What's Next for Andrea Yates?

HOUSTON, July 26, 2006 — -- Andrea Yates may be have been found not guilty of capital murder by reason of insanity, but that doesn't mean she'll walk free.

Thursday morning, Judge Belinda Hill will commit her to either Rusk State Hospital or North Texas State Hospital, in Vernon, where she will remain until a jury decides her psychosis has been adequately treated and conquered.

But that day isn't close. Many say it will likely never come.

The 42-year-old is heavily medicated on Zyprexa, an antipsychotic, and Effexor, an antidepressant.

"You can only imagine the hell Andrea Yates lives with every day," George Parnham, her lead attorney, said earlier today.

Todd Frank is foreman of the jury that spent nearly 13 hours deliberating the case over three days. At a post-verdict press conference, he said: "She needs help. Although she's [being] treated, I think she's worse than she was before. I think she'll probably need treatment for the rest of her life."

So while Yates will spend her future under doctors' care, her ex-husband, Russell Yates, will spend his with a new woman. He remarried earlier this year. Still, he was in the Houston courtroom to support his former wife during her trial; when the verdict came down he put his head down in his hands and cried.

Later, in front of the courthouse he said, "The jury looked past what happened and looked at why it happened. Yes, she was psychotic. That's the whole truth."

That's also likely the last of Andrea Yates's criminal trials. Prosecutor Joe Owmby announced that he would advise Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal that the state not prosecute her in the deaths of her sons Luke and Paul, neither of whom were a part of the just-wrapped court case.