Forgive me for the lengthy post, but there is no 'one' thing that convinces me of her guilt. When all of these points are considered together as they should be, this case is an absolute no-brainer for me. But I can't single out any one incident or moment where I became convinced. These are the elements which formed my opinion:
1. The Transcripts
How many times does this woman want to change her story?! She was fighting with the intruder, she felt pressure on her leg, but then other times she didn't have him on top of her, he was just seen walking away through the kitchen. In one account, she says he walked into the wine rack and it made a loud cracking sound, other times it was the breaking of glass. One account she notices blood on her nightgown, other accounts she doesn't mention this. She gives multiple locations for the knife. She mixes up whether she ran into the entry way to scream for her husband first, or whether she started attending to and inspecting the boy's wounds bef2ore calling for him. She gives some people more details than others. She omits details from some accounts. She mentions in one that she noticed the entire living room was covered with blood. Sometimes the table is completely overturned, other times it's tipped to the side and the vase is knocked over. In one account, she has a towel up to her neck, and others she's just applying towels to the boy's wounds. She omits in several stories seeing blood pouring from the wounds when Devin was attempting CPR. Sometimes Devin goes to check on their baby, other times he doesn't. In one account, he pushed her outside.
Darlie also claimed that she was sleeping downstairs that night, and for many nights prior because whenever her baby stirred in his sleep, it would wake her up. However, Darlie testified that she did not wake up at any point until her son shook her awake. She slept through the stabbing of her young sons, as well as the moment her throat was cut. That fateful night, she'd told police that she'd woken up to a struggle with the intruder who had mounted her, but later omitted this entirely from her story and claimed only to have seen him leaving the scene and dropping the knife as he made his way through to the garage.
2. The 911 Call
Is she crying, or just frantic? She keeps saying they're dead. Wouldn't repeating this to yourself over and over, and seeing the ghastly wounds all over your boys' tiny bodies cause more than just "Oh my God, oh my God, they're dead!" I compared this to a 911 call from a mother who witnessed her teenage daughter being shot by her husband and her scream is absolutely horrific. At the same moment as she placed the call, he was trying to kill her as well, and intended on committing suicide immediately after. She was in danger. She was terrified. She was completely and utterly heartbroken. She was completely unable to give accurate details to the 011 dispatcher on the phone with her. In comparison, Darlie wailed a lot, shouted a lot but most of it was coherent and clear (when she wasn't interrupted by the interference on the line). Her boys were so little and defenceless. Their wounds were incredibly brutal and visible to both parents. There was a large amount of blood found all over the room. How is she finding enough composure to scan the downstairs room to claim, "nothing's missing"? Is it even too far fetched to ask why a parent would be asking "Who would do this? Why would they do this?" while her babies are slowly dying in front of her on the floor? She claims that one of her sons replied "Okay Mommy" when she told him to "hang on" and "be strong" but this can't be heard in the 911 call. She claims she applied towels to their little bodies, but she's still running around outside screaming for her neighbour. She claims that the cops walked in when they arrived, but the 911 dispatcher can clearly be heard telling Darlie on multiple occasions that they're at the front door and she needs to let them inside. She even goes so far as to tell her husband, "I didn't do this". The amount of talking she's doing on the phone really makes me wonder how badly her throat was slashed. She's shouting and wailing and screams loudly out to her neighbour - but she claims she gets dizzy, leans on the vacuum cleaner and eventually passes out. She
3. Birthday Party In The Graveyard
Darlie is attacked, has her throat slashed, watches her sons die in front of her from brutal knife wounds, buries them and that very same week, goes back to the grave site to celebrate D's birthday. Balloons, smiles, laughter, singing and silly string. What parent, considering all the circumstances that befell this little boy's birthday, would not only be able to compose themselves while standing in front of their child's headstone - but to be able to "celebrate" his birthday in such a fashion after he and his brother are viciously murdered? She wasn't choking back tears. She knew the media were watching every moment. She did it for the cameras - not for her little boys. In comparison to Darlie's behaviour, one of the first officers on the scene said that after he'd been shown one of the bodies, he couldn't compose himself and turned away and "bawled like a baby". He went on to say that for months afterwards, he checked on his own sleeping five year old regularly, but that he saw the Routier son's body and "couldn't shake the vision".
4. The Crime Scene
The blood spatter expert testified that evidence on Darlie's nightshirt showed that she raised her arm above her head each time she went to plunge the knife back into her little boy's bodies (s. Murderpedia). There was also bloody footprint evidence UNDERNEATH the vacuum cleaner and broken glass which convinced experts that those items had been placed/broken after the perpetrator had made their way through the crime scene and into the kitchen. It is claimed that it was the police officer who instructed Darlie to put towels on the boy's bodies, and that she ignored him while continuing to shout at the dispatcher on the phone and telling police to chase down the assailant she believed had escaped through the utility/garage door. The family's white Pomeranian later greeted police once the surviving Routiers were on their way to the hospital. They claim that the dog was yappy and hostile to strangers, making them wonder where the dog had been during the 'attack'.
Blood in both the sink and a bloody child's handprint on the couch had been cleaned before police arrived. They were able to discover these lost clues with the use of Luminol.
5. Darlie's Behaviour After The Slaying of Her Preschool Boys
Right from the moment police arrived and spanning through her hospital stay, many law enforcement and hospital staff claim that Darlie's behaviour was not fitting with a woman who had been attacked and had her sons brutally murdered beside her. Darlie, they say, seemed more concerned with explaining why the murder weapon would have her fingerprints on it, than she was about the murder of her young boys. Nurses claimed that she was cold and emotionless, particularly when she visited to view the body of one of her boys. Law enforcement even claimed that her husband, D.R. was amazed by the attention the scene had attracted that night and exclaimed to one of the attending officers, 'Golly, I guess this is the biggest thing Rowlett's ever had.' Nurses claim they had to console the other family members of Darlie and D.R., that they were 'hysterical' and had to be held and comforted for a considerable amount of time. They claim that Darlie never showed any of this grief or anguish. Another noted that although people deal with grief in different ways, they had never seen a reaction like Darlie's. That "tissues were beside her bed but she never took one".
Witnesses present at the funeral parlour for the viewing noted that Darlie lent down between the boys and whispered, "I'm sorry" before wailing loudly "Who could have done this?". When approached by the parlour owner who offered her condolences and expressed, "and now you have this expensive funeral to pay for." it is claimed that Darlie replied with "I'm not worried. I'll get five thousand dollars each for both of the boys." While D.R. spoke with mourners, Darlie is said to have been reading cards on the flower arrangements, comforting other mourners and promising to return thank you cards to all who brought flowers for the boys. Even one of the Routier family relatives noted that Darlie "never wiped her eyes" during the service held for the boys. She "never cried. There is no mistaking grief."
A friend accompanied Darlie as she entered the house for the first time since she had been rushed to hospital that awful night. Her friend M was prepared for an emotional scene once the door was opened, but was completely overwhelmed by the response she got from Darlie. She claims Darlie threw her arms up and shouted, "Look at this mess! It'll cost us a fortune to fix this *advertiser censored*!"
As M recalls, "Right there where her boys were killed, and that's the first thing she said to me. I put my hands on Darlie's shoulders and said, 'Darlie, look me in the eye and tell me you didn't kill the boys.' She looked me in the eye and said, 'I'm gonna get new carpet, new drapes, and fix this room all up.' I couldn't believe it." (s. Murderpedia)