By now most of you know about the Lindsay Clancy case, but I’ll briefly reiterate it. Clancy, then 32 years old, says she was afflicted with postpartum psychosis after the birth of her youngest child, and in 2023 strangled her three children, eight months old, three years old, and five years old. Then, attempting suicide, she jumped out of a window, managing to paralyze herself from the waist down.
Clancy was tried on three counts of murder and other charges. After a six-week trial, the jury could not agree on a verdict. Apparently 11 jurors voted to find Clancy “not guilty,” which could still lead to years of her confinement in a mental hospital if she was “not criminally resp0nsible” (see below). The prosecution is now deciding whether to re-try her, but her defense attorney has asked Donald Trump to give her a pardon.
The article below from Northeastern Global News (click headline to read) clarifies what an “insanity defense” constitutes in Massachusetts (note that Clancy did not please “not guilty by reason of insanity,” but simply “not guilty.”
An excerpt:
Once the defense raises the issue of the accused’s mental state at the time of the crime, prosecutors bear the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was criminally responsible, said Daniel Medwed, a university distinguished professor of law.
“In Massachusetts, we don’t typically use the term ‘insanity defense,’” Medwed said, citing the stigma that attaches to the word “insanity.” Instead, it’s referred to as “lack of criminal responsibility.”
. . .Once the defense raises the issue of the accused’s mental state at the time of the crime, prosecutors bear the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was criminally responsible, said Daniel Medwed, a university distinguished professor of law.
“In Massachusetts, we don’t typically use the term ‘insanity defense,’” Medwed said, citing the stigma that attaches to the word “insanity.” Instead, it’s referred to as “lack of criminal responsibility.”
But what constitues “criminal responsibility”? Psychiatrist Sally Satel answers that in a Free Press article:
Massachusetts uses the McHoul standard for insanity. It allows for a determination of “not criminally responsible” if a person with a mental disorder or defect (which every expert agreed Clancy had) lacks either the capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of her conduct or the capacity to conform her conduct to the requirements of the law. If the defendant presents evidence to support her lack of responsibility, the prosecutors bear the burden to prove her responsibility beyond a reasonable doubt. Some thought the prosecutors did not carry this burden; others thought they did.
My response to this as a hard determinist is that no criminal has the ability to change their mind about whether their conduct be right or wrong, regardless of whether they had a diagnosis of being mentally ill. As I’ve said before, since I don’t believe in retributive punishment, if Clancy did the killings, and is thus physically responsible—which she admitted she was—then there are three reasons to either put her in jail or hospitalize her:
- To deter other people from committing the same act. This is not unthinkable because an Illinois woman, who described herself as being “very invested” in the Clancy case, killed her young son and then unsuccessfully tried to kill herself. It’s possible that if Clancy gets off, it could promote similar “copycat” acts.
- To sequester a dangerous person from society. I’m not sure how dangerous Clancy is. Both her age and her physical condition militate against her having further children, but one could argue, I suppose, that she could harm other people’s children, or constitute a danger in other ways.
- To cure her of her illness. This is manifestly possible, I’m told, but we don’t know how long it will take. However long it takes, that’s how long Clancy should be confined. But the moment that several reputable and objective therapists pronounce her as cured, that’s the moment she should walk free.
At any rate, I’ll take a nonscientific poll here, but regardless of whether or how you answer, I’d appreciate any comments below on what you think could happen to Clancy, even if you didn’t listen to six weeks of evidence. Or tell us your thoughts on this very difficult case.
This is a women’s health issue that remains inadequately studied, and it places every therapist, psychologist, and psychiatrist who treats postpartum patients at real risk of liability. That reality alone tells me this case landed in a courtroom that is simply not equipped to hold the emotional and psychological weight it carries.
As a survivor of domestic abuse myself, I am troubled by inconsistencies in Patrick Clancy’s account. His 911 call describes a conversation with Lindsay, yet first responders reportedly found her unresponsive. Why was he not examined more closely as a potential threat in his own right? It is entirely possible that Lindsay believes she killed the children only because he told her she did.
I am also deeply skeptical of the prosecution’s closing argument. The claim that Lindsay “looked fine and happy” in photographs and videos misunderstands what mental illness actually looks like from the outside. I have worked with many hospitalized and incarcerated people who appeared entirely coherent and composed while carrying an internal landscape of suicidal or homicidal ideation. Appearance tells us almost nothing about what is happening beneath it.
As for a pardon from Donald Trump, I question what purpose it would serve. Lindsay Clancy will live the remainder of her life inside a private hell she can never fully leave, and so will her family incarcerated or hospitalized – no legal outcome changes that.
