# Pregnant mom drives into ocean at Daytona Beach. Wants to take her kids to a "better" place. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [March 7, 2014, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150 "2014-03-07T21:30:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/41 "2014-03-08T16:26:50Z")
Did you guys read the part where **Broomstick** gave her opinion about Smith’s case or were y’all too busy unknotting your panties? She’s not saying “any time a woman kills someone it’s The Man’s fault”, she’s saying “we need better mental healthcare”. Which I definitely agree with, whether the person who’s sick is a man, woman, transexual, hermaphrodite or immigrant from Xenu. ETA: I can’t think of any recent cases of grown men losing their marbles and going after the family, but I can think of two of teenagers who killed their families (one more succesful than the other, but he also had a smaller family) “to take them to a better place”; official diagnosis in both cases is schizophrenia. Both came from poor families and had younger siblings with complicated medical situations of whom they were very protective. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/42 "2014-03-08T16:28:24Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > Didn’t even notice until now that **Broomstick** had subtlely, yet effectively, passed the blame from Andrea Yates to her husband and “the system”, whatever that’s supposed to mean. Oh, bullshit - I was blaming religion, not her husband. A brand of religion that says a woman always finds fulfillment in motherhood and should have as many children as possible until her uterus fall out. Yates’ doctors did their best within the law, including one of them stating she needed to be observed 24/7 and not left alone with the kids, but the reality is these days that until you hurt someone else you’ll not be locked up. Even if you try to hurt _yourself_ the assumption is that a mother is not a danger to her kids… until she is. Andrea Yates is not responsible because she is _mentally ill_. That Smith woman, though - the man she wanted as her boyfriend/sugar daddy told her in no uncertain terms that he didn’t want kids, but that doesn’t make him responsible for their murder. SHE is responsible for their murder. It seems (based on what information I have) she made a cold, calculating decision to kill the kids to get a better deal for herself. That’s Bad Person, not mentally ill. You really can’t see a difference, there? If “the system” is at fault it’s due to societal norms a biases that interfere with proper mental health and/or the best interests of the people involved. For example, the presumption that the mother is always good for her kids - no, she’s not, as Yates and the most recent incident demonstrate. Bias that women should have kids, or must have kids. Bias that prevents women from surrendering kids when it’s in the best interests of all involved - how would things have been different if Smith had felt comfortable either placing her kids with relatives or putting them up for adoption? She may or may not have landed the man she wanted, she may or may not have been skeevy, but it’s no question in my mind those kids would have been better off with someone who gave a damn about them, or at least wasn’t actively trying to get rid of them. **But yes, bottom line, we need better mental health care.** ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/43 "2014-03-08T16:39:02Z")
[QUOTE=Broomstick] … Andrea Yates was suffering from a recognized mental illness and **her religious nutjob husband discouraged/prevented treatment** for her until she killed the kids… [/QUOTE] The operative part of your post. I only recalled some details about the case (she killed her kids, he worked for NASA) so I looked it up. It turns out that your statement that the “religious nutjob” of a husband prevented treatment is false…[she was going to a doctor](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/03/10-years-later-the-tragedy-of-andrea-yates/254290/) at the time. ---
**Author:** ![LibrarySpy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f9ae1b/32.png) [@LibrarySpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LibrarySpy)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/44 "2014-03-08T16:42:47Z")
Sure. [Here’s both](http://www.twincities.com/crime/ci_24992914/families-fear-mental-illness-led-murder-suicides), annecdotally. They seem to be treated even-handedly. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/45 "2014-03-08T16:44:06Z")
And… caught by the edit window. I’m not blaming the societal BS on “The Man” because _woman are just guilty of this bais and promoting it as men are._ There have been instances of killing their families, but as noted they are far more likely to use firearms. I’ll also add that a subsequent attempt to commit suicide at the scene is also far more likely to result in success due to fire arms. This would leave fewer such men alive to drag into a media-circus trial. The other thing is that mother-kills-children is _such_ a violation of society’s myths about motherhood that the publicity is over the top. A quick google search does result in cases of the father killing the kids but none of them receive the notoriety or publicity of the women doing that. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/46 "2014-03-08T16:44:53Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > It turns out that your statement that the “religious nutjob” of a husband prevented treatment is false…[she was going to a doctor](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/03/10-years-later-the-tragedy-of-andrea-yates/254290/) at the time. Re-read **Broomstick** ’s last post, 2nd paragraph, where she notes that Yates was seeing doctors, one of whom said she should never be left alone with the children. ---
