KANSAS CITY - A Missouri woman who fatally shot her nine-year-old daughter and drowned her two-year-old son last May will not face criminal punishment.
According to a press release by Jefferson County Prosecuting Attorney Trisha Stefanski, Ashley Parmeley was determined by two mental health examinations to be unable to comprehend the wrongfulness of killing her two children at the time of the incident last May.
She has entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity related to the first degree murder charges she faces and has been committed to the Department of Mental Health.
According to Missouri law, a person found incapable of knowing the nature and wrongfulness of their action due to a mental defect cannot be held responsible for those crimes.
Court documents say police found the daughter with a gunshot wound in the trunk of Parmeley's car at the Festus police station where she admitted to the killings. The son's body was found in a fountain near Timber Creek Resort where Parmeley drowned him.




