Aug. 26, 2026
Lindsay Clancy: Before The Verdict
Legal Responsibility and Mental Health
The trial of Lindsay Clancy hinges on the legal definition of responsibility for one’s actions while experiencing profound psychiatric distress. David McClam notes that while the defense does not contest that Lindsay committed the acts that caused the deaths of her three children, the core issue for the jury is whether she was criminally responsible at that moment. Massachusetts law dictates that a defendant is not responsible if a mental disease or defect prevented them from understanding the wrongfulness of their conduct or conforming their behavior to the law. The prosecution argues that Lindsey was organized and manipulative, citing her daily activities as evidence of intent, while the defense contends that the ability to function on a surface level does not equate to sanity.
The Role of Expert Testimony and Prosecution Strategy
Conflicting psychiatric testimony dominates the proceedings as both sides attempt to interpret Lindsay's state of mind. David McClam points out that the Commonwealth’s own witnesses acknowledged her significant mental illness, which complicates the prosecution’s effort to prove she possessed the capacity for control. Furthermore, the defense has effectively used expert testimony to argue that her psychiatric deterioration was a clear, documented trajectory. Tensions have occasionally spiked in the courtroom due to controversial tactics, such as the introduction of religious doctrine regarding mortal sin and disputes over the tone of comments made during autopsy testimony, which some observers suggest may undermine the prosecution’s credibility.
Investigation and Systemic Failures
A major theme in the defense’s strategy is the argument that law enforcement failed to conduct a sufficiently thorough investigation into the “why” behind the tragedy. David McClam explains that the defense claims police arrived at a predetermined conclusion without examining the full context of Lindsay’s ongoing struggle with postpartum mental health and the medical failures leading up to the event. This discussion highlights a broader systemic issue, questioning what more can be expected of individuals in crisis who already seek help. By focusing on the gaps in both the criminal investigation and the broader mental healthcare support system, the case serves as a point of reflection for how society treats those experiencing severe maternal mental health crises.
Transcript
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[SPEAKER_00]: I believe the Lindsey class he case could become one of the most important modern criminal cases involving maternal mental health.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But because millions of people are watching a jury confront something our criminal justice system struggles terribly with.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Where does mental illness end and criminal responsibility begin?
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[SPEAKER_00]: Perhaps the most frightening thing we have heard throughout this trial is that someone experiencing severe mental illness does not necessarily look psychotic every second of the day.
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[SPEAKER_00]: A person may make lunch, a person may send a text message, a person may care for a child, a person may answer questions normally, and yet still be profoundly psychiatrically ill.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to True Crime, offers and extraordinary people.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The podcast where we bring two passions together.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The show that gives new meaning to the old adage.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Truth is stranger than fiction, and reminding you that there is an extraordinary person in all of us.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Here is your host, David McClam.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Let's go everybody, welcome to another episode of True Crime.
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[SPEAKER_00]: All the story that people, of course, I'm your man.
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[SPEAKER_00]: David McClellan, maybe having already mentioned you follow us on all of our social medias.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Please, leave this episode and call 988.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It is a suicide prevention hotline.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They can get you the help that you need.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And in case no one else has told you this today, let me be the first one to tell you, I do care.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And I do need you to be here.
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[SPEAKER_00]: There is nothing worth yours or someone else's.
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[SPEAKER_00]: life.
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[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So sorry.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I've been gone for so long.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I think I kind of alluded to my skills all over the place.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Summer came and a lot of things happen.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So for those of you that's still tearing with me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully I'm back at full capacity now.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Also to anyone that has written me want to come on the show.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sorry if I did not get back to you, but I have been a little bit of
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[SPEAKER_00]: And also, as you mind, everyone, if you are trying to come on the show, please only go to my website to do so or write me a true crime and authors at gmail.com.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Some requests I have found has been going to some old email address that has never been associated with the show, so I don't know how you guys are finding that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: If you're Googling me, it is possible that that email comes up.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Or if you go to the be a guest link on my website, that is the only way that you're going to be guaranteed that I'm going to see it and get back to you.
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[SPEAKER_00]: For those of you that's already written me, I promise I'm getting back to you starting this week and apologize, but I've been gone.
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[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so I just want to give you guys that I'm glad to be back a lot to talk about because I have been following a case that is now 21 days in and you caught it on the intro coming in and we are about to talk about that case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm only going to kind of talk about a little bit because I'm going to give you the full case after the verdict is over, the verdict should be about two, three days.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This case has gone 21 days and I started watching it the beginning.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But then what happened is on that first day, I think it's not more than 45 minutes in the judge's like everybody's going home.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So because of that, I decided to let the case kind of pile up a little bit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So I could kind of binge it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Well, before I knew it, there are already what 12 13 days in at that point.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And one of my wife's friends who I hope to have on the show, she's a friend of family, Shauna is also watching this case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Pretty much her whole life went on hold for this case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And so we started talking about the case, and I called up to where we are now, which is live.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So today, I'm going to talk about Lindsey Clancy before the verdict.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I've written down a lot of stuff, so let's go ahead and start.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now before I do begin today, I want to give you a warning.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This case does involve the deaths of three very young children, suicide, severe mental illness, postpartum mental health and testimony that has been extremely difficult to hear.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The children at the center of this case were five-year-old Koraklancy, three-year-old Dawson Clancy, and eight-month-old Talon Clancy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever your feelings are about their mother, whatever verdict you believe should eventually come back, those three children observed to be remembered first.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because tomorrow closing our business began in one of the most unusual emotional and my opinion, important mental health criminal trials we have seen in years.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And tonight, before this case goes to the jury, I want to talk about what we have actually learned, not TikTok rumors, not fan clubs, not hate campaigns, not whether you like Lindsey Clancy, and not whether you feel sorry for her, I want to talk about the evidence, I want to talk about the prosecution, I want to talk about Kevin Ratington and what I think has
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[SPEAKER_00]: I want to talk about Judge William Sullivan and the almost impossible job he has had trying to keep this trial under control.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We need to talk about the moments when that control nearly disappeared.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We need to talk about the controversy surrounding Lindsey's former husband Patrick Clancy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And most importantly, we need to talk about the question the jury actually has to answer.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because that question is not simply that Lindsey Clancy killed her children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Her defense is not claiming that somebody else came in to that house and killed them.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The question is, was Lindsey Clancy criminally responsible when she did it?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And those are two profoundly different questions.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now on January 24, 2023, Patrick Clancy left the family's dugsberry Massachusetts home
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[SPEAKER_00]: When he returned, he found Lindsay seriously injured outside the house after she apparently jumped from a second story window.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Inside the basement where there are three children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Coran Dawson were pronounced dead that night.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Callen survived for several days before he also died.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay survived her fall but suffered catastrophic spinal injuries that left her paralyzed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She was later charged with the murders of all three children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It almost immediately, this case stopped looking like a conventional murder prosecution, because Lindsey had been deteriorating mentally for months.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She had repeatedly sought professional help.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She had been hospitalized.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She had contacted crisis services.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She had struggled with depression, anxiety,
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[SPEAKER_00]: And doing a possibly four months before the killings, record show she received more than 30 prescriptions involved in 13 different psychiatric medications from multiple healthcare providers.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That does not automatically mean the medication calls what happened.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It does not automatically stay up to psychosis, but it makes one thing extremely difficult to argue.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This was not a woman who had absolutely nothing psychiatically wrong with her until the night her children died.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Even the prosecutions on experts have ultimately acknowledged the nifigate mental illness, and that is where this trial became something much bigger than another murder case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now believe the Lindsey class he case could become one of the most important modern criminal cases involving maternal mental health, not necessarily because he creates new law, but because millions of people are watching a jury confront something our criminal justice system struggles terribly with.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Where does mental illness and and criminal responsibility begin?
