THE trial of a young mom who killed her three children before attempting suicide has left the public divided over whether she is a calculated murderer or a victim of mismanaged mental health struggles.
Lindsay Clancy, 35, has pleaded not guilty to murder after her kids were found strangled with exercise bands three years ago, as her lawyer plans to argue she was suffering from undiagnosed postpartum psychosis.
On January 24, 2023, Lindsay sent her now ex-husband Patrick Clancy to pick up dinner and medicine from CVS.
While he was out, she strangled their three children â five-year-old daughter Cora, three-year-old son Dawson and eight-month-old son Callan â in the basement of their Duxbury home.
She then jumped from her second-story bedroom window after she crushed up pills and took a knife from the kitchen to slash her wrists and neck.
Patrick found Lindsay on the ground in their backyard when he returned home, and later discovered his three children in the basement, where he removed the exercise bands from their necks.
Lindsay has admitted to killing her children, but her attorney Kevin Reddington, plans to seek an insanity defense.
In the four months leading up to the Clancy childrenâs deaths, Lindsay was prescribed 13 medications by different healthcare providers and was hospitalized several times for suicidal ideation.
Opening statements began in the trial on Monday, where both the prosecution and Lindsayâs lawyer told jurors what to expect to see and hear in the case.
Reddington began talking about Patrick and Lindsayâs relationship and how they lived in a humble house after briefly warning the jury of the caseâs contents.
Skye Lazaro, a Utah-based criminal defense lawyer told The U.S. Sun that Reddingtonâs remarks about the couple were a âbrilliantâ attempt to set the scene of Lindsay as a struggling mother and not a cold blooded killer to the 18 jurors.
âThe reason is, is theyâre sitting there looking at Lindsay in a wheelchair as a defendant in a criminal trial, accused of murdering her children. Him telling the story of this is who these people are.
âTheyâre the people next door. Theyâre the people who are in everybodyâs neighborhood. Theyâre the people that your kids go to preschool with, or your kids go to school with, or your kids play soccer or baseball with.
âThis was a normal, loving family. And, you know, theyâre educated. They had good jobs. They had a great relationship. Everything was normal.
âEverything was okay until she began suffering from this course. Postpartum depression and psychosis. And what that does is it sort of lays the explanation.
âIt lays the bedrock for where theyâre going with this entire trial is this is not a woman whoâs been crazy her whole life,â she said.
Lazaro explained that Reddington highlighting Lindsayâs life before her kids deaths could make the jury think: âOh my gosh, this could be me. You know, this could be me sitting in that chair if things went bad or things got out of control.â
Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham began her opening statements by telling jurors about Coraâs love for princesses and how she tried to convince her Pre-K teacher that her name was Sofia, because she loved the Disney character from the show Sofia the First.
Buckingham then brought up Dawsonâs love of trucks, how he was âfull of energy,â and spoke with a raspy voice. Lastly was Callan, who was âalways smiling with chunky cheeks.â
Lazaro further broke down the tactics used by the attorneys on Monday, saying the prosecution started off by describing the children to âreally get the jury thinking.â
âThey humanize them in a very, very effective way,â she explained, saying the descriptions helped the jury create a visual so when they listen to evidence, theyâre thinking about how there are real people involved.
âTheyâre thinking about this kid who was boisterous, or this kid who played or smiled or loved a color. All of those types of things make it very real in a jury mind.
âSo when theyâre considering evidence and considering what the state is trying to prove and the arguments being made in the back of their mind, theyâre thinking âthese poor three little kids.’â
Lindsay became visibly upset in court, trembling and wiping away tears, as Buckingham talked about her kids in court.
âThe jury is also judging everybody from the second they walk in, including the defendant. And so when sheâs sitting there crying as theyâre talking about their children, that probably helps her,â Lazaro said.
Lazaro said this case isnât about whether Lindsay killed her three children, but instead whether or not she had âthe legal mental intentâ to do so.
The prosecution is trying to prove that Lindsay deliberately took her childrenâs lives, planning it out by sending Patrick out of the house, as Buckingham alleged, Lindsay âgave herself the time and privacy needed to commit the murders.â
âThereâs multiple elements to every crime, but one of the ones thatâs very, very important is this mental state element,â Lazaro explained. âBut what the state has to prove here is that she intentionally and purposely murdered her children.â
Lazaro said the prosecution chose to use strong words in their opening statements to reach the jurors on an emotional level.
