Another Texas Mother wipes out her children
Posted
May 29, 2007 at
3:33 pm by
Jessica
Again. Again and again. I can hardly stand to hear another one of these stories.
Yet, another Texas mother, identified as Gilberta Estrada, brutally kills her children in a trailer home by hanging them. The twist in this case, is that she succeeded with all but the infant, who was struggling in her noose and rescued when the aunt found the family hanged. Unfortunately, the 5, 4 and 2 year old were already dead, as was the mother.
The most disgusting fact of the article that reported this horrific and tragic incidence, was the fact that this is a frequent pattern in Texas and that a portion of our society calously chooses to give these “mothers” amnesty over giving these children justice or putting abused children first:
Houston Chronicle/AP TX news: The slayings came nearly five years after another woman in Hudson Oaks killed her three children. On July 16, 2002, Dee Etta Perez, 39, shot her 4-year-old daughter and sons, ages 9 and 10, before killing herself.
Texas has seen a disturbing number of child killings by mothers in recent years.
Andrea Yates drowned her five children in the family’s Houston bathtub in 2001. In 2003, Deanna Laney beat her two young sons to death with stones in East Texas, and Lisa Ann Diaz drowned her daughters in a Plano bathtub. Dena Schlosser fatally severed her 10-month-old daughter’s arms with a kitchen knife in 2004.
All four of those women were found innocent by reason of insanity. Yates initially was convicted of capital murder, but that was overturned on appeal.
It is so uncivilized and selfish that there are adults that think that preserving the rights of adults to make the decision of whether or not their children are worthy of life, supersedes their moral obligation to protect children from heinous killers. Furthermore, it is a sad statement of the world in which we live in, that adults in our society see children as objects and of little value, especially when compared to adults. (Ah, they were just babies after all, it’s not like they were adults.)
It’s no wonder why moms keep torturing and killing their kids. Other people keep making excuses for them in order to protect their own selfish agenda - to preserve exclusive rights of adults and make children nearly invisible and worthless. Imagine if we put children first? Adults would be held accountable for them, wouldn’t they?
There is no reason for these “mothers” to second guess themselves. They are constantly being told by society that if they brutally kill their children, it’s not their fault - they’re still good people and that society really doesn’t care. It’s not as if it’s a man who raped a woman or student who shot his peers at a school, c’mon, they were just having a bad day!
The only silver lining is that the mother actually took her own life as well. At least we will have one less murdering, child abusing political pawn to ante up money for some spa-like “therapy” in which child killing advocacy groups can reward her with.
The children however, deserved better.
Tags: Gilberta-Estrada, News-&-Politics, park-county, Texas |
56 Responses to “Another Texas Mother wipes out her children”
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31. Paul
June 1, 2007 @ 8:44 am
Actually, there’s nothing defensive about Tom’s post.
And you really should let those children rest in peace. They didn’t ask you to represent them, and they are in no position to tell you to stop spewing ignorance in their names.
32. Jessica
June 1, 2007 @ 9:10 am
[quote comment="87046"]Jessica, I just feel that your outrage towards these women (and not the system that failed them) is misdirected and socially harmful. Your anger at the women themselves is not helpful in any way. You also seem to have a misunderstanding of how the law works in cases of legal insanity or the conditions of mental institiutions, and that only makes your arguments have less merit.
[/quote]
I don’t have a misunderstanding of the law. Just because some of you are offended by my very controversial position, does not make me ignorant of the facts.
I think the insanity defense is grossly abused. Since 1995, 3 states have dropped the insanity defense entirely and other states have adopted the “Guilty but mentally Ill” defense.
It’s not about displacing my anger (or misplacing as you put it). None of us are likely to change each others minds, we just see justice differently.
33. Jessica
June 1, 2007 @ 9:22 am
[quote comment="87058"]
And you really should let those children rest in peace. They didn’t ask you to represent them, and they are in no position to tell you to stop spewing ignorance in their names.[/quote]
You can say that about all child advocates.
34. Petulant Pixie
June 1, 2007 @ 9:39 am
[quote comment="87072"]
You can say that about all child advocates.[/quote]
Well, no. There is sense in representing the live ones, because they can be helped. The dead ones are already dead, and need no further help.