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[SPEAKER_00]: postpartum psychosis is rare, but rare does not mean imaginary.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It is a psychiatric emergency that can involve hallucinations, delusions, paranoia, severe confusion, and dramatic changes in behavior.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And perhaps the most frightening thing we have heard throughout this trial is that someone experiencing severe mental illness does not necessarily look psychotic every second of
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[SPEAKER_00]: a person may make lunch, a person may send a text message, a person may care for a child, a person may answer questions normally, and yet still be profoundly psychiatric, ill. That issue has hovered over this entire trial because prosecutors repeatedly pointed toward things Lindsey could still do normally.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She built a snowman.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She took one of her children to a doctor's appointment.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She communicated normally at different points that day.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution says those are signs of organization, planning, and controlled.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The defendant says functioning is not the same thing as sanity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The law is critical here, because this is where people watching this trial need to understand Massachusetts law.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey Clancy does not have the burden of proving to the jury that she was in saying.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Once a lack of criminal responsibility is properly at issue, the Commonwealth carries the burden.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Massachusetts law says that a defendant is not criminally responsible if she suffered from a mental disease or defect and because of that condition, lack the substantial capacity, either to appreciate the criminality or won'tfulness of her conduct or to conform her conduct to the requirements of the law.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Notice something very important.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It is OR.
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, the Commonwealth has to prove criminal responsibility beyond a reasonable doubt.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And Massachusetts goes even further.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Simply knowing intellectually that something is illegal is not necessarily enough.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The law talks about meaningfully appreciating is legal or moral wrongfulness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That is why the psychiatric testimony in this trial matters so much.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The jury is not being asked whether Lindsey knew what an exercise band was.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They are not simply being asked whether she understood that her children were physically dying.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They are being asked what her diseased mind was capable of appreciating and controlling at that moment.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That is much harder question.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So prosecutors, Jennifer, Spray, and Shannon Buckingham have argued that Lindsey was deliberate, organized, a manipulative.
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[SPEAKER_00]: In opening statements, Buckingham portrayed her as highly controlling and meticulous schedules, food, sleep, children's routines.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The Commonwealth argues Lindsay intends to lead engineered Patrick Absen from the House by sending him on errands, giving herself enough time to kill the children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They argue that what happened after it was not simply the chaotic act of a woman completely attacked from reality.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And prosecutors have challenged one of the biggest pillars of the defense.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The alleged male voice Lizzy says commander her to kill the children and then herself.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their experts have pointed out inconsistencies concerning exactly when that voice began, how Lizzy described it and the unusual claim that the voice appeared for such a short period surrounding the killings.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Kirk Hillburn testified that he believed Lindsay had a amount of disorder but remained criminally responsible.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Ava Mag believes she had suffered
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[SPEAKER_00]: And the Commonwealth's final witness for Princess psychiatrist Dr. Gregory Seedhoff testified that Lindsey was mentally ill but still capable of understanding right from wrong and controlling her actions.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That is the Commonwealth's case in a strongest form.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay was sick.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But being sick is not enough.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still new.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still planned.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still controlled herself.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, according to the prosecution, she remains criminally responsible.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But the question here is, did the prosecution help the defense?
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, this is where I think this trial became fascinating.
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[SPEAKER_00]: because there have been moments when I believe the commonwealth's own case has done Kevin Redington's work for him.
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[SPEAKER_00]: One of the biggest examples came right at the end.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Seahoff was a prosecution witness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yet, during his testimony, he acknowledged the seriousness of Lindsey's psychiatric condition and reportedly agreed that the prosecution's opening characterization of Lindsey as manipulating health care providers minimized what she had actually been going through.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Think about that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution began this trial painting Lindsey as someone carefully manipulating doctors.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But by the end, one of their own psychiatric experts was acknowledging the depth of her psychiatric suffering.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution also called a huge number of witnesses, more than 70.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The defense called roughly 10.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That can work for the Commonwealth because they create detail and corroboration, but there is another danger.
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[SPEAKER_00]: When the central dispute is not who did it, repetitive testimony about the crime scene, injuries, and aftermath can begin to appear less like proving an element, and more like trying to make the jury emotionally unable to acquit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Reddington complained about that before the trial.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He essentially said, we still stipulate to what happened.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He accused the government of attempting to create what he called a circus designed to inflame the jury.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Whether jurors agree with him is another matter, but the strategy carries risk.
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, because the more aggressive prosecutors appear, the easier it becomes her redding tint to portray Lindsey, not as somebody is escaping responsibility, but as a severely ill woman being prosecuted, without sufficient regard, well, what happens psychologically?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then came the courtroom controversies.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This was one of the strangest moments in the trial.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey's former mother-in-law Susan Clancy testified for the defense.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Susan described Lindsey as a wonderful, nurturing mother who had begun deteriorating in late 2022.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She said, Lindsey was in her words begging for help.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And during cross-examination, prosecutors Shannon Buckingham began questioning Susan about the families Catholic faith in attending church.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then Buckingham asked whether Susan was aware that murder is considered a moral sin.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And before Susan could answer, Judge Sullivan stopped everything.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Sidebar.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The question was struck, and Sullivan specifically instructed the jury not to consider it for any reason or purpose.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That alone was remarkable.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But then, religion entered the trial again.
