Woman faces life sentences for killing her 3 daughters

A jury in New Zealand found a South African woman guilty on Wednesday of murdering her three young daughters, saying she faced a life sentence for each killing.

Lauren Anne Dickason killed her two-year-old twins and their six-year-old sister in September 2021 at their home in Timaru, a city in the South Island, about a month after the family had migrated from South Africa.

Lauren Dickason, 42, had earlier admitted killing her 2-year-old twin daughters Maya and Karla, and their 6-year-old sister Lianè, at their home in the town of Timaru nearly two years ago.

She had pleaded not guilty to murder, arguing she was suffering severe depression that could be traced back to postpartum depression. Prosecutors acknowledged Dickason had suffered from depression but said it wasn’t enough to warrant a medical defense. They said she killed her children out of anger and resentment.

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They pointed to Dickason’s troubling phone messages and online history in the weeks before the killings, including comments about wanting to kill her children and Google searches for “most effective overdose in kids.”

Local media reported that the majority verdict by a jury of eight women and four men said Dickason was not insane at the time of the killings and was guilty of murder, following a month-long high court trial in the city of Christchurch.

Her husband Graham had found the three children dead and his wife in a serious condition upon arriving home after a dinner with colleagues, New Zealand media have previously said.

The prosecution said Dickason knew when she killed her daughters that what she was doing was morally wrong and the act was murder, according to broadcaster Radio New Zealand.

The judge, Cameron Mander, remanded Dickason to custody in a hospital psychiatric unit until her sentencing. She has been in hospital since the murders.

Some of the jury were heard crying as they left the courtroom, the media report said.