Yates planned kids' deaths, deputy says

In what could be a blow to Andrea Yates' defense team's contention that Yates didn't know right from wrong when she drowned her five children in her Clear Lake home's bathtub in 2001, a deputy who interviewed Yates just after the killings testified yesterday that Yates said she planned the deaths and knew they were wrong.

Deputy Michael Stevens told jurors in Yates' capital murder retrial that he overheard Yates' interview with mental health staff the day after she arrived at the Harris County Jail. Stevens testified that Yates said she planned to kill the children the night before, saying "she had a deep impression that she should take the children to the next world." In response to a question from MHMRA Director Melissa Ferguson, Yates said "she knew what she was doing was wrong," Stevens said.

Also on Wednesday, a pediatric pathologist testified that all the Yates kids put up a fight during the drownings. Dr. Harry Wilson's testimony reinforced earlier information from a medical examiner, who testified about the same evidence of struggles June 28.

Yates has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity in her kids' deaths. Though she's never said she didn't kill them, her defense is that she didn't know right from wrong when she did it. If she is judged insane, she'll be sent to a mental hospital; if the jury decides she's sane, she will go to prison.