Mar 13, 2014

Mother who drove van with 3 kids into Florida Surf charged with attempte...


Erin Burnett of CNN's "Up Front" program interviews criminal defense attorney George Parnham and psychotherapist Robi Ludwig about possibilities of the insanity defense as applied in the case of Ebony Wilkerson. Wilkerson has been arrested and charged with 3 counts of attempted murder after driving a minivan carrying her three young children into the ocean surf off Florida. Bystanders and officers helped rescue 32-year-old Ebony Wilkerson and her children, ages 3, 9 and 10, from their minivan as it was almost submerged on Daytona Beach. Hours before driving into the ocean, Wilkerson had talked about demons when she left her sister's house in Daytona Beach. Her sister called Daytona Beach police, who later stopped Wilkerson and noted that she "...was suffering from some form of mental illness, but she was lucid and did not provide any signs that she met Baker Act requirements". The Florida Mental Health Act, commonly known as the Baker Act, allows authorities to involuntarily take people into custody if they seem to be a threat to themselves.