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[SPEAKER_00]: During prosecution Esberg Kirk Heraldberg's testimony, he referred to Lindsey being Ray's Catholic and discussed suicide as a mortal sin.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Readington immediately objected, and this time he asked for a mistrial, he accused a prosecution of intentional misconduct, and Judge Sullivan refused to end the trial, but he was clearly unhappy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He instructs the jury that the religious material was irrelevant and inappropriate in order them to disregard it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Legal commentators have questioned the prosecution's approach because a person's Catholic doctrine is not the legal standard for criminal responsibility.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The jury applies Massachusetts law, not church doctrine, and I believe this could become an important issue if there is eventually an appeal.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But even before an appeal, prosecutors have to ask themselves whether those moments hurt their credibility with this jury, because you never want jurors one new why you are reaching for something.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The judge keeps telling them they cannot consider.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now then, there was the moment that exploded online.
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[SPEAKER_00]: During extremely graphic optopsy testimony, Lindsey became visibly overwhelmed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She sawed the court had to take breaks, and at one point she could be heard saying, I can't do it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The following day, Kevin read into the race and accusation and opened court.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He said someone associated with the prosecution had been caught on a hot microphone saying
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[SPEAKER_00]: Rednting was furious, and when Judd Sullivan initially tried to take the issue to sidebar, Rednton resisted.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He said he did not want to go to sidebar.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He compares the idea of silencing Lindsey to the handmaid's tale.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But there isn't an important fact that must be included.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The district attorney's office disputes Rednton's interpretation.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their spokesperson says the
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[SPEAKER_00]: And that the comment referred to me moving the optopsi photographs from the courtroom monitor.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They also say that remark did not come from either prosecutor.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So I am not going to tell you that a prosecutor definitely said, shed her up.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We don't have enough to say that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But we can say is that the incident became serious enough that just Sullivan later issued a broad warning.
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[SPEAKER_00]: No inappropriate or disruptive comments in his courtroom.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Anyone responsible them could be removed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was one of those rare moments when the temperature in an otherwise remarkably controlled courtroom suddenly shot through the ceiling, but I have to say that my own ears when they played that back, it definitely sounded like shut her up to me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And now that brings me to attorney Kevin Reddington, whatever verdict you believe should
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[SPEAKER_00]: He understood from the beginning that trying to convince jurors that Lindsey did not kill these children would destroy his credibility.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So he didn't.
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[SPEAKER_00]: His strategy has been brutally straightforward.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, something horrific happened.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, Lindsey calls it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, answer why.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That single question has allowed him to turn virtually every witness back toward Lindsay's psychiatric condition.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Doctors, hospital workers, family, medication records, psychiatrists.
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[SPEAKER_00]: psychologists, the months before January 24, the cries for help, the changes in behavior, the insomnia, the suicidal thoughts, the fear that something was wrong with her, and perhaps most importantly, he has a tactic idea that somebody cannot be psychotic if they occasionally appear normal.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because that'sburg Dr. Philip Resonate is particularly
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[SPEAKER_00]: Resonate has extraordinary experience involving maternal philosophies and previously testified in the Andrea Yates case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: His conclusion here was that Lindsey was psychotic and experiencing hallucinations and delusional thinking when she killed the children.
21:26.964 --> 21:33.290
[SPEAKER_00]: Redington also aggressively challenged the commonwealth's expert about their actual experience with postpartum psychosis.
21:34.060 --> 21:48.871
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Heraldburn acknowledged extremely limited experience treating the condition including that his last such treatment experience date of back decades and acknowledged receiving approximately $54,000 for his work in this case.
21:49.831 --> 21:51.432
[SPEAKER_00]: Then there was Dr. Aver Mac.
21:52.333 --> 21:58.838
[SPEAKER_00]: Their cross examination became so heated that ridden finally stopped and asked, what are you smiling for?
21:59.278 --> 22:00.399
[SPEAKER_00]: This is not funny, sir.
22:01.957 --> 22:06.659
[SPEAKER_00]: Judge Sullivan had to intervene multiple times and direct back to answer the questions being answered.
22:07.379 --> 22:16.402
[SPEAKER_00]: That was one of the few times we saw Reddington Jr. lose, so if his usual courtroom restraint, another came during the optopsia injury testimony.
22:17.182 --> 22:24.105
[SPEAKER_00]: As Lindsey repeatedly broke down, Reddington objected several times and became visibly frustrated.
22:24.765 --> 22:26.986
[SPEAKER_00]: For most of this trial, he has been controlled.
22:31.485 --> 22:36.608
[SPEAKER_00]: Now let's talk about Judge William F. Sullivan, because he deserves his own discussion.
22:37.428 --> 22:44.992
[SPEAKER_00]: I have watched plenty of trials where judges turn the courtroom into a second prosecution table or practically become another defense attorney.
22:46.172 --> 22:48.874
[SPEAKER_00]: I've also settled Jerry's, but did the same thing.
22:49.959 --> 22:52.041
[SPEAKER_00]: I do not think that is what happened here.
22:52.722 --> 22:55.764
[SPEAKER_00]: Sullivan has struck me as extraordinarily patient.
22:56.545 --> 22:59.228
[SPEAKER_00]: He has allowed both sides room to make their case.
22:59.888 --> 23:02.931
[SPEAKER_00]: He has stopped testimony when Lindsey became overwhelmed.
23:03.531 --> 23:09.397
[SPEAKER_00]: But at the same time, he'd be peeling me mindedure is that sympathy cannot decide this case.
23:10.872 --> 23:23.341
[SPEAKER_00]: When Lindsey saw doing the testimony about her children's injuries, selling the scent jurors out, allowed the situation to settle, and then reminded them that their verdict cannot be based on sympathy, anger, passion, or prejudice.
23:24.240 --> 23:26.802
[SPEAKER_00]: That is exactly what he judge is supposed to do.
23:27.563 --> 23:41.816
[SPEAKER_00]: Protect the defenders right to participate, protect the jury from emotional contamination, protect their prosecutions right to present relevant evidence, and protect the children's case from becoming laws in the mental health debate.
23:42.697 --> 23:45.439
[SPEAKER_00]: But even Judge Sullivan has had his limits.
23:46.400 --> 23:48.803
[SPEAKER_00]: The religious references clearly bothered him.
23:49.451 --> 23:58.059
[SPEAKER_00]: The second incident earned the prosecution of direct reprimand, and the hot mic controversy resulted in a courtroom wide warning.
23:58.860 --> 24:04.265
[SPEAKER_00]: And Sullivan has also corrected Reddington and Reddington became too aggressive or argumentative.
24:04.946 --> 24:05.826
[SPEAKER_00]: That is important.
24:06.747 --> 24:09.470
[SPEAKER_00]: Being a fair judge does not mean agreeing with everybody.
