JOHANNESBURG – The family of Lauren Dickason has released a statement following the guilty verdict handed down in the Christchurch high court in New Zealand on Wednesday.
The 42-year-old doctor was found guilty of murdering her three young girls in 2021 despite her defence of infanticide and insanity.
Dickason’s family said the little girls, Lianè (6) and her twin sisters, Karla and Maya, aged 2, were “taken from this life to another” as a result of Lauren’s postpartum depression.
The family also said this was not their daughter – rather, it was “a debilitating mental illness that resulted in the awful tragedy.”
They thanked the people of New Zealand, South Africa, and people from around the world for their support, and for “being so understanding of the effects of postpartum depression and mental illness”.
The family also praised New Zealand authorities for the way they interacted with them, in a “most generous and compassionate way”.
Lauren Dickason will now be held in a hospital until her sentencing proceedings get under way in the next few days.