Montgomery woman may stand trial for allegedly suffocating children
SOMERVILLE - A psychiatric evaluation of a Montgomery woman accused of killing her two children will be completed this week.
Somerset County Assistant Prosecutor Michael McLaughlin told Superior Court Judge Peter Tober on Monday that a final evaluation of Yuhwei Chou was being performed Monday and Tuesday.
McLaughlin said the evaluation is "to get some last pieces in place."
Britt Simon, Chou’s attorney, told the judge that his expert's evaluation of Chou has been completed and the results have been shared with the prosecutor's office.
Chou, 37, was indicted in January on charges of murdering her two children on Nov. 8 in Hillsborough, where she allegedly suffocated them in the backseat of her car while parked along a road. She remains in the Somerset County Jail.
Chou was charged with killing her children, 7-year-old Samantha Ross and 11-month-old Paul Ross. Paul would have celebrated his first birthday on Dec. 6.
Earlier:'I think she killed the baby': 911 call sheds light on Montgomery children's deaths
Chou told police after her arrest that she killed the children, according to an affidavit of probable cause, and had been planning the killings for a week.
Chou said she drove to Wawa for lunch and then to a True Value hardware store where she bought duct tape and zip ties, according to the affidavit.
She then drove to a sports facility on Mountainview Road in Hillsborough where she began to put duct tape on her daughter's face, but she became "spooked" by a bystander in the parking lot, the affidavit says.
She then drove along Mountainview Road and parked in a hunting area with a dirt driveway on the side of the road before she climbed into the backseat and zip tied her daughter's hands and duct taped her face along with her son's face, according to the affidavit.
Chou used her hands to suffocate both victims until they were dead, the affidavit says.
At 7:41 a.m. Nov. 9, a witness spotted a gray Toyota Corolla in a ditch on Mountainview Road. The witness spoke with the driver, identified as Chou, whose hands were zip tied to the steering wheel, according to the affidavit.
The witness also saw the children were in car seats in the rear of the vehicle with their faces duct taped and their hands zip tied, the affidavit says.
The witness told another person to call 911. When police arrived, Chou said she had zip tied herself to the steering wheel and duct taped herself, according to the affidavit.
No motive has been given for the killings.
Email: mdeak@mycentraljersey.com
Mike Deak is a reporter for mycentraljersey.com. To get unlimited access to his articles on Somerset and Hunterdon counties, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.
This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: Montgomery NJ woman may stand trial for allegedly suffocating children