**Author:** ![buddha\_david](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ee7513/32.png) [@buddha\_david](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/buddha_david)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/47 "2014-03-08T16:52:05Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > Oh, bullshit - I was blaming religion, not her husband. Gotta admit, you’ll get no argument from me there. (The story of Abraham attempting to murder his son Isaac because “God Told Him To” comes to mind…) > [@Broomstick](#): > > Yates’ doctors did their best within the law, including one of them stating she needed to be observed 24/7 and not left alone with the kids, but the reality is these days that until you hurt someone else you’ll not be locked up. Even if you try to hurt _yourself_ the assumption is that a mother is not a danger to her kids… until she is. > > Andrea Yates is not responsible because she is _mentally ill_. If she’s not accountable for her actions, why does she remain locked down in a mental ward? Your words are a complete contradiction. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/48 "2014-03-08T16:52:56Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > I think in _that_ case it was murder, not mental illness. For one thing, insane people usually don’t make up a cover story. Yates admitted she drowned the kids, she didn’t try to blame someone else. Smith needed the kids out of the way but wanted to retain her freedom, so there you go. Smith was actually like someone who knew she did something wrong and was functional enough to try to cover her actions. Yates clearly wasn’t tracking right and wrong and made no effort to cover her tracks. And as it happens, you have articulated the most common legal standard for insanity: because of a mental disease or defect, the accused was unable to distinguish right from wrong. Someone up-thread said something like, “No sane mother would kill her children.” From a legal standpoint, that’s not accurate. As a society, we have agreed to punish people who do wrong as criminals – but we have also agreed that someone who does not know right from wrong is generally NOT criminally culpable. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/49 "2014-03-08T17:08:01Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > The operative part of your post. I only recalled some details about the case (she killed her kids, he worked for NASA) so I looked it up. > > It turns out that your statement that the “religious nutjob” of a husband prevented treatment is false…[she was going to a doctor](http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/03/10-years-later-the-tragedy-of-andrea-yates/254290/) at the time. Yes, and when her doctor Saeed said _don’t leave her alone with the kids_ what did he do? He couldn’t have hired a nanny? Oh, but taking care of the kids is the woman’s job, right? Apparently Andrea’s mother was helping out, having her own concerns about whether or not Andrea could be trusted with the kids, but Russell Yates over-ruled the doctor’s advice and became deliberately leaving her alone with the kids. Why? It’s not adequate treatment if you either fail to follow doctor’s advice or prevent someone else from following the doctor’s advice. If a family member has diabetes and you decide on your own no, they don’t _really_ need that insulin and hide it or “accidentally” throw it out is that person getting proper treatment? It wasn’t Andrea or her doctor deciding it was OK to leave her alone with the kids, it was her husband, who had no medical training, who went against the advice of at least one trained professional, and also ignored the concerns of other family members who also thought leaving Andrea alone with the kids was a bad idea. _He was in denial._ Or had some other agenda. When doctors in 1999 recommended that she not have any more children due to a history of post-partum psychosis _what did he do?_ He kept on with his association with the [quiverful](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiverful) “movement” that says have as many kids as you physically can, damn the consequences. No condoms for him! No birth control for her! Yates, who had been doing better while medicated after her 1999 problems told Dr. Starbranch, her first psychiatrist, she was discontinuing the drugs prior to _deliberately seeking to become pregnant again._ If Russell Yates had been a responsible adult using his god-given logic, rationality, and brain he would have nixed making another baby but he didn’t. Author Susan O’Malley, who reserached the matter prior to writing about it, had this to say: > [@Susan O'Malley](#): > > During the trial, he’d successfully maintained the position that Andrea would be found innocent. He had fantasies of having more children with her after she was successfully treated in a mental health facility and released on the proper medication. He worked his way through various fixes for their damaged lives, such as a surrogate motherhood and adoption (horrifying Andrea’s family, attorneys and Houston psychiatrists) before giving in to reality. Which statement, if true, makes me question if _Russell_ Yates is entirely mentally competent. I mean, holy crap, the woman has a history of post-partum psychosis, kills their kids and he’s fantasizing about having MORE of them with her? WTF? But hey, why not pile on the blame - their health insurance had a 10-day inpatient limit on mental health services. If you’re still psychotic/suicidal/whatever after that, too bad, just get over it, right? Which is what I mean by _we need better mental health care_. Maybe what Andrea needed was a longer inpatient stay away from a man who thought conceiving more babies was more important than caring for either their mother or the children already present in the world. Maybe if there were so many arbitrary limitations on mental health care they could have found a better therapy for her. Maybe her own mother would have been willing to take in the kids, did anyone even ask her? Maybe society should provide more support to grandparents who do such things, to help them raise these kids, so these tragedies don’t have to happen. Ditto for aunts, uncles, and anyone else, because sending the kids off to live with different relatives than a deranged or incapacitated parent has a long history. Our society even has legal means to transfer guardianship. Andrea Yates is an instance were mental illness collided with religious dogma and resulted in dead kids. It illustrates a LOT wrong with our society’s approach to mental illness and parenthood. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/50 "2014-03-08T17:16:17Z")
> [@buddha\_david](#): > > If she’s not accountable for her actions, why does she remain locked down in a mental ward? Your words are a complete contradiction. No, they’re not. People who are clearly a danger to others can be “locked down” _for the safety of other people_. It’s not because they’re guilty, it’s because they’re _dangerous_. Even if she is not morally responsible due to her illness she still killed five people. It’s no different than quarantining someone with a highly infectious disease or not letting someone with uncontrolled epilepsy drive - nothing personal, but society won’t let them put others at risk. As it happens, she is currently held under less stringent security than before, because apparently there is less need for it. Initially, after the trial ruling her not guilty due to mental illness, when she underwent treatment and recovered sufficiently to regain some contact with reality she’d plunged into a suicidal state because it would hit her that _she killed her own children_. She spent _years_ see-sawing back and forth between disconnect with reality and wanting to hurt herself for killing her own kids. Now that’s a little slice of hell, isn’t it? She’s reportedly doing better, but it’s unlikely she’ll ever be allowed freedom again due to both herself and others. Not everybody can get better and resume a normal life. ---
