Ohio mother Brittany Pilkington, confessed to killing her three children over a period of 13 months.
Three-month-old Niall was the first to die, on July 22, 2014.
His brother, 4-year-old Gavin, died nine months later, on April 6, 2015.
Noah was next: He was born just after Gavin's death - and died on Aug. 18, 2015.
The mother of all three children, Brittany Pilkington, confessed to killing them over a 13-month period, Ohio prosecutors say. The same day her third son died, the 24-year-old mother from Bellefontaine told police that she put a blanket over all three of the children's faces and placed her hand over their noses and mouths.
Pilkington's videotaped confession was played in court this week. Her attorneys argued that the confession was coerced and, therefore, unconstitutional; it shouldn't be used at trial, they say.
Pilkington was indicted on three counts of aggravated murder. If found guilty, she could face the death penalty.
"Every case is awful when you're talking about child deaths," Logan County Chief Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Eric Stewart told The Washington Post. "This one, obviously, is unique in the way that the deaths didn't happen all at once. It's still just terrible to think about what happened."
The first two deaths stymied authorities in Bellefontaine, about 60 miles northwest of Columbus.
Because there were no physical injuries or any other signs of trauma, the coroner's office could not determine how they died, Stewart said.
But police and childcare officials had become highly suspicious of the mother of the dead children. Her husband, Joseph Pilkington, was at work when they died, and she was the only one at home with the children, Stewart said.
After the deaths of Niall and Gavin, Logan County Children's Services took custody of Pilkington's daughter, Hailey, who is now 5, and Noah, who was then a newborn.
Stewart said childcare officials took the boy from the hospital just after he was born.
The parents fought for several weeks to get the children back, and a judge ultimately sided with them.
"The court is also concerned about what's going on in the home," Stewart said. "Two deaths, two unexplained deaths. [But] we've not proven any criminal intent at that point."
Noah died when he was three months old. Stewart said the infant had only been home a week.
Brittany Pilkington was interviewed for two hours at the Bellefontaine Police Department, where she told detectives that she had accidentally rolled over Niall, the first child who died.
"That's something that she's never told the police before in previous investigations," Stewart said.
Pilkington was interviewed for another two hours at the Logan County Sheriff's Office, where she ended up confessing to killing the boys by suffocation, Stewart said.
In the videotaped statements played in Logan County Common Pleas Court on Wednesday, Pilkington described how Gavin, her first son, kicked his legs as he struggled.
She said she used one hand to cover the boy's nose and mouth and the other hand to hold his legs, the Columbus Dispatch reported.
It took "a few minutes" for the boy to stop moving, she said.
Pilkington said Niall, who was the first to die, was lying in her bed when she held a blanket over his face, according to the paper.
Noah, her youngest son, was in his crib when she put a blanket over his face, she said.
When asked why she used a blanket, Pilkington said she "didn't want to see it."
"I didn't want to see them suffering," she said in the tape.
Stewart said that Pilkington suffocated her sons because she was jealous the boys were getting more attention from their father than she and her daughter were.
She also said her own father beat her as a child, and she feared her sons might grow up to do the same, Stewart said.
Pilkington sat motionless during the first half of the interview at the police department, Stewart said. She later became emotional and was crying throughout her interview at the sheriff's office.
She told investigators she'd been depressed and had been thinking about killing herself, the Columbus Dispatch reported. She said she loved her sons.
"I should've hurt myself," she said.
Kort Gatterdam, Pilkington's attorney, said the way police interrogated her "lends to the possibility of a false confession." Gatterdam said that during the lengthy interrogation, detectives put in Pilkington's mind what she ultimately confessed to doing.
"Being there all day with no sleep, having just watched the kid, with no food, no drink, she finally started agreeing with them," Gatterdam said. "Her statements are basically what the cops told her happened."
Gatterdam also said that Pilkington made the statements to police without first talking to her attorney. Had she been able to do so, she would have been advised to not talk, Gatterdam said.
"The other issue is there's no evidence of a crime being committed apart from her statement," Gatterdam said. "Without her statements, I don't think they have a case."
Stewart, the prosecutor, disagreed.
Pilkington was not forced to say anything, he said, adding that she was given food and drink throughout the interview. He also said that Pilkington was advised of her rights twice and she understood what she was doing when she agreed to talk to detectives.
A judge will likely decide this month whether the videotapes can be used as evidence at trial.
Pilkington's defense team is also asking the judge to find the death penalty in Ohio unconstitutional.
Gatterdam also said detectives didn't sufficiently investigate Pilkington's husband who, police say, found his children dead after coming home from work.
Forty-four-year-old Joseph Pilkington was arrested less than a month after his wife was indicted, but not in connection with the children's deaths.
The Columbus Dispatch reported that as police were investigating the death of the third child, they found that Joseph Pilkington, who is 20 years older than his wife, got her pregnant when she was a minor.
At that time, the two were not yet married and he was in a live-in relationship with Brittany Pilkington's mother.
Joseph Pilkington pleaded guilty last July to a reduced charge of sexual imposition, a misdemeanor, court records show. He was sentenced last month to 60 days in jail and was required to register as a sex offender.
Brittany Pilkington's trial is scheduled to start on Feb. 27 and is expected to last a little more than a month. She's being held in Logan County Jail on a $1 million bond.
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