After nearly a week of deliberations a jury delivered a guilty verdict in the trial of Elaine Campione, who murdered her two daughters four years ago.
The six woman-six man jury was tasked with deciding whether or not Campione was criminally responsible for drowning her young daughters in the bathtub. They found her guilty of two counts of first-degree murder. Campione sobbed in the prisoner's box when the decision was read out. The conviction carries a life sentence.
Defence lawyer Mary Cremer didn’t dispute the fact that Campione killed her children, but argued the mother was mentally disturbed at the time and didn’t know what she was doing was wrong. Doctors had diagnosed Campione as having unspecified psychosis with borderline personality traits, post-traumatic stress disorder due to spousal abuse and depression.
The Crown argued the 35-year-old Barrie woman killed her kids to ensure her estranged husband, Leo Campione, wouldn’t get custody.
Campione drowned her kids, three-year-old Serena and 19-month-old Sophia, in the bathtub on Oct. 2, 2006. She then dressed and posed them on her bed holding hands surrounded by a photo album and a rosary.
Campione attempted to overdose on the anxiety medication clonazepam.
After killing the girls, Campione recorded a video ranting to and about her estranged husband.
"Leo, there are you happy?" she said in the video. "Everything's gone ... The idea that you could actually have my children — God believes me and God's taking care of them now."
"I want you to know how much I hate you," she said in the video message. "You couldn't leave us alone. You wanted to win and you won ... Are you happy? ... You beat your wife to death and your children and don't you ever, ever, ever forget it."
Campione called police on Oct. 4 and stated: “My children are dead.” She then said she couldn’t remember how it happened. When detectives arrived at her door she instructed them to head to her bedroom where the girls’ bodies lay under the covers of a neatly-made bed, wearing their pajamas, necklaces and earrings.
The mother had left burial instructions on the childrens’ beds.
The Campiones had a troubled relationship. The court heard that Leo Campione had been charged with assaulting his wife and eldest daughter. Elaine Campione and the girls lived at a shelter for a time before moving into an apartment.
Leo Campione’s parents had temporary custody of the children while Elaine Campione was hospitalized for stress and suicide attempts. The husband's application for custody of the girls was to be heard the day they were found dead.
Due to the disturbing nature of the case, Justice Alfred Stong ordered the Attorney General's office to cover the cost of counselling for jurors who want it.
"The circumstances of this case are undeniably and inordinately tragic," Stong said. "One can only hope that they do not reflect, even at their most extreme, a direction of our society."
With files from the Canadian Press