A defense attorney for a Massachusetts mother accused of strangling her two young children asked a judge to free her and dismiss the case entirely on Thursday.
Joseph Krowski, lawyer for Janette MacAusland, 49, of Wellesley, argued there was insufficient evidence to keep his client jailed despite her alleged admissions to police, according to court records and WCVB. The judge denied both requests and ordered MacAusland to remain held without bail on two counts of first-degree murder, to which she has pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors told the Dedham District Court judge on Wednesday that they were still awaiting official manner-of-death determinations from the medical examiner’s office for 7-year-old Kai and 6-year-old Ella. The children were found dead inside a bedroom of the family’s $1.5 million home on April 24, with dispatch audio noting “blood spatter everywhere,” according to harrowing recordings.
MacAusland allegedly fled roughly 140 miles to her aunt’s home in Bennington, Vermont, showing up late that night with bloody wounds across her neck. Her concerned aunt called police, who also found MacAusland “hysterical,” prosecutors previously recounted in court.
“I strangled them and then I tried to kill myself,” MacAusland told a Vermont officer at her aunt’s home, according to a police report.
“I wanted the three of us to go to God together but it didn’t work,” she allegedly continued.
The slayings came just three days after a guardian was appointed to make custody recommendations for the children, following a motion filed by both parents. Samuel MacAusland, the children’s father, had filed for divorce in October after nine years of marriage and was seeking custody of the children and the couple’s home, court filings show. Janette MacAusland, who worked as an acupuncturist with New England Integrated Health, had been fighting for custody herself.
The bitter legal battle appeared to reach its breaking point with the April 21 guardian appointment. Kai and Ella attended Schofield Elementary School, where they were in kindergarten and second grade.
The case drew immediate parallels to another Massachusetts child-killing case that ended in mistrial less than a week before Krowski’s request. A judge declared a mistrial in the murder case against Lindsay Clancy, who strangled her three children but argued she was suffering extreme postpartum psychosis at the time.
People who knew the MacAuslands described Janette as a “doting mom,” and the family appeared happy in photos posted online. Krowski and the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office did not immediately respond to requests for comment following Thursday’s hearing.
MacAusland’s shocking request for freedom came even as prosecutors continue building their case around her own alleged words to police and the grim scene officers discovered at the Wellesley home she had fled.