A New Jersey mother who drowned her two young daughters has been found not guilty by reason of insanity and will be committed to a secure psychiatric facility instead of serving time in prison.
On June 25, 2024, police in Lakewood, New Jersey, responded to a 911 call about two young children in cardiac arrest, according to Fox 29. The caller, 27-year-old Naomi Elkins, later confessed to killing her daughters—ages 1 and 3—for what she described as "religious purposes."
According to investigators, Elkins believed that by taking her daughters' lives, she was ridding the world of evil. The mother, who had a history of severe mental illness and postpartum psychosis, had previously exhibited signs of distress, including obsessive religious ideation and delusions involving messianic identity.
During a court hearing on Tuesday, a judge concluded that Elkins did indeed drown her daughters, but ruled her legally insane at the time of the killings.
Evidence presented in court included her own statements to police, disturbing details about how each child was drowned in a separate bathroom and a letter in which Elkins wrestled with guilt and confusion about her actions.
Psychologist Gianni Pirelli testified that Elkins was in a full psychotic break during the murders, believing she or her husband was the Messiah and that killing her children would destroy evil.
"She thought that if she destroyed her children, she would be destroying all the evil in the world,'' the psychologist told the court, according to Asbury Park Press.
The judge ordered Elkins to be committed to a psychiatric institution for the equivalent of two life sentences—150 years total.
