The defense won a major victory in the case of accused child killer Shirley Winters Thursday. Winters is charged with the drowning death of 23 month old Ryan Rivers of Pierrepont in 2006.
St. Lawrence County Court Judge Jerry Richards ruled that the jury will not hear about the suspicious deaths of Winters' own two children in Jefferson County.
In a four page ruling, Judge Richards denied allowing prosecutors to introduce evidence in the 1979 deaths of Winters' three year old daughter, Colleen, and 18 month old son, John.
The two children died in a suspicious fire at Hyde Lake in Theresa.
The judge's ruling states that "there is simply no proof that the children were murdered or that the defendant did it".
However, Richards will allow prosecutors to use potentially incriminating portions of a letter that Winters wrote to a friend involving the November 28, 2006 drowning death of Ryan Rivers.
The toddler was found lying face up in a nearly empty bathtub at the Pierrepont home of Rick and Lena Gollinger.
In a March 16, 2007 letter to a friend, Winters allegedly began with the sentence,"Things are not so good now" and ending with the sentence, "But I only remember a little and never all that happened."
Winters' trial is scheduled to get underway on April 29.