24:10.171 --> 24:14.575
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes fairness looks like making everybody at council table equally unhappy.
24:15.492 --> 24:19.676
[SPEAKER_00]: Now there's a question, did police decide what happened too quickly?
24:20.477 --> 24:25.982
[SPEAKER_00]: Because another theme, Redington has increasingly emphasized, is the investigation itself.
24:27.243 --> 24:31.467
[SPEAKER_00]: His argument is essentially, police arrived at a horrific scene.
24:32.189 --> 24:40.591
[SPEAKER_00]: Three children, dead or dying, their mother was critically injured, and investigators rapidly concluded that they knew what happened.
24:41.311 --> 24:45.052
[SPEAKER_00]: What Reninton says they did not adequately investigate was why.
24:45.812 --> 24:50.473
[SPEAKER_00]: Today, as testimony ended, his theme became especially clear.
24:51.493 --> 24:58.055
[SPEAKER_00]: There was no investigation in his view into Lindsey Psychiatric Condition sufficient to explain the event.
24:59.165 --> 25:08.310
[SPEAKER_00]: Judd Sullivan declined to give a special jury instructions concerning a layered shortcomings in the investigation, but he will allow ready to argue those shortcomings during closing.
25:09.210 --> 25:18.755
[SPEAKER_00]: That could become one of tomorrow's most important arguments, because investigators apparently even floated a theory that psychologists Paul Zazel
25:22.989 --> 25:26.895
[SPEAKER_00]: But testimony established police found no evidence supporting that theory.
25:27.656 --> 25:33.023
[SPEAKER_00]: Insysel testified that he did not coach Lindsey and did not tell her what to say.
25:34.085 --> 25:36.789
[SPEAKER_00]: And that takes us into another controversy.
25:37.538 --> 25:41.540
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, you will sometimes hear people say, why are we even having this trial?
25:42.040 --> 25:42.921
[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey confessed.
25:43.701 --> 25:45.182
[SPEAKER_00]: That needs clarification.
25:45.922 --> 25:48.864
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense is not denying that Lindsey killed the children.
25:49.484 --> 25:51.365
[SPEAKER_00]: Kevin Reditton has said that openly.
25:51.945 --> 25:56.247
[SPEAKER_00]: That is very different from saying there was some conventional police interrogation.
25:56.648 --> 26:02.891
[SPEAKER_00]: It was Lindsey gave detectives a recorded, detailed confession while competent and able to be questioned.
26:03.742 --> 26:06.223
[SPEAKER_00]: her defense conceded the physical acts.
26:06.823 --> 26:09.784
[SPEAKER_00]: Their argument is about legal responsibility for them.
26:10.504 --> 26:18.667
[SPEAKER_00]: And while Lindsey was hospitalized after the killings, Redington obtained a court order allowing psychologists Paul Zayzel access to her.
26:19.607 --> 26:24.489
[SPEAKER_00]: Doing one of those visits, Lindsay asked to use Sicell's phone to call Patrick.
26:25.009 --> 26:26.389
[SPEAKER_00]: Patrick eventually answered.
26:27.169 --> 26:34.832
[SPEAKER_00]: Sicell testified that Lindsay told Patrick he loved him and that she had heard of Mel voice ordering her to kill the children and then herself.
26:35.672 --> 26:39.173
[SPEAKER_00]: Sicell testified that he did not suggest that account to her.
26:39.933 --> 26:45.755
[SPEAKER_00]: So when people say simply, she confessed, they can accidentally erase the actual legal issue.
26:46.395 --> 26:50.637
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense is not asking the jury to find that somebody else committed these acts.
26:51.338 --> 26:58.282
[SPEAKER_00]: They are asking the jury to find that the common world has failed to prove Lindsey was criminally responsible when she committed them.
26:59.022 --> 27:02.184
[SPEAKER_00]: Those are not remotely the same defense.
27:03.520 --> 27:17.774
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we have to enter on countable territory, because there is a growing online movement arguing that Patrick Clancy either killed the children himself, participated somehow, or knows more that he has admitted.
27:18.697 --> 27:25.640
[SPEAKER_00]: I have seen those theories, I know many of you have seen them as well, but here is where I have to draw a line.
27:26.260 --> 27:33.964
[SPEAKER_00]: There is currently no credible, publicly established evidence proving Patrick Clancy participated in the deaths of his children.
27:34.804 --> 27:44.589
[SPEAKER_00]: He has not been charged, he has not been identified by authorities as responsible, and Lindsey's own defense has not presented Patrick as the secret killer.
27:45.657 --> 27:54.481
[SPEAKER_00]: social media speculation has become so intense that Patrick attorney, how a Cooper issued a warning over accusations being circulated against him.
27:55.401 --> 27:58.403
[SPEAKER_00]: Does that mean nobody is allowed to ask questions about Patrick?
27:59.243 --> 28:00.003
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course not.
28:00.704 --> 28:03.125
[SPEAKER_00]: It is completely legitimate to examine the timeline.
28:03.785 --> 28:05.846
[SPEAKER_00]: It is legitimate to examine his statements.
28:06.386 --> 28:09.007
[SPEAKER_00]: It is legitimate to ask what police investigated.
28:09.588 --> 28:09.728
[SPEAKER_00]: It is
28:15.398 --> 28:25.950
[SPEAKER_00]: Those are questions about an investigation, but saying police should have investigated this borethorly is different from saying Patrick murdered his children.
28:26.611 --> 28:31.336
[SPEAKER_00]: We cannot leap across the canyon without evidence, and ironically we don't need to.
28:32.144 --> 28:40.610
[SPEAKER_00]: because the potential and adequacy of an investigation can matter to the defense even if Patrick can absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the deaths.
28:41.251 --> 28:44.613
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm going to let you guys know what's my already is a lot do have some questions.
28:45.054 --> 29:00.225
[SPEAKER_00]: This is just a preview before we get the verdict, but when I come back and do the whole case, believe me, we will examine these questions of Patrick Clancy, and I will tell you exactly what I think when it comes to this case, when it comes to him.
29:01.166 --> 29:04.627
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the case that may have heard the coming wealth the most.
29:05.507 --> 29:11.608
[SPEAKER_00]: See, to me, the coming wealth's biggest problem is something surprisingly simple.
29:13.129 --> 29:18.630
[SPEAKER_00]: After five weeks of testimony, they have largely stopped arguing that Lindsey was mentally healthy.
29:19.430 --> 29:22.891
[SPEAKER_00]: Their own experts recognize serious psychiatric illness.
