Lindsay Clancy strangled her three children — Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months — at their Duxbury, Massachusetts home on January 24, 2023, then jumped from a second-story window in a suicide attempt that left her paraplegic. She doesn't dispute killing them; she pleaded not guilty on the grounds that postpartum psychosis made her not criminally responsible. After roughly seven days of deliberation, the jury told Judge William Sullivan it couldn't reach a unanimous verdict. Defense attorney Kevin Reddington then filed an emergency appeal asking the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court to individually question or remove the holdout juror before any mistrial. The SJC denied it Friday afternoon, and Judge Sullivan declared a mistrial the same day. He wants a retrial "sooner rather than later," and Clancy is due back in court September 29.

1. The Defense (Kevin Reddington, Dr. Phillip Resnick)

One juror, not the facts, is why this isn't over.

The jury actually reached a verdict, and it got thrown out. Reddington says jurors voted 11-1 to find Clancy not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility, and that a single holdout blocked it.

That holdout was biased, not just unconvinced. The defense's emergency motion argued the juror was ignoring the judge's instructions on reasonable doubt in a way that "reflects a bias against those who suffer from debilitating mental illness." It accused Judge Sullivan of having "abdicated its responsibility" by not investigating the juror further, calling a mistrial "entirely avoidable."

Their own expert says Clancy wasn't in control. Forensic psychiatrist Dr. Phillip Resnick testified Clancy was like a "puppet," her body driven by delusion. He said she was unable to conform her conduct to the law.

Reddington isn't hiding his anger. He told reporters jurors "were robbed — by one man — for whatever his agenda was, who stole seven weeks of the life of these other jurors."

2. The Prosecution (DA Timothy Cruz, ADA Jennifer Sprague)

She knew what she was doing, and the case is about her kids, not the health care system.

This was planned, not a psychotic break. Prosecutors say Clancy tracked her husband's errand timing and killed the children during his roughly 30-minute absence — evidence they argue shows premeditation. ADA Jennifer Sprague told jurors, "She knew what she did was wrong. She could conform her behavior to the law and chose not to."

Cruz is drawing a hard line against the bigger debate. Reporters asked DA Timothy Cruz about the maternal mental health questions swirling around the case. He said, "the case is not about a health care system, or about how women are treated in it," but "about Lindsay Clancy, and what she did on January 24, 2023."

The victims are the point, he says. Cruz added: "It is our job to make sure the victims are not invisible. I am a father and a grandfather, and I cannot imagine the hell this entire family has lived through."

3. Maternal Mental Health Advocates and Clinicians (Dr. Veerle Bergink, Dr. Susan Hatters Friedman, Meghan Cliffel)

Whatever the verdict says, doctors missed this case.

Clancy's own records show a textbook case that nobody caught. Before the killings she'd had psychiatric consultations, outpatient treatment, and a five-day inpatient stay at McLean Hospital, plus a drug regimen that included Zoloft, Seroquel and Valium. No provider diagnosed postpartum psychosis.

That's a training gap, not bad luck, one specialist says. Dr. Veerle Bergink, who directs the Women's Mental Health Center at Mount Sinai's Icahn School of Medicine, called it "a very classical, typical story of a woman with postpartum psychosis not being diagnosed," adding, "we don't train our doctors in it, that it's massively missed."

The diagnosis barely exists on paper — that's part of the problem. Dr. Susan Hatters Friedman, a reproductive and forensic psychiatrist at Case Western Reserve University, calls postpartum psychosis "the scariest mental illness that I know of" and notes it isn't even listed as its own diagnosis in the DSM.

Advocates say attention like this shouldn't need a tragedy first. Postpartum psychosis survivor and advocate Meghan Cliffel argues real change means building "a system of care ... centered around the family's wellbeing" — not reacting only after children die.

Where This Lands

The defense says a biased holdout juror threw out an 11-1 acquittal vote and that Clancy was never in control of her own actions. The prosecution says she planned the killings and wants the case to stay about accountability for three children, not a referendum on health care. Maternal mental health specialists point to Clancy's own treatment history: real appointments, real hospitalization, no diagnosis. They say it shows a system that keeps missing this illness until it's too late. Cruz hasn't said whether he'll retry Clancy or pursue lesser charges. Judge Sullivan has already said he wants any retrial done "sooner rather than later," so a second jury could hear all three arguments again by fall.

Sources