Buckingham said Lindsay âcoldly and efficiently executedâ the kids and âthis was not a woman in the throes of psychosis.â
âThey were strangled, deliberately and meticulously, killed by this defendant on January 24th of 2023,â the Plymouth County assistant district attorney said.
âOne by one, she grabbed exercise bands around each one of the kidâs necks and pulled until their little bodies were limp and lifeless.â
âThese other phrases about the execution, I think, really go more to trying to implore upon the jury just how depraved this act was, that this was not just she was out of her mind in a psychosis, that she purposely planned to execute her children or to murder her children,â Lazaro said of Buckinghamâs statements.
When Reddington got up to give opening statements after Buckingham, he immediately addressed the jury, telling them that they were going to see and listen to âthe most horrific things.â
âYou people will never forget this case,â he told the jury of 12 women and six men.
âI think that immediately gets people on the edge of their seats,â Lazaro told The U.S. Sun.
âThereâs a couple of things you want to do [as] an effective defense attorney in trial. You want to take the sting out of things that are not helpful to you, because if you say them first, you can kind of pass them off a little bit, like weâre aware of that.â
âAnytime you can invoke passion, which I think he did a very good job of doing, I think itâs far more effective,â she said.
Lindsay Clancy Murder Trial
Lindsay Clancy is accused of strangling her three children, Cora, five, Dawson, three, and eight-month-old Callan, with exercise bands inside their Duxbury, Massachusetts, home on January 24, 2023.
The former labor and delivery nurse does not deny killing them, but has pleaded not guilty and claims she was not criminally responsible because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis.
Prosecutors argue Clancy deliberately sent her then-husband Patrick out to collect medicine and dinner so she could be left alone with the children.
The trial began with Patrick on the witness stand, describing Clancyâs declining mental health before recounting how he returned home, found her injured outside and discovered the children in the basement. Jurors have since heard his harrowing 911 call, seen the bands that were removed from the childrenâs necks and viewed their pajamas and other evidence from the home.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
- Lindsay Clancyâs murder trial is expected to last between six and eight weeks, meaning testimony could continue well into September.
- Proceedings are scheduled to begin at around 9am ET on sitting days and normally continue through the afternoon, with morning, lunch and afternoon breaks.
- Prosecutors will present their case first, calling first responders, police officers, investigators, medical professionals and other witnesses connected to the killings.
- The state listed more than 180 potential witnesses, although prosecutors are not expected to call everyone named.
- Jurors are also expected to visit the Clancy familyâs former Duxbury home with the judge and lawyers to see the scene for themselves.
- Once prosecutors rest, Clancyâs defense will begin calling its own witnesses, including people who knew her and experts expected to testify about her medication, mental health and alleged postpartum psychosis.
- The defense listed more than 60 possible witnesses, but some overlap with the prosecutionâs list and may not be called twice.
- After both sides finish presenting evidence, lawyers will deliver closing arguments before the judge instructs jurors on the law.
- The jury will then decide whether Clancy is guilty of murder or was not criminally responsible because of her mental state when she killed her children.
In his remarks, Reddington also shared graphic images from the case, including closeups of Lindsayâs injuries and the bloody knife she used left on a table.
Lazaro said the defense can âacknowledge all the bad facts before the prosecution,â and by him showing the photos early on, it again takes âthe sting out of it.â
âIt really diminishes their impact for the prosecution because theyâre still going to be thinking, yeah, we already know this. He already told us this.â
Patrick, Lindsayâs now-ex-husband, was the first witness to testify in the trial, which Lazaro explained the first witness is âalways a strategic decision.â
She believes Patrick was called first to help lay out the trial by having him recall what he observed that fateful day and all of the events that unfolded.
Lazaro said as the trial goes forward, the prosecution will âhone in on to show that this this was not a psychotic break. This was not a product of postpartum depression,â as they argue their case.
On the flipside, the defense will set up how âthe system failedâ the Clancy family.






















