Women on Trial

On January 24, 2023, Lindsay Clancy fatally strangled her three children—five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson, and eight-month-old Callan—at the family's home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, United States. She then cut her wrists and neck and jumped from a second-story window, sustaining injuries that left her paralyzed from the waist down. Lindsay later said she heard an auditory hallucination commanding her to commit the acts and felt unable to resist. Lindsay was prosecuted for three counts of murder in a criminal trial that began on July 20, 2026. Although she did not deny killing her children, her defense argued that she had been suffering from postpartum psychosis and bipolar disorder and therefore lacked criminal responsibility. Much of the trial focused on her mental health in the months before the deaths, during which she repeatedly sought treatment for symptoms including insomnia, intrusive thoughts, and suicidal ideation. Prosecutors alleged that Lindsay was mentally aware at the time of the killings and that her actions beforehand, including sending her husband out on an errand, demonstrated methodical planning. They emphasized that she reported hearing the commanding voice only on the day of the killings and that none of her clinicians reported observing psychosis. After nearly seven weeks of trial, the jury reported that it was deadlocked. The jury foreperson informed judge William F. Sullivan that a single holdout juror might be disregarding his instructions on reasonable doubt. After defense attorney Kevin Reddington tried and failed to have the juror removed, Sullivan formally declared a mistrial on September 4, 2026. The next hearing is scheduled for November 2. The case attracted significant media attention and wide discussion of postpartum mental illness and criminal responsibility. Both Lindsay and her former husband, Patrick Clancy, filed civil lawsuits against her former healthcare providers, alleging that medical malpractice and negligence had contributed to the deaths of their children.