Judge Rules Mother Sane When She Killed 3 Daughters
COMPTON (CBSLA.com) — A judge ruled on Thursday that a woman, who killed her three young daughters at her Torrance home last year, was sane at the time of the murders.
Carol Coronado faces life in prison without the possibility of parole when she is sentenced Jan. 7.
The 32-year-old was convicted of first-degree murder on Nov. 30 in a non-jury trial for the fatal stabbings her daughters, Sophia, 2, Yazmine, 16 months, and Xenia, 2 months, on May 20, 2014.
Superior Court Judge Ricardo Ocampo also found true the special circumstance allegation of multiple murders. But prosecutors decided not to seek the death penalty against Coronado.
She was acquitted of an attempted murder charge involving her mother, who found the children's bodies.
The first phase of her trial was disrupted late last month when Coronado began shouting in court and had to be physically removed from the courtroom. Testimony was put on hold while a court-appointed psychiatrist evaluated her.
Her husband, Rodolfo "Rudy" Coronado, told the judge during the trial that his wife was behaving strangely in the days leading up to the murders of their children.
He recalled he was working on his truck when his mother-in-law came out of the house screaming: "Don't go in there. She killed them."
Coronado said he ran inside and saw his daughters lying on a bed and his wife with a knife in her left hand and a blank stare. He said she told him that she loved him before stabbing herself.