“As a survivor of domestic abuse myself, I am troubled by inconsistencies in Patrick Clancy’s account.”
“It is entirely possible that Lindsay believes she killed the children only because he told her she did.”
Don’t you think that if Patrick Clancy was in any way culpable, her defense attorney would have been all over this?
So what is more likely…
1.) That you as an outside observer, who is only aware of what is filtering through from the media, has in a few seconds of consideration spotted a major flaw in both the defense’s case and the prosecution’s?!
OR
2.) That there is absolutely no evidence linking Patrick Clancy to these murders, as his alibi is probably as airtight as they come.
Also, the fact that you were a victim of domestic abuse may predispose you to assume that the husband is guilty.
“Don’t you think that if Patrick Clancy was in any way culpable, her defense attorney would have been all over this?” And, you know, just possibly, law enforcement, too? (Or is that too ideologically impure?)
It is perfectly possible that she lost consciousness after speaking to Patrick. She told him that the children were in the basement. If she had told him that she had tried to kill them then he could have gone to them faster. One of them only died later in hospital. He has a solid alibi, although some extremists are trying to claim that the video footage from the takeaway was fake, even though she specifically ordered food from there so that he couldn’t divert to somewhere nearer 🤦🏻♀️
I refuse to listen to the 911 call myself, but he discovered the children while he was still on the 911 call and there is a recording of that. From what I’ve heard, no one who listens to it thinks he is faking. A couple of people I know have listened to it and I trust their opinion totally.
I agree that the people who often seem the happiest may be those who are suffering from clinical depression, but I can’t agree that she is living in a private hell. She seemed more concerned about her relationship with Patrick than she did about the children as she asked one of her assessors to lend her his phone to call him.
I don’t know/understand enough about the specific details of the case to have an opinion whether she was in a psychotic state detached from reality. If that is truly the case, then I would say not criminally responsible; otherwise I would say guilty of murder.
Regardless, I completely agree about the three possibilities that you mention at the end, although I am not fully convinced that her conviction would deter a possible copycat. Contagions like this, when happens, may not necessarily happen due to knowing that they might get away. In this regard, I am more concerned about the glorification and moral support Clancy is receiving from some people. The other two points are completely reasonable and they go hand in hand.
I am not sure how I would distinguish “not guilty of murder” from “not criminally responsible for murder”. There is too much reasonable doubt for a guilty verdict.
This is very difficult but if she was/is ill then a hospital is the right place . It’s not the same but the Valdo Calocane case in the UK has some similarities.
Not sure if she is guilty of murder, or if she is not criminally responsible for reason of mental illness or defect. I am sure that she had no choice in the matter, and that one of Jerry’s three potential remedies apply. My guess is that she is not a danger to society at large, leaving options 1 and 3. If the state biases toward deterrence, some sort of confinement would seem to be appropriate. (This could also provide opportunity for treatment.) If the state’s goal is cure, then confinement might or might not be necessary, depending on her mental condition.
All of these considerations might already have been discussed in detail in the Talmud. But, the Talmud (I am told) contains arguments, but rarely conclusions.
I have no major objections of her going free after confinement with treatment. But I have no idea how one determines that someone is no longer insane if they conceal dark thoughts about killing. She should never adapt children, btw.
I personally knew a woman who suffered from postpartum depression. It sucked, but she got over it and was fine (or seemed fine). But I understand that there are different degrees of this. And what about someone who has a pre-existing bipolar disorder and comes down with this? I wonder if that is Clancy.
The idea that Clancy could cause harm against isn’t so relevant here. Almost certainly she can’t. Her suicide attempt left her paralyzed below the sternum. She is confined to a wheelchair and will never walk again. That may be part of the reason eleven jurors were willing to acquit.
Guilty of murder. She understood she had committed a heinous crime and tried to escape the consequences by attempting suicide.
Maybe, or maybe she was consumed with grief at murdering her three children so wanted to die.
I suspect it may be the other way around. She wanted to kill herself and decided to kill the children from a misguided idea that they couldn’t survive without her.
She was extremely competent at killing three people, but has inexplicably proven completely incompetent at killing herself, despite apparently multiple attempts.
It strikes me as odd that someone, especially a highly trained medical professional, could have perfectly planned and executed the killing of three children but completely botched her own planned death.
Put differently, a person with both medical knowledge AND a demonstrated ability to kill should be able to kill themselves, if that is what they truly intended.
What if she didn’t try to kill herself?
Also if someone with bipolar disorder who kills someone (because voices in their head were telling them to), and then tries to kill themself also guilty of murder?
