Darlie Routier

[Glasgowghirl]

1 hour ago, Dreadcrumbs said:

I think of those kind of murderers and people like Andrea Yates fall into categories that probably don't make up the vast majority of murderers.

ETA: No idea what I think of Darlie. But the emphasis on her appearance during the trial and the jurors watching that silly string video over and over and letting it sway them? Ridiculous. 

That is why I'm on the fence about her, she could be guilty but the evidence used in court was not enough to convict her and definitely not enough to put her on death row.

 

[adidas]

@Aine and @Briefly (and any other I missed - my apologies). The sock DNA evidence was given at the trial. 

Go to page 13, from point/line 16. It is the testimony of Judith Floyd, Forensic laboratory supervisor at Gene Screen in Dallas. She testified at the trial for the State.

edit - something is wonky with the link sorry. Click the blank space to read the trial transcript. 

Edited July 26, 2019 by adidas

[Blahblah]

So why are they pinning so much hope on the sock if it has already tested against her?

As for the injuries to Darlie, all the nonsense about “it was so close to the carotid artery” being a reason why it was not self-inflicted is garbage. Unless she was a trained surgeon she would have had zero idea where precisely she was sticking a knife. Whether she came close to her carotid or not was just luck.

I agree it was a bad trial but I think the outcome was correct.

I’m assuming most, if not all, people here visit Websleuths.

[Briefly]

11 hours ago, Blahblah said:

So why are they pinning so much hope on the sock if it has already tested against her?

As for the injuries to Darlie, all the nonsense about “it was so close to the carotid artery” being a reason why it was not self-inflicted is garbage. Unless she was a trained surgeon she would have had zero idea where precisely she was sticking a knife. Whether she came close to her carotid or not was just luck.

I agree it was a bad trial but I think the outcome was correct.

I’m assuming most, if not all, people here visit Websleuths.

The sock has been sent of for dna testing again, probably because the science of dna testing has improved so much since then.  The defense is pinning everything on the dna test exonerating her based solely on the sock.  Results are expected sometime this year.

I have the same thoughts as far as her injuries, I do think that it is self-inflicted.  I think she is guilty.  I've gone back and forth but after re-watching Forensic Files for the billionth time and also looking up a lot of stuff online, I think that she did it.  But yes, it was a bad trial and the silly string video has a lot to do with that.

[Blahblah]

@Briefly I always go back to Occam’s Razor. If she didn’t do it, what evidence is there that anyone else did? A stranger would have left some sort of trace of themselves.

Her story is garbage and here are some reasons why:

- a fatally wounded child with punctured lungs and liver managed to tiptoe over to her, waking her up. 

- she was asleep on the sofa but her nightgown had cast-off blood on it

- no blood on the sofa where she says she was attacked

- her 911 call where she breaks off and snaps at her husband that an intruder did it “I promise”. Who says that?

- evidence of staging - eg the tipped over vacuum cleaner which was on top of blood stains.

-evidence of clean up at the sink.

-an intruder who deeply stabs small children multiple times but leaves an adult with only a fairly superficial neck wound with hesitation marks around it. (Again, it being near the carotid was luck not planning).

-her testimony where she repeatedly replies “I don’t remember”.

 

The defenders who say that they can’t believe that a mother could do that to their own children need to take a look at the number of mums in gaol all over the world who have done exactly that. 

 

 

[adidas]

@Blahblah I agree. I read something once and just did some searching to find it again - it was quoted at webseuths.

"If Ms. Routier didn't commit this crime, what a fortunate assailant there must be running around this desolate Texas neighborhood. He goes in and brutally murders two children. He slashes their mother's throat as they're struggling face to face. He drops the knife and she wipes off his prints. He runs away, but leaves Darlie alive - the one woman who could identify him, and send him to the gas chamber. Then, d'oh, she gets amnesia and can't remember what he looks like. This must be the luckiest child killer in the universe”

[nelliebelle1197]

@Palimpsest Andrea Yates was also Quiverfull and fundie...

