Mother who drowned children said 'she finally did it'

Andrea Yates, the mother who drowned her five children in the bathtub, called her husband at work that day to say ‘‘she finally did it,’’ a jury at her murder trial in Texas was told.

Russell Yates went home after getting the call last June, and police Sergeant David Svahn testified that he was the first officer to encounter Yates as the young father ran up to the house in Houston.

‘‘He was screaming and hollering,’’ Svahn testified. ‘‘He was saying, ‘What did she do to my kids? What did she do to my kids?’’’

Svahn said he had the grim task of informing Yates that his children - aged six months to seven years - were dead.

‘‘At that point he fell to the ground and began hitting his hand on the ground,’’ Svahn said. The father then picked up a plastic chair from the yard and threw it, the officer said.

Andrea Yates, 37, is charged with murder and could face the death penalty. She has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity.

Yates’ extensive medical records detail her bouts with depression and two suicide attempts. They also show her fear that she might hurt someone and a doctor’s caution that the couple reconsider having more children.

On June 20, Russell Yates ‘‘said his wife had called him at work and told him it was time to come home,’’ Svahn testified. ‘‘His wife told him she had hurt all five of the kids and that she finally did it.’’

The jury was also shown the pyjamas the five children wore that day, including the purple sleeper worn by their six-month-old daughter Mary and the blue and white pyjamas worn by her seven-year-old brother Noah.

During the display, Yates sat at the defence table and wiped her face as her lawyer, Wendell Odom, tried to comfort her.

George Parnham, another of Yates’s lawyers, objected to the ‘‘parade’’ of clothing, which he said prejudiced the jury against Yates.

But prosecutor Joe Owmby said the display was necessary to show the size of each of the children.