29:23.651 --> 29:28.132
[SPEAKER_00]: That means the battlefield has narrowed dramatically where she's sick,
29:29.225 --> 29:31.427
[SPEAKER_00]: isn't increasingly difficult to say no.
29:32.368 --> 29:38.412
[SPEAKER_00]: The question becomes, how sick was she at the precise moment her children died?
29:39.733 --> 29:54.645
[SPEAKER_00]: And can become a well-proved beginner reasonable doubt that despite that disease or defect she retains a substantial capacity both to understand the roughness of what she was doing and to control her behavior according to law.
29:56.178 --> 30:01.542
[SPEAKER_00]: that as far more difficult prosecution than she planned it, therefore she was saying.
30:02.523 --> 30:11.831
[SPEAKER_00]: Knowing something physically happened, a meaningfully appreciating as moral wealth on this are not necessarily identical concepts under Massachusetts law.
30:12.791 --> 30:16.675
[SPEAKER_00]: That is exactly why the jury instructions matter so much.
30:18.076 --> 30:20.297
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, there is another danger in this trial.
30:21.275 --> 30:25.636
[SPEAKER_00]: A mental health defense can accidentally turn the defendant into the entire story.
30:26.536 --> 30:27.036
[SPEAKER_00]: She isn't.
30:27.957 --> 30:32.918
[SPEAKER_00]: Quar was five, Dawson was three, Kallen was eight months old.
30:33.698 --> 30:39.119
[SPEAKER_00]: Three children lost their lives, Patrick lost all the children in a single night.
30:39.700 --> 30:45.741
[SPEAKER_00]: Their grandparents lost three grandchildren, entire families were destroyed, understanding
30:49.830 --> 30:56.194
[SPEAKER_00]: Likewise, remembering the children does not require us to pretend severe mental illness does not exist.
30:57.275 --> 31:00.237
[SPEAKER_00]: Both realities can occupy the same courtroom.
31:00.938 --> 31:04.420
[SPEAKER_00]: That may be the hardest truth in this entire case.
31:06.362 --> 31:14.027
[SPEAKER_00]: So when close the argument begins, I am watching Kevin Reddington first, because I believe he has one central job.
31:14.934 --> 31:17.315
[SPEAKER_00]: Bring everything back to the burden of proof.
31:18.076 --> 31:20.697
[SPEAKER_00]: He does not need every Georgia diagnose linseum.
31:21.238 --> 31:22.798
[SPEAKER_00]: He does not need them to love her.
31:23.339 --> 31:27.901
[SPEAKER_00]: He does not even need them to completely understand what happened inside her mind.
31:28.602 --> 31:35.165
[SPEAKER_00]: He needs them to ask whether the commonwealth proved criminal responsibility beyond a reasonable doubt.
31:35.886 --> 31:41.189
[SPEAKER_00]: In a Redington recently, promissory porters there may be in his words, fireworks.
31:42.218 --> 31:44.840
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution has a different challenge.
31:45.620 --> 31:56.267
[SPEAKER_00]: Spray again, bucking him, have to pull this jury away from sympathy, away from systemic failures and mental health care, and away from the number of prescriptions and appointments.
31:56.967 --> 31:59.909
[SPEAKER_00]: They need to focus the jury tightly on January 24th.
32:01.190 --> 32:26.748
[SPEAKER_00]: the errands, the timing, the preparation, the exercise bands, Lindsay's behavior before and after, the inconsistencies surrounding the alleged voice, and they have to convince this jury that whatever little disease Lindsay suffered from, it did not deprive her of the legal capacity required for criminal responsibility.
32:30.675 --> 32:33.777
[SPEAKER_00]: And at that point, this case belongs to them.
32:34.978 --> 32:37.680
[SPEAKER_00]: So here's my final thought on this little preview here.
32:39.522 --> 32:46.567
[SPEAKER_00]: See I said at the beginning that I believe this is one of the most important mental health cases we have seen in a long time.
32:47.508 --> 32:52.972
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's why, whatever verdict comes back, this trial has to expose something deeply uncomfortable.
32:53.918 --> 32:56.659
[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay Clancy Repeally entered the mental health system.
32:57.379 --> 32:58.680
[SPEAKER_00]: She saw professionals.
32:59.160 --> 33:00.360
[SPEAKER_00]: She saw help.
33:00.960 --> 33:03.581
[SPEAKER_00]: She received medication after medication.
33:04.201 --> 33:05.562
[SPEAKER_00]: She was hospitalized.
33:06.102 --> 33:08.823
[SPEAKER_00]: People around her new seriously deteriorating.
33:09.463 --> 33:17.146
[SPEAKER_00]: And somehow, on January 24, 2023, three children still died in the mother nearly died with them.
33:17.993 --> 33:26.339
[SPEAKER_00]: That does not tell us what verdict the jury should return, but it should force us to ask a question much larger than this courtroom.
33:27.680 --> 33:35.826
[SPEAKER_00]: What does it actually mean to tell somebody in psychiatric crisis to get help when they have already been trying to get it?
33:37.067 --> 33:39.209
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe Lindsey Clancy was legally responsible.
33:42.968 --> 33:50.495
[SPEAKER_00]: that decision belongs to 18 jurors who have now listened to weeks of evidence with 12 ultimately deciding the verdict.
33:51.436 --> 34:00.165
[SPEAKER_00]: But regardless of what they decide, the mental health system described it doing this trial should disturb everyone of us.
34:01.506 --> 34:03.328
[SPEAKER_00]: Tomorrow comes the final argument.
34:04.289 --> 34:05.229
[SPEAKER_00]: Then comes the jury.
34:06.488 --> 34:18.212
[SPEAKER_00]: Then we find out whether the Commonwealth convinced 12 people beyond a reasonable doubt that Lindsey Clancy was not merely mentally ill, but legally responsible.
34:19.452 --> 34:24.834
[SPEAKER_00]: When the verdict comes down, we go, when the verdict comes down, we will come back here.
34:25.434 --> 34:27.435
[SPEAKER_00]: We were breakdown what the jury decided.
34:27.935 --> 34:30.696
[SPEAKER_00]: We will examine why they may have decided it.
34:31.497 --> 34:35.099
[SPEAKER_00]: And we will talk about what the Lindsey Clancy case may mean.
34:35.579 --> 34:39.842
[SPEAKER_00]: Long after this courtroom finally goes quiet.
34:41.923 --> 34:46.185
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if you guys have not examined this case for yourself, I encourage you guys to go do that.
34:46.566 --> 34:50.508
[SPEAKER_00]: All 21 parts of this case is online right now.
