Yates’ Mother Fights Tears, Defends Daughter at Trial

Andrea Yates’ elderly mother choked back tears Tuesday while defending her daughter as a wonderful parent, and testified that her “baby daughter” was not the same woman who drowned her five children.

Jutta Kennedy took the stand in her daughter’s defense for a very brief time, providing emotional punctuation to days of testimony from psychiatric experts in Yates’ capital murder trial.

Earlier in the day, a noted psychiatrist testified for the defense that Yates knew drowning the children was illegal, but said Yates thought it was the right thing to do because it was the only way to save them from the fires of hell.

Yates, a 37-year-old former nurse and high school valedictorian, cited a long history of mental problems in pleading not guilty by reason of insanity. Yates, who could face the death penalty if convicted, has confessed to drowning her children methodically in the bathtub of their Houston home on June 20, 2001.

Kennedy has come to all of her daughter’s court dates, but this was the first time she testified.

“She’s my baby daughter,” Kennedy said, her voice catching as tears streamed down her face, when asked by defense lawyer George Parnham to describe her relationship with the defendant.

“She was a wonderful mother, a wonderful daughter,” Kennedy answered, locking eyes with her child.

Kennedy choked back tears and dabbed her eyes throughout her 10 minutes on the witness stand, while her daughter sat motionless, as she has throughout much of the trial.

Parnham also asked Kennedy about the death of her husband last year, which the defense has suggested triggered Yates’ downward mental spiral.

“She was very attached to her father,” she said. “It hit her pretty hard.”

Parnham asked Kennedy her reaction when she learned what her daughter had done.

“I didn’t believe it,” she said.

“Was this the Andrea you knew to be a loving mother?” Parnham asked.

“No,” she replied.

Prosecutors declined to ask her any questions.