Man pleads guilty in 3 Wis. daughters' deaths

Aaron Schaffhausen
Aaron Schaffhausen makes his way into a St. Croix County Courtroom for a pretrial hearing, Wednesday, March 27, 2013 in Hudson, Wis. Schaffhausen 35, has pleaded guilty in last summer's slayings of his daughters in the River Falls, Wis., home where they lived with Schaffhausen's ex-wife.
AP Photo/The Star Tribune, Elizabeth Flores

A man has pleaded guilty to killing his three young daughters at their home in western Wisconsin, but still maintains he shouldn't be held responsible because he was insane.

Thirty-five-year-old Aaron Schaffhausen changed his plea Thursday after more than a day of legal wrangling about what kind of evidence would be allowed at his trial. He answered yes when the judge asked if he was guilty.

Jury selection is due to begin Monday in St. Croix County Circuit Court.

The change-in-plea means prosecutors won't have to prove Schaffhausen killed his daughters at their River Falls home last July. The defense will have to prove he had a mental disease or defect, and that he lacked substantial capacity to appreciate that what he did was wrong or couldn't control his impulses.

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