34:51.497 --> 34:54.078
[SPEAKER_00]: believe me when I come back after the final verdict.
34:54.158 --> 35:02.183
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to say too but until we get that final verdict out and we know exactly what's coming down.
35:02.883 --> 35:07.305
[SPEAKER_00]: Then I'm going to come back and I'm going to tell you everything that I believe in this case.
35:07.326 --> 35:11.088
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I have a whole lot of questions.
35:11.828 --> 35:16.951
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you watch this case, I think you guys have a whole lot of questions too.
35:18.652 --> 35:18.932
[SPEAKER_00]: All right,
35:21.917 --> 35:22.758
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tearing with me.
35:22.798 --> 35:29.747
[SPEAKER_00]: I know I've been gone for a little bit, but I do know that you do have many torches and true crime, and I am grateful that I am just one of them.
35:31.370 --> 35:36.953
[SPEAKER_00]: And remember always, you have been listening to the only three-faceted podcast of its kind.
35:37.653 --> 35:40.615
[SPEAKER_00]: Be good to yourself and to each other.
35:41.275 --> 35:44.237
[SPEAKER_00]: And always remember, always stay humble.
35:44.917 --> 35:47.558
[SPEAKER_00]: An act of kindness can make someone's day.
35:48.299 --> 35:50.860
[SPEAKER_00]: A little love and compassion can go a long way.
35:51.520 --> 35:55.903
[SPEAKER_00]: And that there is an extraordinary person in all of us.
35:57.123 --> 35:58.564
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll talk to you guys after the verdict.
36:02.687 --> 36:05.249
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't forget to write, comment, and subscribe.
36:05.729 --> 36:06.970
[SPEAKER_01]: Join us on social media.
36:07.551 --> 36:09.292
[SPEAKER_01]: One link to the link tree has it all.
36:09.972 --> 36:14.516
[SPEAKER_01]: Feel free to drop us a line at truecrimeantauthors at gmail.com.
36:15.136 --> 36:17.578
[SPEAKER_01]: Sound mixing and editing by David McClam.
36:18.298 --> 36:21.140
[SPEAKER_01]: Intro script by Sophie Wilde and David McClam.
36:21.941 --> 36:24.743
[SPEAKER_01]: theme music, legendary by new alchemist.
36:25.444 --> 36:28.326
[SPEAKER_01]: Introduction and ending credits by Jackie Voice.
36:29.156 --> 36:33.325
[SPEAKER_01]: See you next time on True Crime, Authors, and Extraordinary People.
00:00.051 --> 00:06.838
[SPEAKER_00]: I believe the Lindsey class he case could become one of the most important modern criminal cases involving maternal mental health.
00:06.998 --> 00:13.765
[SPEAKER_00]: But because millions of people are watching a jury confront something our criminal justice system struggles terribly with.
00:14.600 --> 00:19.021
[SPEAKER_00]: Where does mental illness end and criminal responsibility begin?
00:19.161 --> 00:30.044
[SPEAKER_00]: Perhaps the most frightening thing we have heard throughout this trial is that someone experiencing severe mental illness does not necessarily look psychotic every second of the day.
00:30.944 --> 00:44.067
[SPEAKER_00]: A person may make lunch, a person may send a text message, a person may care for a child, a person may answer questions normally, and yet still be profoundly psychiatrically ill.
00:48.552 --> 00:52.633
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to True Crime, offers and extraordinary people.
00:53.173 --> 00:56.154
[SPEAKER_01]: The podcast where we bring two passions together.
00:56.754 --> 00:59.595
[SPEAKER_01]: The show that gives new meaning to the old adage.
01:00.115 --> 01:07.037
[SPEAKER_01]: Truth is stranger than fiction, and reminding you that there is an extraordinary person in all of us.
01:07.697 --> 01:09.878
[SPEAKER_01]: Here is your host, David McClam.
01:09.998 --> 01:12.099
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's go everybody, welcome to another episode of True Crime.
01:12.179 --> 01:13.980
[SPEAKER_00]: All the story that people, of course, I'm your man.
01:14.000 --> 01:18.982
[SPEAKER_00]: David McClellan, maybe having already mentioned you follow us on all of our social medias.
01:19.502 --> 01:24.484
[SPEAKER_00]: One link to a link tree will get you every place you need to go pertain to the show.
01:24.584 --> 01:31.287
[SPEAKER_00]: And like I always like to remind you, if you are so one, oh, you know someone who feels like hurting themselves or someone else.
01:31.847 --> 01:34.508
[SPEAKER_00]: Please, leave this episode and call 988.
01:35.228 --> 01:38.028
[SPEAKER_00]: It is a suicide prevention hotline.
01:38.308 --> 01:40.649
[SPEAKER_00]: You can resimble by phone or text.
01:41.209 --> 01:43.209
[SPEAKER_00]: They can get you the help that you need.
01:43.630 --> 01:49.011
[SPEAKER_00]: And in case no one else has told you this today, let me be the first one to tell you, I do care.
01:49.411 --> 01:50.931
[SPEAKER_00]: And I do need you to be here.
01:51.431 --> 01:54.592
[SPEAKER_00]: There is nothing worth yours or someone else's.
01:55.292 --> 01:55.592
[SPEAKER_00]: life.
01:55.672 --> 01:56.093
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
01:56.233 --> 01:57.013
[SPEAKER_00]: So sorry.
01:57.053 --> 01:58.114
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been gone for so long.
01:58.134 --> 02:00.675
[SPEAKER_00]: I think I kind of alluded to my skills all over the place.
02:01.115 --> 02:03.176
[SPEAKER_00]: Summer came and a lot of things happen.
02:03.497 --> 02:05.458
[SPEAKER_00]: So for those of you that's still tearing with me.
02:05.638 --> 02:06.158
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.
02:06.718 --> 02:08.940
[SPEAKER_00]: Hopefully I'm back at full capacity now.
02:09.400 --> 02:12.261
[SPEAKER_00]: Also to anyone that has written me want to come on the show.
02:12.722 --> 02:16.224
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sorry if I did not get back to you, but I have been a little bit of
02:19.175 --> 02:30.299
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, as you mind, everyone, if you are trying to come on the show, please only go to my website to do so or write me a true crime and authors at gmail.com.
02:30.860 --> 02:40.083
[SPEAKER_00]: Some requests I have found has been going to some old email address that has never been associated with the show, so I don't know how you guys are finding that.
02:40.163 --> 02:43.785
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're Googling me, it is possible that that email comes up.
02:47.846 --> 02:57.077
[SPEAKER_00]: Or if you go to the be a guest link on my website, that is the only way that you're going to be guaranteed that I'm going to see it and get back to you.
