NSW mum who killed her two sons ruled not criminally responsible for murder

A mother who killed her children will not be held criminally responsible for the murders after a court found she was suffering from a mental health condition that made her unable to reason.

The woman, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, pleaded not guilty to murdering her two sons in their NSW home in September 2024.

The woman was taken to hospital under police guard with self-inflicted injuries before she was charged with two counts of domestic violence murder.

In a letter, she had written “I can’t leave my children alone in such a bad world without my support” and “hope you can forgive me”, the NSW Supreme Court was told.

The woman had also made a series of internet searches relating to murder, suicide, and killing children in the month leading up to the murders.

Following the murders, the woman told a psychiatrist that she had thought “if her children died, then nothing could go wrong for them”, the court was told.

The Director of Public Prosecutions previously agreed to enter a special verdict of not guilty by reason of mental impairment as the woman was suffering from major depression at the time of the murders.

Justice Richard Cavanagh on Thursday ruled the woman did kill her two children, but she is not criminally responsible as per mental health legislation.

His view was supported by the opinions of three psychiatric experts who all provided reports and gave oral evidence to the court opining that the woman suffered from major depression at the time of the murders and therefore did not know her actions were wrong.

“Having regard to the updated reports of the psychiatric experts … I’m satisfied that at the time of killing her two children, the accused did not know that the act of stabbing them was wrong, in that she could not reason … as to whether those acts, as perceived by reasonable people, were wrong,” Justice Cavanagh told the court on Thursday.

The woman was beamed into the court via an audiovisual link for the judgment, keeping her head down the entire time and at some points appearing to wipe away tears.

She will not be released into the community but will instead become a forensic patient at a location to be determined by a mental health tribunal.

She can only be released if the tribunal becomes satisfied that her release would not pose a danger to herself or others.

Even then, the NSW Attorney-General and Minister for Health must be given an opportunity to be heard on the matter.