Article February 4, 2002 Issue

A response to the Yates trial

BY Barbara M. Vining Contributing Editor

IT'S NORMAL TO ASSUME that a mother loves her children, and that because of this love, there is no safer place for them than in the care of the one who will always put a child's welfare first. That's why news that a mother has neglected or harmed her own children leaves people feeling so incredulous.

Andrea Yates, the Texas mother who admits to drowning her five small children in a bathtub last June, is a case in point.

Mrs. Yates is scheduled to be tried for capital murder. She has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity. The prosecution seeks the death penalty.

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