Murders of the Dickason children

Common card · No. 316997

On 16 September 2021, Lauren Anne Dickason, a 40-year-old South African-born doctor who had emigrated to New Zealand five days earlier, murdered her three daughters—six-year-old Liané and two-year-old twins Maya and Karla—at their home in Timaru. While her husband was out at a work dinner, Dickason gathered the girls in a bedroom, initially trying to asphyxiate them with linked cable ties before smothering them with towels and blankets until they died. She then attempted suicide by swallowing prescription pills and cutting herself with a knife. The murders occurred following years of severe mental illness, fertility struggles, and a turbulent migration process. Dickason had suffered from major depressive disorder, anxiety, and postpartum depression dating back to 2015, following 17 rounds of IVF and a late-term miscarriage in 2013. Her mental health deteriorated significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, local political violence in South Africa, and the family's move to New Zealand. In...

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