Yates Murder Conviction Tossed

An appeals court in Texas has overturned Andrea Yates' capital murder conviction for drowning her children.

The Texas First Court of Appeals in Houston ordered a new trial in the drownings of her children. Yates had been serving a life sentence on convictions in the 2001 drownings of three of her five children. She was not tried for the deaths of the other two children.

A three-judge panel found that the Harris County jury may have been prejudiced by the false testimony of a prosecution expert.

Yates' lawyers had argued at a hearing last month before a three-judge panel of the First Court of Appeals in Houston that psychiatrist Park Dietz was wrong when he said he consulted on an episode of the TV show "Law & Order" involving a woman found innocent by reason of insanity for drowning her children.

After jurors found Yates guilty, attorneys in the case and jurors learned no such episode existed.

"Park Dietz was the prosecution expert who came into court and told jurors that Andrea Yates was not legally insane at the time of the killings; that she didn't just snap and drown her kids," says CBSNews.com Legal Analyst Andrew Cohen. "His testimony was vital to the prosecution's case."

"We conclude that there is a reasonable likelihood that Dr. Dietz's false testimony could have affected the judgment of the jury," the court ruled. "We further conclude that Dr. Dietz's false testimony affected the substantial rights of appellant."

Within hours of Russell Yates leaving for work in June 2001, Andrea Yates called police and an ambulance to her home. She answered the door in wet clothes and told an officer what she had done.

She led the officer to a bedroom where the four youngest children's bodies were laid out on a bed. Police found the oldest, Noah, 7, floating face down with arms outstretched in the tub.

The others were John, 5, Paul, 3, Luke, 2, and 6-month-old Mary. She had called them into the bathroom and drowned them one by one.

According to testimony, Yates was overwhelmed by motherhood, considered herself a bad mother, and had attempted suicide and been hospitalized for depression.

Prosecutors acknowledged she was mentally ill but argued that she could tell right from wrong and was thus not legally insane.

The case stirred debate over the legal standard for mental illness and whether postpartum depression is properly recognized and taken seriously. Women's groups had harshly criticized prosecutors for pushing for the death penalty.

"This is a win for Yates in the sense that it may result in her being released from jail but it's not likely she is going to be free on the streets any time soon," says Cohen. "She is still severely mentally ill and on heavy medication and probably would be required to stay in a mental health facility for years and years to come."

The court ruling returns the case back for a new trial.

The appeal cited 19 errors from her 2002 trial but the court said since the false testimony issue reversed the conviction, it did not rule on the other matters.