A psychiatrist who treated Andrea Yates testified Monday that the Houston mother who drowned her five children was just a "shell" and a threat to herself and others.

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Ellen Allbritton admitted Yates to a mental health treatment center in March 2001, less than three months before the drownings.

Allbritton told the court that she immediately recognized Yates as someone who required inpatient treatment.

Allbritton testified that Yates and her husband, Russell, were both reluctant to admit her into the hospital, KPRC-TV in Houston reported. When she was admitted, Allbrittton said that Yates was in a "catatonic state."

Defense attorneys in the capital-murder trial are trying to show Yates didn't know right from wrong in June, when she drowned her children in their own bathtub. They are arguing she is not guilty by reason of insanity.

Under cross examination, the psychiatrist told prosecutors that Yates denied having any suicidal or homicidal thoughts. Still, Allbritton said, she "wouldn't have trusted Yates to walk across the street."

Yates could face the death penalty if convicted. She faces two capital-murder counts in three of the drownings.

Defense attorneys also plan to put Yates' mother, Karen Kennedy, on the stand Monday, and said that they are hoping to wrap up their case Tuesday or Wednesday.