[JermajestyDuggar]

Motive isn’t an issue for me in her case. I think being overwhelmed and possible PPD exacerbating her feeling overwhelmed could be motive enough. I’ve seen cases where there was less motive. I think she’s where she needs to be. In prison.

[JenniferJuniper]

I think she's probably guilty, but that sock has always been troubling to me.  My understanding is that it was 75 yards away if on foot.  If it was planted, this means Darlie would have had to have run a football field and a half in order to plant it that night.   

How'd she do that?

She shouldn't have been convicted because of the silly string or the lifestyle.  And I believe she primarily was.  But I also agree that her story is bizarre and implausible. 

But how'd she get that sock there?

 

[Palimpsest]

15 hours ago, nelliebelle1197 said:

@Palimpsest Andrea Yates was also Quiverfull and fundie...

I know, but I was trying to spare everyone my 99th rant on Rusty Yates criminal irresponsibility for 1) insisting on even more babies when he had been told Andrea had postpartum psychosis with previous pregnancies, 2) insisting that she discontinued meds on several occasions even though she had suicidal ideation, and 3) leaving Andrea unsupervised with the children against the advice of her doctor and to her own mother's horror.

Rusty is also culpable.  IMO.

[Briefly]

2 hours ago, Palimpsest said:

I know, but I was trying to spare everyone my 99th rant on Rusty Yates criminal irresponsibility for 1) insisting on even more babies when he had been told Andrea had postpartum psychosis with previous pregnancies, 2) insisting that she discontinued meds on several occasions even though she had suicidal ideation, and 3) leaving Andrea unsupervised with the children against the advice of her doctor and to her own mother's horror.

Rusty is also culpable.  IMO.

Yes, Rusty is culpable.  Which does not mean that he deserved to die, but she was in a horrible situation and her mental illness issues were made so much worse by the way he treated her.  I can't remember the name, but her story was covered in one of Ann Rule's anthologies and there were details about how bad he treated her and the kids.  She probably felt pushed to the wall and like she had no other option but to strike back.

[Palimpsest]

2 hours ago, Briefly said:

Yes, Rusty is culpable.  Which does not mean that he deserved to die, but she was in a horrible situation and her mental illness issues were made so much worse by the way he treated her.  I can't remember the name, but her story was covered in one of Ann Rule's anthologies and there were details about how bad he treated her and the kids. 

 

The way you wrote this confused me but I've stumbled over my fingers too.  Frequently. 

Rusty Yates did not die.  And he was never charged with anything.  I think he should have been charged with criminal negligence, but I am not a lawyer.  If he had been charged I think he should have done time.  He was culpable in the deaths of his children.  IMO.

Rusty's testimony in Andrea's trials (both the original trial and appeal) was to play the dumbfuck ignorant hick who blamed medical professionals for their ebil meds and failure to explain to him properly that Andrea's serious illness made her dangerous to herself and others.  Rusty failed to blame his own religion and assholery.

My response to that is FU, Randy Rusty.  How dare you!  You were demonstrably Fucked Up QF Fundie.  You treated Andrea unbelievably badly, and pressured her to have more children due to your Fucked Up Patriarchal QF Fundie beliefs.

Rusty is still very much alive and kicking.  He divorced Andrea on the "Christian" grounds of desertion (I mean, gee, Andrea is in prison or inpatient mental hospital and can't live with you or satisfy your sexual and procreative needs.) and remarried. 

He is now divorced from wife #2.  Probably a happy escape for wife #2.  I hope the kid from that marriage is ok.

2 hours ago, Briefly said:

She probably felt pushed to the wall and like she had no other option but to strike back.

Andrea did not "strike back." No spousal revenge motives seem to have been present, even the jury rejected that.   And it was a TX jury.  My apologies to all right minded Texans among us - but TX juries usually stink!

In terms of motive -- to Andrea was a mercy killing.  Her children were possessed by Satan and she was an inadequate and sinful mother.  She was psychotic.

Andrea stood trial for capital murder in a death penalty state.  She was convicted but escaped Death Row because apparently jury and judge understood that her mental illness was a mitigating factor.

