The heartbreaking tale of an Australian child that his mother drowned: "Stop, Mom"

WARNING: disturbing content

A little boy said that he was almost drowned by his mother and had seen her five-year-old brother die while she would have turned against him, during an interview given to the police by a tribunal.

The child, who told detectives that his favorite cartoon character was Donatello, the purple turtle, had just turned nine when he survived the terrible ordeal that took located in the Murray River at Moama, New South Wales, on March 2, 2017.

Her mother, a 28-year-old Deniliquin woman who can not be named for legal reasons, is being prosecuted for the murder of her youngest child and the attempted murder of her elder brother.

The woman is today in Wagga Wagga court on the third day of her trial a week after pleading not guilty to both counts of mental illness.

In a video released in court this morning, the surviving child spoke to detectives from his hospital bed only hours after the incident and said that his mother had drawn the brothers to the river under the false pretense of fishing.

Once the boys were in the water, their mother asked the eldest to "put their head under", he said.

"I just said" no "… then she plunged my head into the water, I was scared.

"My whole body (was under the water) My face was down."

The boy stated that his mother "had his arm on the throat" and that he could feel the sand at the bottom of the river.

"Then I started to hit her for her to let go, but she did not," he said.

"I began to choke as she jumped on me.

"(Finally, she released me) then she grabbed my brother and did the same thing (for him)."

The court heard that the nine-year-old boy had told the police that when he arrived at the bank, he looked at the river and saw his mother "shaking my brother" in the water. The boy never saw his little brother again.

During her interview with the police, which took place yesterday in court, the woman described the horrible moment when she forced the boys to throw themselves into a river and kept them under water.

On Tuesday, Judge Richard Button noted that the woman was crying, "weaved oddly" and "rocked back and forth" throughout the proceedings, and therefore apologized to her for the police interviews.

In the video, the accused told investigators the day after the tragedy that she had "lost consciousness and drowned her babies" because one of them "had become perverted".

The woman told the police that she had first turned to her eldest son and had "kept her head under" the water.

"It was horrible," she said during the interview.

"He stayed alive for a little while, I had to sit on him, I could not hold him back because he was so strong."

In the video, the woman told the detectives that at one point she had heard one of her sons shout, "Stop, Mom."

The Supreme Court of NSW heard the boy struggling before being released.

"I did not want to continue to do so," said the accused in her interview with the police.

"It was so fake."

She then turned her gaze to the youngest boy, heard the court. In the video, she moaned telling the detectives that she had a hand on the head of her five year old son and the other on his chest, while "keeping him on the ground".

She said that she could feel the little boy struggling, but she did not let go until he stopped, heard the court.

"I pushed it and let it float for people to find it," she said.

The lifeless body of the child was found in the river two days later as a result of a thorough search by the authorities.

In a statement handed to the court and seen by news.com.au, the woman stated that she "had caused the death of her child by drowning her" and that she "had the intention of "kill" both boys when she took them into the river.

Earlier, the court had learned that the woman was on probation after being released from prison for serious breaking and entering a month before the incident.

In his opening address, Crown Attorney Max Pincott said the morning of the murder that the woman had seemed angry and called her mother from the Victorian town of Goornong to say, "You will not see us more."

A few hours later, the accused took her sons to the edge of the river and forcibly put them under the water, the trial before the judge said.

A witness who heard cries ran towards the river and saw the older boy being viciously attacked by a dog. He took her and the boy said, "I think I'm the only survivor," said the rescuer in a statement. In one statement, a witness stated that the surviving boy was "screaming and naked (and) covered in blood".

In his video of the police interview played in court

"I started screaming at my mother," said the boy in the video.

"I said 'help me please'."

"I tried to put my hands on the dog's face so that he would not do it but he was too strong."

Another man saw the woman float on her back in the river shortly thereafter. On Tuesday, the court heard that the accused was trying to commit suicide.

The nine-year-old girl was hospitalized for life-threatening injuries and spent the next three days under a suction pneumonia ventilator following the drowning attempt.

Later that night, the local resort owner, Michael Falzon, saw the woman enter the workplace, soaked with blood, blood and crying, around 9 pm.

Mr. Pincott testified that the witness found that the woman's pants were torn under her knee and asked if everything was okay.

She replied, "I drowned my babies," said Mr. Pincott.

When asked what she meant, she replied: "I had to drown my babies."

In a statement, Mr. Falzon said that the accused had told him, "I just want a bullet, I should be dead."

Mr. Falzon then took the woman to the police station at her request.

"He observed on the way to the police station that the accused was crying and saying," My babies, my babies, "Mr. Pincott told the judge.

The court heard that the woman had told the police, "I killed my children … I did not want to do it, I'm a fool."

Mr. Pincott stated that when the police asked where his children were, she got upset and shouted, "I drowned them."

The court learned that she had then talked to a former partner with whom she had not had contact since 2016.

"F ** k does not need to be shot," she told the police, the court said.

Defense counsel Eric Wilson SC said his client thought she was saving her children by killing them.

"She protected them, your honor," he says.

The court learned that she was delusional and that she thought she was going to be raped, tortured … and had to prevent her children from testifying … or they would be killed themselves. "

"She was suffering from a severely disrupted mental condition," said Wilson.

"She thought that she was saving them from being killed (in a worse way).

"She thinks she's actually kept them safe."

The judge stated that it was "totally bizarre to think that these acts were the solution to the problem".

"One would know that drowning is surely not (a pleasant death)," said Mr. Button.

"It's not like the boys got sleeping pills and simply fell asleep.

"To be drowned would be a terrible way to die."

The prosecution witness, Dr. Jonathon Adams, a forensic psychiatrist who badessed the alleged murderer, told the court that she appeared to be suffering from borderline personality disorder and was probably suffering from delusional beliefs at the time the alleged facts.

"I think she has a borderline personality disorder, a long-standing addiction and a major depressive disorder likely," said Dr. Adams.

"It seemed to me that his mental state had deteriorated during the four weeks preceding the alleged offense."

The court learned that the woman had a history of drug abuse, but that toxicology reports indicated that she had no evidence of illicit substances in her system at the time of her arrest.

Dr. Adams stated that her patient told her that she had used the drug on one occasion – to celebrate her birthday – during the four weeks that followed her release from prison and drowning her children.

In addition, she had not taken her prescribed antipsychotic medication since her release from prison in February, the judge said. In the days leading up to the alleged murder and attempted murder, we saw the woman shouting to herself: "You're stupid," "stupid, b ** ch" and "I'm going to kill him". She was also taken twice by theft on the display. The woman's mother, who was taking care of the boys, had issued an apprehended violence order to her daughter, who forbade her to come within 24 hours of the use of illicit drugs or drugs. # 39; alcohol.

The court heard that the accused had threatened to "drive with her and the boys in a tree" during a conversation with her mother in 2015. The incident had been reported to the police at that time. time.

The court heard that the woman had been subjected to physical, badual and psychological abuse as both a child and an adult and that she had a family history of schizophrenia.

Dr. Adams stated that she had been "tormented" by voices in her head since the age of seven. In one report, he noted that she had been self-injured since the age of nine, her first overdose at age 13, and her suicide attempt twelve times. He added that years of chronic addiction had worsened her condition and that she had recently tried to starve herself.

The trial continues.