Cja 314 Criminology: Biological Criminal Behavior

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andrea Biological Criminal Behavior Dawn Borden CJA/314 Criminology November 5, 2014 John Ferrante Some may wonder why people kill. Some people say biology plays a role in it. Others say that people kill because they want to but other will disagree and say that people kill because of the way they were raised. All cases are different, people are different. So we cannot say everyone is the same. For example someone that robs a store and ends up killing someone would be different from someone just going out killing someone, or killing someone from a disagreement. In the case of Andrea Yates, she murdered her five children by drowning them all in the bath tub in her home. Her children ranging from the ages of 6 months to 7…show more content…
Postpartum depression occurs in up to twenty percent of women who have children psychotic manifestations are much more rate, and thus much less understood. One in five hundred births result in the mother’s postpartum psychosis. Hormonal shifts can actually cause violent hallucination and thoughts, women can become incoherent, paranoid, irrational, and delusional. They are at risk of committing suicide or harming their child, particularly for the child’s own good, the woman will not recognize it as an illness. Andrea also was hospitalized for trying to kill herself with a knife in July of 1999, then in the spring of 2001 she was admitted twice to a treatment center for mental illness. But then in June 4, 2001 Andrea’s psychiatrist discontinues her medications, and on June 20, 2001 Andrea drowns her five children. On July 31, 2001 a Houston grand jury indicted Andrea Yates for capital murder in the cases of Noah, John and Mary. Since she had killed someone that was under the age of six years old and kill more than one person she was eligible for the death penalty. Andrea Yates attorneys filed for an insanity defense. They called expert witnesses to testify on the Andrea’s condition, and state of mind. The trial had lasted three weeks, but it took the jury less than three hours

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