Andrea Yates had preexisting diagnoses of postpartum depression, postpartum psychosis, and schizophrenia.  And preexisting diagnoses of suicidal and homicidal ideation. 

Did the medical professionals make mistakes?   Yes.  They mistakenly trusted Randy Rusty to supervise her and protect his children.

 Rusty Yates left Andrea unsupervised with his children.  Against all medical advise.  And common sense.  

On appeal, Andrea's sentence was revised to not guilty by reason of insanity.  That moved her from general prison population to a low security mental hospital, where she (we all hope)  gets better treatment and therapy.

Should she ever be set free?   Well, not yet.  Apparently she still thinks she did the right thing.

To what extent does Fundamentalist Christianity play a part in this psychosis?   I do not know,  But I suspect that it exacerbated her illness. 

And I will end this by reiterating that the vast majority of people with mental illness do not commit terrible crimes.  Andrea Yates is an outlier.  And her crimes could probably have been prevented.

Edited July 28, 2019 by Palimpsest

[Blahblah]

I find this site to be very informative. It compares Darlie’s claims and statements to actual evidence and court transcripts. 

http://www.darlieroutierfactandfiction.com/introduction-2/

[mstee]

I feel stupid but I didn’t realize that they had a baby, too. It wasn’t in the special I watched. I wonder how he’s doing today. 

[Blahblah]

14 minutes ago, mstee said:

I feel stupid but I didn’t realize that they had a baby, too. It wasn’t in the special I watched. I wonder how he’s doing today. 

I read that he was passed around to various carers but was allowed to visit Darlie regularly and still does. He was diagnosed with leukaemia in his teens but recovered. You might find this interesting:

https://forensicfilesnow.com/index.php/2018/07/06/drake-routier-4-things-to-know-about-darlie-routiers-son/

[AmazonGrace]

What a colossal mindfuck it must be to go to prison visits with somebody who murdered your siblings and attempts to play mom now. 

[Briefly]

23 hours ago, Palimpsest said:

The way you wrote this confused me but I've stumbled over my fingers too.  Frequently. 

Rusty Yates did not die.  And he was never charged with anything.  I think he should have been charged with criminal negligence, but I am not a lawyer.  If he had been charged I think he should have done time.  He was culpable in the deaths of his children.  IMO.

Rusty's testimony in Andrea's trials (both the original trial and appeal) was to play the dumbfuck ignorant hick who blamed medical professionals for their ebil meds and failure to explain to him properly that Andrea's serious illness made her dangerous to herself and others.  Rusty failed to blame his own religion and assholery.

My response to that is FU, Randy Rusty.  How dare you!  You were demonstrably Fucked Up QF Fundie.  You treated Andrea unbelievably badly, and pressured her to have more children due to your Fucked Up Patriarchal QF Fundie beliefs.

Rusty is still very much alive and kicking.  He divorced Andrea on the "Christian" grounds of desertion (I mean, gee, Andrea is in prison or inpatient mental hospital and can't live with you or satisfy your sexual and procreative needs.) and remarried. 

He is now divorced from wife #2.  Probably a happy escape for wife #2.  I hope the kid from that marriage is ok.

Andrea did not "strike back." No spousal revenge motives seem to have been present, even the jury rejected that.   And it was a TX jury.  My apologies to all right minded Texans among us - but TX juries usually stink!

In terms of motive -- to Andrea was a mercy killing.  Her children were possessed by Satan and she was an inadequate and sinful mother.  She was psychotic.

Andrea stood trial for capital murder in a death penalty state.  She was convicted but escaped Death Row because apparently jury and judge understood that her mental illness was a mitigating factor.

Andrea Yates had preexisting diagnoses of postpartum depression, postpartum psychosis, and schizophrenia.  And preexisting diagnoses of suicidal and homicidal ideation. 

Did the medical professionals make mistakes?   Yes.  They mistakenly trusted Randy Rusty to supervise her and protect his children.

 Rusty Yates left Andrea unsupervised with his children.  Against all medical advise.  And common sense.  

