Aussie mum won’t stand trial

BRISBANE: A mother who stabbed to death her seven children and a niece in northern Australia in 2014 will not stand trial for murder because she was suffering cannabis-induced schizophrenia when she lost control, according to a court judgment released yesterday.

Raina Thaiday stabbed herself 35 times after killing the children, aged 2 to 14, at her home in Cairns on Dec 19, a month after her delusions began.

The Queensland state Mental Health Court ruled a month ago that Thaiday, then 37, had been of “unsound mind” when the children were slain. State law kept the ruling from being made public until yesterday.

She will be held indefinitely in a high-security ward of a psychiatric hospital here.

Thaiday had been smoking up to 20 cones of marijuana a day when she developed severe schizophrenia in late 2014, the court heard. AP