In these cases the best way to advocate for the live children is to ensure their safety, right? And we can do that by making sure their mothers get the help they need so that the kids are safe.
Which three states have dropped the insanity defense? And how does the “guilty but mentally ill” sentencing differ?
35. Petulant Pixie
June 1, 2007 @ 9:40 am
And I STILL can’t figure out the quote thing. Honestly, I’m not stupid, just always and forever hurried.
36. Paul
June 1, 2007 @ 9:46 am
“I think the insanity defense is grossly abused.”
You keep making these ridiculous and unsupportable statements. The insanity defense is extremely difficult to prove and is rarely upheld, let along “grossly abused.” You appear to be making this up, like most of the other facts on which you claim to be relying.
And this isn’t about seeing justice diffently, as you continue to assert. That’s plain lazy. The least you can do is get your facts straight and draw reasonable conclusions from them. You haven’t even made an attempt to do that. And then you claim the dead children would want you to represent them. I’m horrified.
37. Jessica
June 1, 2007 @ 11:09 am
[quote comment="87077"]
Which three states have dropped the insanity defense? And how does the “guilty but mentally ill” sentencing differ?[/quote]
The three states that have dropped the insanity defense are Montana, Idaho and Utah. Now, before you go off on how intellectually inferior the people that live there are…
The more appropriate provision, in my opinion, is the 20 other states that have adopted the “Guilty but mentally ill” provisions.
From pbs.org:
A defendant who receives a GBMI verdict is sentenced in the same way as if he were found guilty. The court then determines whether and to what extent he requires treatment for mental illness. When, and if, the defendant is deemed “cured” of his mental illness, he is required to serve out the rest of his sentence, unlike an insanity-defense acquittee who would be released from psychiatric commitment once he is deemed to be no longer dangerous.
38. Jessica
June 1, 2007 @ 11:15 am
[quote comment="87085"]“I think the insanity defense is grossly abused.”
You keep making these ridiculous and unsupportable statements. The insanity defense is extremely difficult to prove and is rarely upheld, let along “grossly abused.” You appear to be making this up, like most of the other facts on which you claim to be relying.[/quote]
Can we please get away from the ‘I don’t agree with you so you’re so stupid’ arguments? Really. It’s pretty lame.
Anyway, you are correct in that the insanity plea is rarely used for general felonies. I’m focusing on women who murder their young children however and the pleas they enter. In those cases I do believe that the insanity defense is grossly abused. That’s what we’re talking about here - mothers that brutally kill their children, right?
39. Paul
June 1, 2007 @ 12:43 pm
You said: “I’m focusing on women who murder their young children however and the pleas they enter. In those cases I do believe that the insanity defense is grossly abused.”
How many cases have there been? Two? So two cases where the women were severely and obviously psychotic, you believe the insanity defense was “grossly abused.” Then how could it have been used in a manner that wasn’t “abuse,” gross or otherwise?
It seems that what you are really objecting to is the use of the insanity defense, not the abuse, and certainly not the gross abuse. But in your hysteria to prove to everyone how offended you are by the death of children - as if you are the only one who noticed that children have been tragically killed - your rhetoric has become so overheated that you can’t seem to say what you mean. Notice that I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt; I’m assuming you can say what you mean when you’re not hysterical.
In addition, you refuse to acknowledge that Andrea Yates has or had a severe psychological disorder. Until you do that, nothing else you say can be taken seriously. And please, please, for the love of God, stop making reference to that idiotic documentary that you claim proves Andrea Yates murdered her children to get back at her husband. You’ve made some ridiculous arguments in these posts, but that one takes the cake.
40. JayMonster
June 1, 2007 @ 2:26 pm
Who was it crying for fact checking? In this post alone there are more than two that have used the “insanity” defense (I am generalizing to avoid the nitpicking on what it is called in each case.
While I do not agree with Jessica’s conclusions of how society has given these women “a pass” (fill in amnesty, or whatever term you prefer, again, I am talking generally), I also am of the opinion that in these types of cases (and please feel free to go to Google News and do some research of your own of how often it has happened), the “automatic” defense has been to claim some form of “mental incapacity.”
