Leatrice Brewer Update: Judge says N.Y. mother who killed her children is not entitled to piece of their estate
Updated 3:12 p.m. EST
(CBS/AP) MINEOLA, N.Y. - A judge has ruled that a Long Island mother found not guilty because of mental disease in the 2008 drowning of her three children is not entitled to a piece of their $350,000 estate.
Thirty-three-year-old Leatrice Brewer's bid hinged on whether her case applies to New York's "Son of Sam" law, legislation that was enacted in the 1970s following the capture of serial killer David Berkowitz. The law sought to bar him and other criminals from profiting from their crimes.
Brewer admitted she drowned the children in the bathtub of her apartment in New Cassel, on Long Island about 20 miles east of New York City, in February 2008. She later placed the children's bodies on a bed and tried to kill herself by swallowing a concoction of household cleaning chemicals. When that suicide bid failed, she jumped out her second-story window but again survived.
Instead of facing trial on three murder counts in the children's deaths, Brewer pleaded not responsible by reason of mental disease or defect. Psychiatrists had determined she suffered a major depressive disorder and believed she killed the children, ages 1,5 and 6, to save them from the potentially fatal effects of voodoo.
The money in question comes from lawsuits the fathers of the children settled with Nassau County over claims that social services workers failed to properly monitor Brewer.