**Author:** ![PeskiPiksi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e495f1/32.png) [@PeskiPiksi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PeskiPiksi)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/51 "2014-03-08T17:21:09Z")
Similar story happened here locally just a few days ago: [http://www.newson6.com/story/24897913/police-respond-to-possible-murder-suicide-in-jenks](http://www.newson6.com/story/24897913/police-respond-to-possible-murder-suicide-in-jenks) For those who don’t want to click, a mother, in the middle of a divorce and custody battle, committed murder/suicide by taking her 3 year-old and 5 year-old in the car and running it in the garage. The 5 year-old boy managed to survive, found by the father. So tragic. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/52 "2014-03-08T17:34:40Z")
Enough of Yates and Smith, let’s get back to Ebony Wilkerson. One thing annoying me about the reporting in my area is that the talking heads have said “she has no history of mental illness”, as if that definitively makes her sane. No, what it means is _she has no history of TREATMENT for mental illness_. There are a lot of really crazy people out there walking around who haven’t had the least bit of treatment for the crazy. That doesn’t make the not-crazy, it just means they’ve not been treated and have no official “history of mental illness”. Apparently, Ebony had been talking about “demons in the house” to concerned relatives. This is not normally seen as an indication of sanity, quite the opposite. There are allegations of abuse, which may or may not have been happening. Assuming it had been, it certainly would not have helped someone with mental illness. Apparently, the people who rescued the kids and her reported she acted as if she was in a “daze”. If nothing else, she wasn’t reacting _normally_ to a near-death situation. That, too, is an indication that there is something not right going on between the ears. I have to wonder if there had been any prior indication of mental problems in her, or if she had tried to seek treatment before. It is _very_ clear, given that family members were calling 911 to ask for a wellness check earlier that day, even for her to be taken to a hospital whether she consented or not, that people knew something was seriously amiss and were trying to get an intervention for her. The police did check on her but there are rules about who you can and can’t commit involuntarily and she was coherent enough to give answers that made sense. I’m _guessing_ that this woman was having some sort of break with reality/psychotic episode. It may or may not have been triggered by abuse. While she has been charged with murder and child abuse, she is currently undergoing evaluation at a mental health facility which, under the circumstances, is the right and proper thing to do. Meanwhile, I’m wondering about the kids. They’re currently in the custody of the state which means… what? They’re with strangers? I know sometimes states make an effort to place the kids with relatives. I guess, in an ideal world, the kids would wind up with relatives, Ebony would get whatever treatment she needed (assuming this is mental illness), and maybe wouldn’t get custody of them again but would be able to be a presence in their life. If that’s what the kids wanted, because, after all, they were quite aware that mom _really was_ trying to kill them. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/53 "2014-03-08T17:50:38Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > And as it happens, you have articulated the most common legal standard for insanity: because of a mental disease or defect, the accused was unable to distinguish right from wrong. > > Someone up-thread said something like, “No sane mother would kill her children.” From a legal standpoint, that’s not accurate. As a society, we have agreed to punish people who do wrong as criminals – but we have also agreed that someone who does not know right from wrong is generally NOT criminally culpable. **Bricker** what is the general standard for insanity in the various States? In the commonwealth, we have more or less some variation on the[M’Naughten Rules](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M'Naghten_rules). Under the classical interpretation of those, Yates would not be insane. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/54 "2014-03-08T18:18:08Z")
As a native South Carolinian, I’d just like to express gratitude that there was someone in the world who hadn’t heard of Susan Smith. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2014, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150/55 "2014-03-08T19:16:46Z")
> [@AK84](#): > > **Bricker** what is the general standard for insanity in the various States? In the commonwealth, we have more or less some variation on the[M’Naughten Rules](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M'Naghten_rules). Under the classical interpretation of those, Yates would not be insane. Many states use the M’Naughten Rule, or some variant like irresistible impulse. A few have abolished the insanity defense completely and the remainder use the Model Penal Code version: because of a mental disease or defect, the accused was unable to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or conform his conduct to the requirements of the law. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pregnant-mom-drives-into-ocean-at-daytona-beach-wants-to-take-her-kids-to-a-better-place/683150.md?page=2)