He had ,but when the local police spoke to my dad they said it was a miracle the blokes father lived as long as he did because he was a nasty abusive person who had terrorised his entire family for years and the son was a decent normal man who had been driven to breaking point .
The insanity thing is difficult ,i have spent time with people who are in the acute phase of pyschosis ,and their reality is often so skewed ,but the point is ,to them it is reality . When your reality is so messed up and you are paranoid and truly terrified of the world i can just about see how somehing like this may happen , but to be fair to those with mental illness ,in the vast majority of cases it is only themselves they harm

My cop friend always says, 'There's three sides of every story: her side, his side and the truth.'

did she KNOW what she was doing? she got the kids together,chose her knife.....i'd say she had a pretty good idea.....

Well, did Andrew Case know what he was doing? Guess we won't ever know as he hanged himself. Is it known yet if his children were asphyxiated or stabbed? Reports were initially that he stabbed them, but later that they were asphyxiated and he stabbed his wife.

Guess it's a moot point as they are all gone.

I do see a gender bias, though, in all these. When a man does this, it's never 100% assumed he was mad, insane, mentally ill, abused, what have you. But when a woman does, nearly everyone proclaims she was definitely mad, insane, abused, psychotic, etc.

This couple was also both American. It would have been possible for her to take them there on an extended visit, with his consent for sure, establish residency and then file for divorce over there.