02:57.457 --> 03:04.245
[SPEAKER_00]: For those of you that's already written me, I promise I'm getting back to you starting this week and apologize, but I've been gone.
03:05.263 --> 03:22.645
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so I just want to give you guys that I'm glad to be back a lot to talk about because I have been following a case that is now 21 days in and you caught it on the intro coming in and we are about to talk about that case.
03:24.481 --> 03:32.815
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, I'm only going to kind of talk about a little bit because I'm going to give you the full case after the verdict is over, the verdict should be about two, three days.
03:33.316 --> 03:38.625
[SPEAKER_00]: This case has gone 21 days and I started watching it the beginning.
03:39.652 --> 03:44.855
[SPEAKER_00]: But then what happened is on that first day, I think it's not more than 45 minutes in the judge's like everybody's going home.
03:45.716 --> 03:50.459
[SPEAKER_00]: So because of that, I decided to let the case kind of pile up a little bit.
03:50.939 --> 03:52.280
[SPEAKER_00]: So I could kind of binge it.
03:52.740 --> 03:56.723
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, before I knew it, there are already what 12 13 days in at that point.
03:57.768 --> 04:04.150
[SPEAKER_00]: And one of my wife's friends who I hope to have on the show, she's a friend of family, Shauna is also watching this case.
04:04.250 --> 04:07.312
[SPEAKER_00]: Pretty much her whole life went on hold for this case.
04:08.232 --> 04:14.694
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we started talking about the case, and I called up to where we are now, which is live.
04:15.855 --> 04:21.157
[SPEAKER_00]: So today, I'm going to talk about Lindsey Clancy before the verdict.
04:22.092 --> 04:26.014
[SPEAKER_00]: I've written down a lot of stuff, so let's go ahead and start.
04:26.494 --> 04:31.096
[SPEAKER_00]: Now before I do begin today, I want to give you a warning.
04:32.116 --> 04:47.522
[SPEAKER_00]: This case does involve the deaths of three very young children, suicide, severe mental illness, postpartum mental health and testimony that has been extremely difficult to hear.
04:48.951 --> 04:59.641
[SPEAKER_00]: The children at the center of this case were five-year-old Koraklancy, three-year-old Dawson Clancy, and eight-month-old Talon Clancy.
05:00.481 --> 05:12.052
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever your feelings are about their mother, whatever verdict you believe should eventually come back, those three children observed to be remembered first.
05:13.878 --> 05:22.982
[SPEAKER_00]: Because tomorrow closing our business began in one of the most unusual emotional and my opinion, important mental health criminal trials we have seen in years.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And tonight, before this case goes to the jury, I want to talk about what we have actually learned, not TikTok rumors, not fan clubs, not hate campaigns, not whether you like Lindsey Clancy, and not whether you feel sorry for her, I want to talk about the evidence, I want to talk about the prosecution, I want to talk about Kevin Ratington and what I think has
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[SPEAKER_00]: I want to talk about Judge William Sullivan and the almost impossible job he has had trying to keep this trial under control.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We need to talk about the moments when that control nearly disappeared.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We need to talk about the controversy surrounding Lindsey's former husband Patrick Clancy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And most importantly, we need to talk about the question the jury actually has to answer.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because that question is not simply that Lindsey Clancy killed her children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Her defense is not claiming that somebody else came in to that house and killed them.
06:29.975 --> 06:34.779
[SPEAKER_00]: The question is, was Lindsey Clancy criminally responsible when she did it?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And those are two profoundly different questions.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now on January 24, 2023, Patrick Clancy left the family's dugsberry Massachusetts home
06:49.303 --> 06:55.930
[SPEAKER_00]: When he returned, he found Lindsay seriously injured outside the house after she apparently jumped from a second story window.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Inside the basement where there are three children.
06:59.734 --> 07:01.936
[SPEAKER_00]: Coran Dawson were pronounced dead that night.
07:02.656 --> 07:05.920
[SPEAKER_00]: Callen survived for several days before he also died.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay survived her fall but suffered catastrophic spinal injuries that left her paralyzed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She was later charged with the murders of all three children.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It almost immediately, this case stopped looking like a conventional murder prosecution, because Lindsey had been deteriorating mentally for months.
07:26.055 --> 07:28.276
[SPEAKER_00]: She had repeatedly sought professional help.
07:29.156 --> 07:30.696
[SPEAKER_00]: She had been hospitalized.
07:31.017 --> 07:33.297
[SPEAKER_00]: She had contacted crisis services.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She had struggled with depression, anxiety,
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[SPEAKER_00]: And doing a possibly four months before the killings, record show she received more than 30 prescriptions involved in 13 different psychiatric medications from multiple healthcare providers.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That does not automatically mean the medication calls what happened.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It does not automatically stay up to psychosis, but it makes one thing extremely difficult to argue.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This was not a woman who had absolutely nothing psychiatically wrong with her until the night her children died.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Even the prosecutions on experts have ultimately acknowledged the nifigate mental illness, and that is where this trial became something much bigger than another murder case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now believe the Lindsey class he case could become one of the most important modern criminal cases involving maternal mental health, not necessarily because he creates new law, but because millions of people are watching a jury confront something our criminal justice system struggles terribly with.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Where does mental illness and and criminal responsibility begin?
08:50.638 --> 08:55.901
[SPEAKER_00]: postpartum psychosis is rare, but rare does not mean imaginary.
08:56.642 --> 09:06.849
[SPEAKER_00]: It is a psychiatric emergency that can involve hallucinations, delusions, paranoia, severe confusion, and dramatic changes in behavior.
09:08.129 --> 09:18.716
[SPEAKER_00]: And perhaps the most frightening thing we have heard throughout this trial is that someone experiencing severe mental illness does not necessarily look psychotic every second of
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[SPEAKER_00]: a person may make lunch, a person may send a text message, a person may care for a child, a person may answer questions normally, and yet still be profoundly psychiatric, ill. That issue has hovered over this entire trial because prosecutors repeatedly pointed toward things Lindsey could still do normally.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She built a snowman.
09:45.904 --> 09:48.665
[SPEAKER_00]: She took one of her children to a doctor's appointment.
09:49.365 --> 09:52.626
[SPEAKER_00]: She communicated normally at different points that day.
09:53.346 --> 09:58.287
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution says those are signs of organization, planning, and controlled.