On appeal, Andrea's sentence was revised to not guilty by reason of insanity.  That moved her from general prison population to a low security mental hospital, where she (we all hope)  gets better treatment and therapy.

Should she ever be set free?   Well, not yet.  Apparently she still thinks she did the right thing.

To what extent does Fundamentalist Christianity play a part in this psychosis?   I do not know,  But I suspect that it exacerbated her illness. 

And I will end this by reiterating that the vast majority of people with mental illness do not commit terrible crimes.  Andrea Yates is an outlier.  And her crimes could probably have been prevented.

I was confusing Andrea Yates with someone else then, the woman I am thinking about killed her husband and then took the children and ran.  But now that I have had time to think about it, Andrea Yates is the woman (in Houston?) who drowned her children.  I will try to remember the name of the person I'm thinking about.

I do agree, Andrea Yates did need help and she did not get it.  I hope she gets it now.

9 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

What a colossal mindfuck it must be to go to prison visits with somebody who murdered your siblings and attempts to play mom now. 

He is on record as saying that he does not believe she did it, he thinks she's innocent.

[EmainMacha]

@Briefly I think the woman you're thinking of is Mary Winkler. She shot her husband and fled with her three daughters 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Winkler

[adidas]

On 7/28/2019 at 4:21 AM, JenniferJuniper said:

I think she's probably guilty, but that sock has always been troubling to me.  My understanding is that it was 75 yards away if on foot.  If it was planted, this means Darlie would have had to have run a football field and a half in order to plant it that night.   

How'd she do that?

She shouldn't have been convicted because of the silly string or the lifestyle.  And I believe she primarily was.  But I also agree that her story is bizarre and implausible. 

But how'd she get that sock there?

 

IMO she didn’t. I think her husband planted it.

Rusty Yates should be in prison for how he set Andrea up. She didn’t just have post partum depression, she had post partum psychosis! She needed 24/7 support and to never be left alone. Those children would still be alive if Rusty had followed the doctor’s orders. It makes me furious.

[Briefly]

14 hours ago, adidas said:

IMO she didn’t. I think her husband planted it.

Rusty Yates should be in prison for how he set Andrea up. She didn’t just have post partum depression, she had post partum psychosis! She needed 24/7 support and to never be left alone. Those children would still be alive if Rusty had followed the doctor’s orders. It makes me furious.

Now that I am clear on who we're talking about, thank you @EmainMacha, I agree.  She had well known, documented issues and her husband had to have known better.  I know that people can be in extreme denial, but I don't think anyone can be that deep!

[JenniferJuniper]

17 hours ago, adidas said:

IMO she didn’t. I think her husband planted it.

Okay.  So when in all this mess did he plant it?  

Do you think both parents agreed that the little boys should be murdered in their sleep (but not the baby)?  Or do you think Darin sometime after the mayhem decided it would be a good thing to cover for the murderer of his sons?

I'm seriously not being snarky.  If I were on her jury at a re-trial I would not convict unless someone explained how that bloody sock ended up a football field and a half away (round trip).  And if the story doesn't involve Darlie doing it, I'd want an explanation as to why someone who was not the murderer would bother to do such a thing.

[nausicaa]

1 hour ago, JenniferJuniper said:

Okay.  So when in all this mess did he plant it?  

Do you think both parents agreed that the little boys should be murdered in their sleep (but not the baby)?  Or do you think Darin sometime after the mayhem decided it would be a good thing to cover for the murderer of his sons?

I'm seriously not being snarky.  If I were on her jury at a re-trial I would not convict unless someone explained how that bloody sock ended up a football field and a half away (round trip).  And if the story doesn't involve Darlie doing it, I'd want an explanation as to why someone who was not the murderer would bother to do such a thing.

Darlie could have dropped it there before stabbing herself. It doesn't have any of her blood on it--only the boys'. 150 yards isn't that far to run, and Darlie was a healthy 26 year old. Average, untrained 25 to 35 year old adult times on 100 m dashes (only a bit off from 100 yards) can average about 18 to 25 seconds. So even rounding way up and making it 60 seconds each way, that's only two minutes she's gone. 