Postpartum psychosis is really a psychotic depression. Severe cases involve delusions, usually involving either the child(ren) or the mother becoming the victim of unspeakable evil. That was always in the form of the devil once, but not necessarily today. Not uncommonly the mother sees herself as the source of evil, perhaps possessed. Killing the child is generally a way of placing them safely in heaven, or at least to prevent their suffering. The mother then kills herself because she knows herself to be evil, but she may feel guilty for the murder, knowing murder is unforgivable, although it seemed like a rational lesser of two evils choice at the time.
We cannot put ourselves in her mind. At best you might believe what I have written above, but then you still have to overcome your disgust at a mother killing her child and understand that she was not responsible. That isn’t easy. Why the USA seems relatively reluctant to accept this compared to other western countries is a subject for debate.
I don’t know enough about the law, the facts of the case, or the particulars of things like post-partum psychosis to make a decision. But, based on my limited understanding of the Massachusetts law in question, the state has the burden of proof to show beyond a reasonable doubt that she was NOT insane. So based on my (very limited) exposure to the facts of the case, there does seem to be reasonable doubts about her sanity, and thus the state does not meet that burden.
But, I maintain that I would need more study of the law (as in what is meant by “reasonable doubt” for instance) and much more exposure to the facts of the case to make an intelligent decision. Depending on the media outlet I view, I often get a very different picture of the facts.
How on earth can her attorney fail to understand that the president has no power to pardon a person for crimes charged under state law?
I’m sure the current President doesn’t know nor care if he has the power. He can SAY anything he wants to, and does.
I’m pretty horrified by the fact that people talk so little of the victims:three little children totally unable to defend themselves. I don’t understand how this woman seems keen to defend herself instead of trying again, day in day out, to kill herself. So I have a doubt, maybe she killed the little ones to hurt her husband – I know she hurt herself too – and now she can go on because she got what she wanted
From what Jerry posted about her case to date, the “cunning murderer” description simply does not fit the facts of the case. I am sorry but I have little patience with the quick-to-judge mentality that seems to be behind a few of these posts. I would hope everyone can at least try to imagine a situation when they would be unable to control their actions. Too little empathy, too much court TV?
She killed three innocent, beautiful children, not only robbing them of their lives but also creating the last image in their minds as the horror of the person they most loved in the world killing them. She knew it was wrong, as evidenced by the attempt to take her own life. She’s guilty and should have received the maximum sentence, regardless of whether she’s a threat to others or not. Was she under stress or had other mental issues? If that’s the yardstick, then every murderer can make a similar case, as who in their right mind would ever kill anyone?
However, for some reason this case captured the hearts and minds of a lot of people, and so it seems controversial.
Just my opinion.
It is remarkable how many people (here and elsewhere) presume to know the mental state of another person, and presume to know that someone knew and could control what they were doing, that they were in control themselves (even though they did something that seems very much against their apparent usual personality and the usual behavior of a human mother). And yet, the jury, who probably have more information about the case, and are in any case by law the trier of fact, seem to have been less convinced. This arrogance born of self-righteous anger is one of the main reasons we have trial by jury, rule of law, presumption of innocence and such things as “not criminally responsible” due to mental illness. And it’s clear that it is necessary and crucial that we have them.
Humans…
Yes.
The criminal law is meant to take out of the hands of private citizens and give to the state the right and responsibility of determining and punishing crime. Unless insanity takes this action out of being a crime, the punishment we as citizens would expect ought to fit the severity of the crime committed. That’s the reason we have notionally agreed to stand back and give to the state this function. Three innocent children have been murdered. The person who has done this, if not innocent by reason of her insanity, should spend the rest of her days in prison.
We should legalize suicide and let her decide if she wants to continue the act, regardless of whether she is hospitalized, incarcerated or set free. If someone wishes to die, they should be allowed to choose a painless option. I understand Switzerland and some of the more progressive countries have this available?
She doesn’t want to complete the act. Reports during her incarceration given during the trial have stated that she is looking to the future and making plans. Presumably the plans don’t include the deceased children that she didn’t ask about when she became conscious in hospital.
Guilty of murder, and deserving of the most severe punishment that the law allows. I believe that the State of Massachusetts does not retain the death penalty, but if it did, I would have no problem with seeing her executed. I may be an outlier on this, but I really don’t care about her state of mind when she committed the crime. Only the end result counts – three small children dead. If she was genuinely psychotic at the time, then absent the death penalty, life imprisonment would be the appropriate sentence in order to protect the public. If she was crazy enough to commit such a hideous act once, she should never be allowed back into society. Call me harsh if you like, but I feel that some crimes are beyond any possible redemption, and this is one of them.
I do not know the factors the pharmaceuticals played.
The manufacturers of the drugs, the physicians, clinical trials, or some link in the chain needs to be evaluated and potentially brought to justice.