That being said, when a child is dead, somebody should be held accountable, to some degree. There are obviously things being missed here that allows these atrocities to occur and somebody should be charged for that negligence. That however is more a “feeling” as a parent than anything worthy of a legal opinion.
Yes PPD is a serious and debilitating problem. However, where the hell is everybody else in this person’s life? Are there no symptoms of problems (not that you could predict that they would do the heinous things that these women did, but still there are signs that something is amiss).
And finally Jessica, I think you are far too hard on “society” in these cases. To me, any woman capable of killing their child is (in my opinion, not a legal one obviously) “freakin’ nuts” and does in fact need help. Long Term Help that would probably be better served in a mental hospital than a prison. Thus I don’t think that sending them to prison would serve as a “deterrent” to make somebody who is not “of sound mind” to “think twice”
It is unfortunate. It is maddening. But I don’t think it is by any stretch as neatly packaged as you seem to believe.
41. Jessica
June 1, 2007 @ 3:20 pm
[quote comment="87154"]
And finally Jessica, I think you are far too hard on “society” in these cases. To me, any woman capable of killing their child is (in my opinion, not a legal one obviously) “freakin’ nuts” and does in fact need help. Long Term Help that would probably be better served in a mental hospital than a prison. Thus I don’t think that sending them to prison would serve as a “deterrent” to make somebody who is not “of sound mind” to “think twice”.[/quote]
I’ve already said it but I guess it bears repeating — that is why I believe the more appropriiate provision is “Guilty by reason of insanity”. (See above)
Also, I will repeat the following again as well: It’s not completely about being a deterrent, it’s about retribution and holding people accountable for their actions (regardless of their sanity), IMO.
The reason I throw society into the camp of child killer apologists is becasue it seems to me to be the more popular opinion, no? Most people think that in cases like Andrea Yates, that it wasn’t her fault. This is my blog and I hold a different opinion on the matter, controversial as it may be.
42. Paul
June 1, 2007 @ 3:48 pm
“Most people think…it wasn’t her fault..”
Most people aren’t looking at it in such simplistic terms. You keep returning to these childish notions of blame and fault. Most of us think that’s irrelevant and have determined that Andrea Yates was suffering from a severe psychological disorder, she should be held in a psychiatric hospital, and that the woefully inadequate access to mental health services needs to be remedied in order to prevent future occurances. You, on the other hand, are far more interested in puritanical condemnation and retribution, neither of which addresses any of the most important issues.
And “child killer apologists”? Please. It’s long past time to give that nonsense a rest.
43. Petulant Pixie
June 1, 2007 @ 4:24 pm
“And “child killer apologists”? Please. It’s long past time to give that nonsense a rest.”
Yes, and we’ve been through that before, the generalized angry statements about liberals and whoever has an opinion different than yours. It is tiresome. Really, do you think I’m a “child killer apologist”? Do you think that I don’t care about the welfare and protection of children? Honestly, after all these years, do you think that I put the protection of adults before the protection of children?
As far as the “guilty but mentally ill” concept, I think it’s moot. Really, either a person is culpable for their actions or they’re not. A person who is significantly mentally retarded would not be culpable for certain crimes. Nor should people suffering from certain mental illnesses. The idea of having a prison sentence to serve when the person is stabalized is just to pacify people who feel justice needs to be served. A person who is determined to be truly legally insane and suffering from a true psychotic condition prompting a murder would never be deemed able to serve a prison sentence. That person would spend the rest of their days in a mental institution. That’s like condemning a mentally retarted person to serve a prison sentence once thier IQ is raised to normal. It isn’t going to happen. But, if having that available makes you happy, then so be it. It makes no difference in the outcome of the sentencing though.