I am pretty confident in Darlie's guilt, but am unsure about Darin's. I do find it odd that he has very little relationship with his one surviving child (but I also understand that means jack shit in court.) And whether it was an intruder or Darlie, it's weird he didn't wake up. I imagine the boys screamed quite a bit considering their injuries. The only answer to the latter question is that he was in on it. 

[Blahblah]

5 hours ago, JenniferJuniper said:

Okay.  So when in all this mess did he plant it?  

Do you think both parents agreed that the little boys should be murdered in their sleep (but not the baby)?  Or do you think Darin sometime after the mayhem decided it would be a good thing to cover for the murderer of his sons?

I'm seriously not being snarky.  If I were on her jury at a re-trial I would not convict unless someone explained how that bloody sock ended up a football field and a half away (round trip).  And if the story doesn't involve Darlie doing it, I'd want an explanation as to why someone who was not the murderer would bother to do such a thing.

Unless Darlie or Darin confess, we might never know which of them dropped the sock. I can’t imagine it was a rational scene at all. Two minutes for one of them to trot outside and run up the street isn’t a long time.

But logically, the odds are overwhelming that it was one of them, not some theoretical third person who managed to leave no trace of themselves anywhere, who broke into an occupied house through a cut window screen and stabbed two little boys repeatedly and savagely (both things done with a knife that he found in the kitchen - and how did he get the knife from the kitchen in order to cut the screen?), apparently ignoring an adult female in the room until one of the stabbed, dying boys took a miraculous walk to the sofa to wake her up, at which point he sliced her neck, leaving no blood on said sofa, somehow got blood in the kitchen sink, then thoughtfully cleaned it up, and ran away leaving her alive to identify him. And wasn’t it lucky that she had amnesia about any identifying features? 

An explainable sock does not outweigh all the other evidence.

[adidas]

4 hours ago, JenniferJuniper said:

Okay.  So when in all this mess did he plant it?  

Do you think both parents agreed that the little boys should be murdered in their sleep (but not the baby)?  Or do you think Darin sometime after the mayhem decided it would be a good thing to cover for the murderer of his sons?

I'm seriously not being snarky.  If I were on her jury at a re-trial I would not convict unless someone explained how that bloody sock ended up a football field and a half away (round trip).  And if the story doesn't involve Darlie doing it, I'd want an explanation as to why someone who was not the murderer would bother to do such a thing.

The sock is so insignificant in the scheme of all of the other evidence imo. It really is a non issue for me. I haven’t thought long and hard about it and I don’t have any strong theories because it doesn’t send up red flags for me at all. It’s just a piece of evidence which one of them planted in front of a guy’s house - a guy who Darlie would later accuse of the murder but had to back down when LE pointed out that he didn’t match her description of the alleged intruder at all.

I have no idea why Darin would agree to go along with Darlie’s story - I’m not involved in a toxic, codependent relationship like I believe they were, so I don’t understand the mental gymnastics it would take. Plenty of people have lied to protect their loved ones. Maybe she blackmailed him. Maybe she had something on him that she would have divulged if he didn’t agree to cover for her. He is known to have had affairs and to have committed insurance fraud - perhaps there are other skeletons in his closet. I don’t know.

It would have been absolute chaos before Darlie called 911 - they would would have been panicking and trying to figure out what to do to cover it up. None of the staging was very effective. The sock was just another poorly executed piece of attempted staging.

A question for you - if an intruder dropped the sock, why wasn’t Darlie’s blood on it?

[JenniferJuniper]

7 hours ago, adidas said:

A question for you - if an intruder dropped the sock, why wasn’t Darlie’s blood on it?

It wouldn't necessarily have to be if the sock only came in contact with the boy's blood.

I disagree the sock can be considered "insignificant". It's an item from a crime scene with the blood of two victims on it found 75 yards away from the crime scene.  It does need to be explained.  Either Darlie took the time and effort after killing the boys to run 75 yards, drop it, and run 75 yards back or Darin did.  Or someone else did.

If I were on a re-trial jury I'd need the prosecutors to the explain the "how" and "when" this could have occurred.