If there were risk factors associated with the drugs – these need to be laid out.
That includes a patient going off the drugs.
There’s so many little things even with real simple prescriptions that make a big difference – and that’s just going from common sense / experience.
Huge factor that just keeps this case from settling neatly, IMHO.
Could you explain your free will argument? I don’t understand how you could decide for or against punishment if it is true.
Of course she could’ve done otherwise – not in a anti-deterministic sense but she could’ve complied with taking the medication that was prescribed to her for post-partum psychosis that might’ve altered her brain chemistry such that she didn’t kill her children. What were the presciptions for if not an intervention to manage her PP depression and/or psychosis? If you want to claim her brain was serially forgetful about remembering to take her meds, there are strategies to navigate these (dated pill boxes next to the coffee maker, prescribing physician confirming if she renewed the prescriptions, etc.). That’s not to say the drugs would’ve worked to spare those kids or the prescribing doctors were negligent because patient non-compliance in taking medication as directed is a huge problem but determinism is not necessarily fatalism or inevitability in my conception of it. It would be inevitable if nothing changed that mother’s brain from acting as she did (the meds if taken would’ve worked for her, police intervened, her dr. told the father she might be a risk to the kids so be vigilant, etc.) because those could’ve worked and would also be just as determined but with a different outcome instead of post facto ‘it couldn’t have happened any other way because it didn’t.’
Mass law sucks. A defendant should be required to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. (She didn’t.) Absent that plea, evidence of her insanity is irrelevant and inadmissible. Here she probably got away with “not guilty” arguing that guilt requires sanity (criminal responsibility). The defense should have to plead and prove insanity–a defense. One should be insane only if she doesn’t know right from wrong. We’re in a world where a sympathetic or popular defendant skates.
Pre-trial I thought she was perhaps innocent due to psychosis, but then I listened to all of the evidence. I find it very hard to think that she deliberately murdered her children, but there doesn’t seem to be much evidence for psychosis and there are so many flaws in her case and lies she told. For example saying that they use that far away takeaway regularly, they didn’t. Both the prosecution and the defense made serious errors. For example, if they hadn’t only analyzed her smart watch for the day of the murder then they could have established a lot more about her stress levels and whether she took her watch off every single day at that time, or if she just removed it in preparation for murder. Also there was no explanation about why lemonade suddenly appeared the house.
She contributed to her mental health problems by not following doctors instructions and she refused to take many of the tablets she was prescribed, returning to her two favourite medications rather than listening to doctors.
The specialist witness who discussed the different reasons for suicide seemed to hit the nail on the head. I’ve forgotten the term, it means you want to commit suicide and you take your children with you because you don’t want to leave them alone without you. I suspect that that is what she did, so she is guilty of murder.
I have no doubt whatsoever that she was suffering from very serious postpartum depression, but she is doing a disservice to women with postpartum psychosis by claiming that’s what she had. Even the PPP specialist seemed to have difficulty believing her.
I listened to around 30 hours of trial analysis by two prosecutors on the Prosecutors Podcast. I recommend it for anyone who wants to listen to the details. They didn’t give any personal opinions on her innocence or guilt until closing argument stage.
Fascinating (public) case. I, as a sometime-hydrologist, high school English teacher, determinist, apathist (non-theist), agree with you: forget dark-ages retributive justice; onward with diagnosis/treatment/recovery(cure); release. What are we here for? to make some other clowns feel better, by INCREASING suffering? Run around after undiscovered “copy-cat” illness/behaviour? Keep it functional (“real”): DEAL with her, in her ghastly mess/distress. “There but for the….go I”, we should be saying/celebrating.
This article is the best one I’ve read about the Clancy case. The author is familiar with both Mass law and Clancy’s history of mental illness.
https://substack.com/inbox/post/214207703
The comments are very interesting as well.
I think she is guilty of manslaughter, since she and her husband irresponsibly withheld to therapists her thoughts of harming children, for fear that they would be taken away. That would actually kept them alive. At this point, since she is paralyzed and still needs therapy, I am inclined to support her confinement in a psychiatric hospital, and if she gets cured before a manslaughter sentence end, pass the rest of that time in jail.
Her doctors failed her. She spent months pleading for help and was spiraling downhill from the drugs and they just upped the dose, even when she told her husband and doctors she was having intrusive thoughts of harming her kids. Lock the doctors up too, then.
Personally, I vote for the death penalty. There is a place for punitive punishment, and that is for society to see that people who do terrible things are not permitted to go about their day with their past swept under the rug. This woman killed her children. An infant and toddler. She should be removed from society and from the taxpayer balance sheet.