44. Allison
June 1, 2007 @ 5:04 pm
Why does it always have to come down to the safe argument of “resources weren’t available”? People need to be held accountable for their actions! Could you imagine the pain the children felt while hanging to their deaths? Or the pain of losing air and eventually gasping in water in Andrea Yatets’ bathtub!? Right is right. Wrong is wrong. If you don’t want to go to prison, don’t murder your kids. If you have post-partum depression after your kids are born, go to your OB or family practitioner. What, does her small town not have a doctor, a babyitter, a 911 system? If you feel like you just might kill your kids, call the police!!!!!!!!!
Why is the argument always “the system failed these mothers”? Is the system supposed to read their inner-most thoughts, and promptly send out a unit to untie the nooses or drain the bath water? Yeah, I think I saw that movie Minority Report.
And Paul, you seem to want to chew up the opinions of the blog poster, yet you’re not really making your own opinion known here. At least Petulant Pixie can tell the poster, “I disagree. Now here’s my take on it.” What do you think should happen to these mothers? Let ‘em walk free so they can meet a new man, breed his kids and kill them too? Or Jessica right, you just come here to say “Your facts are wrong and I disagree so you’re just dumb.”
45. Paul
June 1, 2007 @ 7:34 pm
You must not have read all of my posts Allison.
I believe Andrea Yates will spend the rest of her life in a mental institution. Nobody who has ever been found legally insane in a murder trial has ever been released from one. In addition, malpractice insurance contracts issued to psychiatrists do not cover decisions of doctors to release such patients, which means that any doctor signing off on her release would be personally liable in the event she hurt someone. I don’t believe there are any doctors willing to take that risk. There never has been before. And all this is ok by me.
I have no interest in retribution. As Paul Newman said, “revenge is for suckers.” I also have no interest in blame. Whether Andrea Yates was at fault is meaningless to me. I’m more interested in increasing the accessibility of mental health services, particularly for women who suffer from post-partem psychosis, which I believe is driving all of these ghastly incidents of mothers killing their children. I don’t think these women are rational when they commit these acts - that seems obvious - so fear of retribution is not going to be a deterrant.
The key is making mental health services readily available and increasing awareness of the severity and the frequency of the illness. It’s a lot more common than people want to acknowledge. I also think we need to be more understanding of mental illness in general. These people aren’t monsters. They are human beings with chemical imbalances that are treatable with medication and therapy. By demonizing them it seems like we are deterring people from seeking treatment, which only compounds the problem. Until these things are done, I’m afraid we may see more of these chilling incidents.
I’ve been banned from this site, so this will be my last post. Carry on, but please, try to do it with a little more understanding. Compassion is not a four letter word, and it’s not a liberal v. conservative thing either. Children’s lives depend on it.
46. Prescott
June 1, 2007 @ 9:30 pm
[quote comment="87217"]I’ve been banned from this site, so this will be my last post.[/quote]
Right, because people that are “banned” from a site are usually allowed to make a farewell comment. What a crock of shit, you have not been “banned” by anyone here.
My god, are you a drama queen.
47. TomCat
June 1, 2007 @ 9:45 pm
Prescott,
Didn’t you trace his posts back to his computer and then respond with this:
“Ha! Slightly overcooking my steak gives me more fits than you do, Paul.
Now go back to reading Department of Labor regulations like a good boy. Do the senior partners know you’re wasting time commenting on silly parenting blogs?”
Isn’t that a threat to tell his employer that he was spending time on this site during work? Is that different than banning him? Do you trace all of our posts?
48. Prescott
June 1, 2007 @ 10:32 pm
I didn’t “trace” anything. When someone comments on a blog they leave a clear footprint. When you do it from work, especially a company that has its own servers, it’s left by a size 16 shoe.
What I said doesn’t constitute a “threat” except to the most incredibly paranoid. Perhaps, rather, it should serve as a caution to trolls antagonizing random people on their blogs as someday you may run across someone that’s a bit less dispassionate about a debate than I am.
49. TomCat
June 1, 2007 @ 10:34 pm
[quote comment="87205"]Right is right. Wrong is wrong. If you don’t want to go to prison, don’t murder your kids. If you have post-partum depression after your kids are born, go to your OB or family practitioner. What, does her small town not have a doctor, a babyitter, a 911 system? If you feel like you just might kill your kids, call the police!!!!!!!!!
