AP Photo/Brett Coomer, Pool, file
File – In this July 26, 2006 file photo, Andrea Yates, right, and her lawyer George Parnham stand as the verdict in her murder retrial for drowning her five children is read in Houston.
As he awaited the conclusion of a court case that lasted over five years, attorney Wendell Odom rose from his chair at the defense’s table in the Harris County Courthouse.
His client, Andrea Yates, stood to his immediate right. Then 42 years old, she had been arrested in 2001 for drowning her five children – John, Luke, Mary, Noah and Paul, who were between 6 months and 7 years old – in the bathtub of the family’s home in Clear Lake. She was convicted of capital murder a year later.
A subsequent appeal and overturned conviction, due to false testimony by an expert witness for the prosecution, led to Odom standing next to Yates one final time on July 26, 2006. She was found not guilty by reason of insanity that day.
Nearly 20 years later, the attorney can still recall the emotions that washed over him in the moment.
“It was relief and elation,” Odom said. “It was a combination that we had actually convinced the jury and the system that she wasn’t some premeditated murderer, and that also the right result had occurred.”
Saturday marks the 25th anniversary of the day Yates drowned her children and was arrested. She now is committed to the Kerrville State Hospital.
AP Photo/David J. Phillip
Russell Yates wipes his eyes as he visit the graves of his five children on the one-year anniversary of their deaths Thursday, June 20, 2002 in Houston.
The case caught the country’s attention and brought awareness to the potential horrors of maternal mental illnesses such as postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis.
Odom said it also significantly changed the way in which the criminal justice system views and approaches cases involving the mental health of mothers.
“It educated a lot of people, myself included, and today, a lot of these cases are dealt with between the district attorney and the defense attorneys,” Odom said. “Those that aren’t, when they do go to trial, there’s a whole new perception on what this type of mental illness is.”
George Parnham, Yates’ lead criminal defense attorney, and his wife Mary created the Yates Children Memorial Fund in 2001 to provide support to those suffering from maternal mental health disorders.
The fund is now supported by Postpartum Support International under the Yates Children Memorial Fund Legal Justice Program.
“It is dedicated to the proposition of trying to educate not only the public and the lawyers and judges, but also the women that are going to have pregnancies, and aren’t aware of the dangers of what postpartum can do,” Odom said.
Although Odom hasn’t seen Yates in person since the retrial nearly 20 years ago, he said he makes an effort to keep in contact with her.
He still receives Christmas cards from Yates, Odom said.