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American Morning

Lawyers Getting Ready for Next Phase of Yates Murder Trial

Aired March 13, 2002 - 09:08   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Lawyers are getting ready for the next phase of the Andrea Yates murder trial. Yesterday, the jury convicted her of capital murder.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: In cause number 880205, the state of Texas versus Andrea Pia Yates, we the jury find the defendant Andrea Pia Yates guilty of capital murder as charged in the indictment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZAHN: The jury deliberated for less than four hours, clearly rejecting her insanity defense. The question facing jurors now is whether Andrea Yates should pay for drowning her children with her own life.

Joining us now for a look at what's ahead and what happened inside the courtroom yesterday, reporter Anne Gesalman, who has been covering the trial for "Newsweek."

Welcome back.

ANNE GESALMAN, "NEWSWEEK" REPORTER: Good morning.

ZAHN: OK, Anne, let's review what happened yesterday. I know you weren't terribly surprised by the verdict, but help us understand the significance what the jurors asked for during their short deliberation.

GESALMAN: Sure, I think what the jurors asked for was very telling of what their verdict was going to be. The first thing they asked for were for all of the exhibits, which is fairly standard in a long case like this. But the second thing they asked for was a clarification, or a redefinition, if you will, of the insanity defense, of the insanity law, which was a little bit curious, because they had that already back there with them.

But the third thing they asked for was for a tape recorder. They already had the cassette tapes and the videotapes back there, but they wanted a tape recorder, and the only two audio tapes they had back there were the 911 call that Mrs. Yates made to police on morning of drowning and then her confession tape that she made to a police detective just a couple of hours after. So those were strong pieces of state's evidence, and reviewing those clearly pretty fully. And so it sort of did look like they were giving some close scrutiny to these key pieces of evidence.

ZAHN: Describe to us what happened in the courtroom, then, when the guilty verdict was ultimately reached. Tell us who you could see, and what sort of emotions they might have betrayed.

GESALMAN: Paula, it was just a very tense, tense moment. I mean, the buildup to this had been eight months of a lot of legal wrangling. The families for Andrea, her mother and her siblings, were on one side of the courtroom, and her husband, and his mother and aunts were on the other side of the courtroom. And when the guilty verdicts were read by Judge Hill, there was a real sense of surprise, not so much that it was guilty, but that it was guilty so quickly, that the thinking had been that if the jury did return with a quick verdict, that that would be indication of acquittal.

So I think for that reason specifically, it was just a very surprising moment. And there was a lot of emotion. The judge had admonished the courtroom observers not to show any emotion, and Rusty Yates sat with -- was sitting, and sat down right away, and just buried his heads in his hands and could be heard saying oh, God, and then began to cry. Her mother was less emotional, but we understand that shortly after become so. So it was a very emotional time.

Andrea herself glanced at her mother and her brothers, and tried to sort of offer a weak smile, but it quickly decinigrated into a long face and then tears. We're told back in the cell, she was quite upset.

ZAHN: And of course her attorneys were very upset by the turn this verdict took. And Wendell Odom, who was one of Andrea's attorneys, had this to say about the next phase of the trial.

Let's listen in.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

WENDELL ODOM, YATES' DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, I'm not happy. But it's the verdict, and now we go to the next stage.

QUESTION: Was your client prepared for this?

ODOM: Yes. Yes.

QUESTION: She was?

QUESTION: How do you get prepared for something like this?

ODOM: You take a deep breath and you think about the thoughts you thought about going into it, and you start all over again.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ZAHN: All right, let's talk about starting all over again here, as the Sentencing phase gets under way tomorrow. What kind of case does Andrea's Lawyer have to continue to try to rebuild here?

GESALMAN: Well, Andrea's lawyers will undoubtedly put forward more evidence that she was or has suffered for a long time from mental illness. We expect also for a number of family members to take the stand. Rusty Yates himself has said that if offered to give what's called in Texas a victim impact statement, he would like to address the jury.

Typically, this is time when the jury will hear from a victim, pleading for, you know, a strong sentence. But in this case, we expect Rusty to say that he hopes that his wife's life will be spare. We expect to be -- just lots of more emotion in the next couple of days, particularly from the defense side. On the state side, we're not sure what witnesses we'll put forth. Joe Owmby already indicated during voir dire that the would have offered a life sentence in exchange for a guilty plea, even before testimony began. So it will be interesting to see what evidence they do put forth at this point.

ZAHN: Before we let you go, we have had a number of legal analyst this morning on, who indicate they believe the jury knows exactly what they want to have happen to Andrea Yates. Do you believe they've made up their minds?

GESALMAN: You know, it's always so hard to guess what a jury might do. I will say, though, that there is very strong evidence that her mental illness would be what's call a mitigating factor in Texas. Even the prosecutor himself during voir dire, in individual questioning of the jurors before they were selected for the panel, suggested to them, that this would be the phase during which they would -- should give the most weight to mental illness. He said would not be something to consider during the guilt or innocence phase of trial, but certainly during punishment. He almost encouraged them to consider it. They may be swayed in this direction, but again, we'll just have to wait and see in the next couple of days.

ZAHN: Well, as always, we learn an awful lot from you.

Anne Gesalman, thank you for joining us on A.M. And we'd like to check with you on the sentencing phase. Thank you. Take care.

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