[/quote]
Those would be the actions of a rational person. The problem is, women with post pratem psycosis, which is different from post partem depression, don’t think rationally. Also, the mother in the trailer park probably didn’t have health insurance or a family practioner. Huge problem. So it isn’t as simple as right is right and wrong is wrong.
50. TomCat
June 1, 2007 @ 10:41 pm
[quote comment="87271"]What I said doesn’t constitute a “threat” except to the most incredibly paranoid. Perhaps, rather, it should serve as a caution to trolls antagonizing random people on their blogs as someday you may run across someone that’s a bit less dispassionate about a debate than I am.[/quote]
Looks an awful lot like a threat. Even with the explanation, because he wasn’t antagonizing random people. He was antagonizing your wife.
51. Prescott
June 1, 2007 @ 10:54 pm
Random people, genius, in that Paul nor you are regular commenters on this blog (and probably safe to assume not regular readers, either).
Oooh, do you think you’re revealing a big secret that Jessica is my wife? What’s your relationship to Paul? Significant other? Roommate? Sock puppet?
Want to also add, thanks you guys, this is the most fun I’ve had in weeks.
52. Petulant Pixie
June 2, 2007 @ 4:40 am
Huh. I didn’t think they were antagonizing. I thought they found fault with Jessica’s argument. If she isn’t interested in hearing that, maybe she should take the “leave a comment” option away.
53. Prescott
June 2, 2007 @ 7:23 am
[quote comment="87354"]If she isn’t interested in hearing that, maybe she should take the “leave a comment” option away.[/quote]
Who said anything about not wanting to hear dissenting comments? Nobody was “banned” in either theory or reality, so I don’t know how you are forming that opinion.
54. Petulant Pixie
June 2, 2007 @ 9:13 am
I’m forming that opinion based on you saying this: “Perhaps, rather, it should serve as a caution to trolls antagonizing random people on their blogs as someday you may run across someone that’s a bit less dispassionate about a debate than I am.”
Certainly implying that Paul’s statements were “antagonizing”, when from I saw all he did was disagree with Jessica’s arguments. Then that thing that you posted about where he works? I dunno. I mean, if he were a threat to you, I could see doing that. But, in the context of what I’ve seen, that was just bad form. So, I say again, if you are gonna go that low when someone disagrees with the arguments in the blog, then just don’t have a comments section. Save yourself the hassle.
55. Jessica
June 2, 2007 @ 9:34 am
Nope, PP, we’re keeping the comments section. Dissenting arguments are welcome here.
Although I never mentioned any objection to any poster on this thread (to Prescott), besides perhaps “troll”, Tomcat even admitted that Paul was antongizing me, he/she said, “He was antongonzing your wife.” (see above) But anyway, that was Prescott’s call alone, although being on the other side of the blog (admin), I understand why he did it. I’m not going to argue about the calls of the administrators however. If anyone wants to stick with the OP, please feel free to do so going forward, pro or con.
56. Emilia Liz
June 2, 2007 @ 2:07 pm
There was an interesting article by a woman named Cathy Young on the idea of retribution in the justice system. In her view, the purpose of retribution is to make a perpetrator pay for his or her crime. In the case of someone who is mentally ill, however, the person may not have awareness that what he or she did was wrong, so retribution would not be relevant.
In the case of the woman who killed her children, it remains to be seen whether the court judges her as mentally ill. If she is, I don’t think she should be made to “pay” for her crimes by going to prison for life, but I do believe society has a responsibility to protect future potential victims (and possibly herself) from her actions. To me, this would mean a.) keeping her in a mental institution for life, and b.) sterilizing her or at least making her use long-acting contraceptives so that she does not have any more children. It is clear she is incapable of raising children, so her future offspring have to be protected.
On the other hand, if she is not insane, she should be put in prison for life (and sterilized, because she could get pregnant by a guard, a male visitor, etcetera). But the idea is: in the case of sane criminal, society has a duty to both protect the public from his or her actions and make him or her pay for the crime(s) he or she has committed. In the case of an insane criminal, only the first duty would exist.
Anyway, just my two cents.