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Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Mother guilty of murdering babies

Girls drowned days before custody battle

By: Allison Jones

Posted: 11/16/2010 1:00 AM | Comments: 0 (including replies)

Elaine Campione drowned Serena, 3 and Sophia, 19 months, in October 2006. A jury Monday rejected her claim of being not criminally responsible. (HANDOUT PHOTO)

BARRIE, Ont. -- An abusive husband, escalating psychosis and an ineffectual mental-health system were all cited Monday as factors in the deaths of two young sisters, but a jury decided the ultimate responsibility lies with their mother, who held their tiny heads underwater in the bathtub.

Elaine Campione's whole body began to shake and she burst into loud sobs after the jury found her guilty of two counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of her daughters Serena, 3, and Sophia, 19 months.

The defence had conceded from the beginning that Campione drowned her children in October 2006, just days before a family court appearance at which her ex-husband was to fight for custody. But lawyer Mary Cremer had urged the jury to find Campione not criminally responsible by reason of mental disorder.

Three of the jurors wiped tears from their eyes Monday as the verdict was delivered.

Justice Alfred Stong told the court that because of the "unimaginable facts of this case" he is ordering the Ministry of the Attorney General to cover any counselling the jurors may want.

"The circumstances of this case are undeniably and inordinately tragic," Stong said after the verdict was read. "One can only hope that they do not reflect, even at their most extreme, a direction of our society."

Stong continued on, telling the court about the "breakdown of the family unit" and an "increasing inability to make personal commitments, much less permanent commitments."

"It is more than disconcerting to think that if Ms. Campione had not been so abused, so used and discarded as a person, her two daughters could still be alive," Stong said.

The jury, which heard seven weeks of testimony and deliberated for nearly a week, was tasked with sifting through evidence of Campione's suicide attempts and mental illness. They heard doctors had diagnosed her as having unspecified psychosis with borderline personality traits, post-traumatic stress disorder from spousal abuse, depression and an eating disorder when she was younger.

The Crown didn't deny Campione was mentally unwell, but lawyer Enno Meijers argued it did not prevent her from knowing right from wrong. He had argued Campione killed the girls out of spite so her abusive ex-husband couldn't get custody.

While assault charges against Leo Campione were stayed after his wife was charged with killing their children, the trial heard evidence that he hit his wife and eldest daughter.

Leo Campione and his family have been given the chance to make victim impact statements on Wednesday before Elaine Campione is formally sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for 25 years.

Campione's lawyer said she hopes her client will get the help she needs in prison, but called the case a tragic indictment of Ontario's mental-health system.

"It's a sad statement in that our system is horribly underfunded. We are not equipped to deal properly with mental-health issues. We are short of psychiatrists," Cremer said.

-- The Canadian Press

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition November 16, 2010 A8

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