09:59.467 --> 10:03.768
[SPEAKER_00]: The defendant says functioning is not the same thing as sanity.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The law is critical here, because this is where people watching this trial need to understand Massachusetts law.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey Clancy does not have the burden of proving to the jury that she was in saying.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Once a lack of criminal responsibility is properly at issue, the Commonwealth carries the burden.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Massachusetts law says that a defendant is not criminally responsible if she suffered from a mental disease or defect and because of that condition, lack the substantial capacity, either to appreciate the criminality or won'tfulness of her conduct or to conform her conduct to the requirements of the law.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Notice something very important.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It is OR.
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, the Commonwealth has to prove criminal responsibility beyond a reasonable doubt.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And Massachusetts goes even further.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Simply knowing intellectually that something is illegal is not necessarily enough.
11:15.192 --> 11:19.736
[SPEAKER_00]: The law talks about meaningfully appreciating is legal or moral wrongfulness.
11:20.505 --> 11:24.966
[SPEAKER_00]: That is why the psychiatric testimony in this trial matters so much.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The jury is not being asked whether Lindsey knew what an exercise band was.
11:30.827 --> 11:35.548
[SPEAKER_00]: They are not simply being asked whether she understood that her children were physically dying.
11:36.188 --> 11:43.029
[SPEAKER_00]: They are being asked what her diseased mind was capable of appreciating and controlling at that moment.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That is much harder question.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So prosecutors, Jennifer, Spray, and Shannon Buckingham have argued that Lindsey was deliberate, organized, a manipulative.
11:57.147 --> 12:06.931
[SPEAKER_00]: In opening statements, Buckingham portrayed her as highly controlling and meticulous schedules, food, sleep, children's routines.
12:07.732 --> 12:17.136
[SPEAKER_00]: The Commonwealth argues Lindsay intends to lead engineered Patrick Absen from the House by sending him on errands, giving herself enough time to kill the children.
12:18.231 --> 12:24.156
[SPEAKER_00]: They argue that what happened after it was not simply the chaotic act of a woman completely attacked from reality.
12:24.877 --> 12:28.480
[SPEAKER_00]: And prosecutors have challenged one of the biggest pillars of the defense.
12:29.121 --> 12:34.186
[SPEAKER_00]: The alleged male voice Lizzy says commander her to kill the children and then herself.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their experts have pointed out inconsistencies concerning exactly when that voice began, how Lizzy described it and the unusual claim that the voice appeared for such a short period surrounding the killings.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Kirk Hillburn testified that he believed Lindsay had a amount of disorder but remained criminally responsible.
12:56.977 --> 12:59.317
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Ava Mag believes she had suffered
13:05.757 --> 13:17.803
[SPEAKER_00]: And the Commonwealth's final witness for Princess psychiatrist Dr. Gregory Seedhoff testified that Lindsey was mentally ill but still capable of understanding right from wrong and controlling her actions.
13:18.623 --> 13:22.105
[SPEAKER_00]: That is the Commonwealth's case in a strongest form.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay was sick.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But being sick is not enough.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still new.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still planned.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She's still controlled herself.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, according to the prosecution, she remains criminally responsible.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But the question here is, did the prosecution help the defense?
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, this is where I think this trial became fascinating.
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[SPEAKER_00]: because there have been moments when I believe the commonwealth's own case has done Kevin Redington's work for him.
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[SPEAKER_00]: One of the biggest examples came right at the end.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Seahoff was a prosecution witness.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yet, during his testimony, he acknowledged the seriousness of Lindsey's psychiatric condition and reportedly agreed that the prosecution's opening characterization of Lindsey as manipulating health care providers minimized what she had actually been going through.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Think about that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution began this trial painting Lindsey as someone carefully manipulating doctors.
14:30.683 --> 14:37.466
[SPEAKER_00]: But by the end, one of their own psychiatric experts was acknowledging the depth of her psychiatric suffering.
14:38.207 --> 14:43.610
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution also called a huge number of witnesses, more than 70.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The defense called roughly 10.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That can work for the Commonwealth because they create detail and corroboration, but there is another danger.
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[SPEAKER_00]: When the central dispute is not who did it, repetitive testimony about the crime scene, injuries, and aftermath can begin to appear less like proving an element, and more like trying to make the jury emotionally unable to acquit.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Reddington complained about that before the trial.
15:15.271 --> 15:18.913
[SPEAKER_00]: He essentially said, we still stipulate to what happened.
15:24.723 --> 15:30.994
[SPEAKER_00]: He accused the government of attempting to create what he called a circus designed to inflame the jury.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Whether jurors agree with him is another matter, but the strategy carries risk.
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[SPEAKER_00]: See, because the more aggressive prosecutors appear, the easier it becomes her redding tint to portray Lindsey, not as somebody is escaping responsibility, but as a severely ill woman being prosecuted, without sufficient regard, well, what happens psychologically?
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[SPEAKER_00]: And then came the courtroom controversies.
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[SPEAKER_00]: This was one of the strangest moments in the trial.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey's former mother-in-law Susan Clancy testified for the defense.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Susan described Lindsey as a wonderful, nurturing mother who had begun deteriorating in late 2022.
16:18.542 --> 16:21.845
[SPEAKER_00]: She said, Lindsey was in her words begging for help.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And during cross-examination, prosecutors Shannon Buckingham began questioning Susan about the families Catholic faith in attending church.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Then Buckingham asked whether Susan was aware that murder is considered a moral sin.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And before Susan could answer, Judge Sullivan stopped everything.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Sidebar.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The question was struck, and Sullivan specifically instructed the jury not to consider it for any reason or purpose.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That alone was remarkable.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But then, religion entered the trial again.
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[SPEAKER_00]: During prosecution Esberg Kirk Heraldberg's testimony, he referred to Lindsey being Ray's Catholic and discussed suicide as a mortal sin.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Readington immediately objected, and this time he asked for a mistrial, he accused a prosecution of intentional misconduct, and Judge Sullivan refused to end the trial, but he was clearly unhappy.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He instructs the jury that the religious material was irrelevant and inappropriate in order them to disregard it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Legal commentators have questioned the prosecution's approach because a person's Catholic doctrine is not the legal standard for criminal responsibility.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The jury applies Massachusetts law, not church doctrine, and I believe this could become an important issue if there is eventually an appeal.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But even before an appeal, prosecutors have to ask themselves whether those moments hurt their credibility with this jury, because you never want jurors one new why you are reaching for something.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The judge keeps telling them they cannot consider.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now then, there was the moment that exploded online.
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[SPEAKER_00]: During extremely graphic optopsy testimony, Lindsey became visibly overwhelmed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She sawed the court had to take breaks, and at one point she could be heard saying, I can't do it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The following day, Kevin read into the race and accusation and opened court.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He said someone associated with the prosecution had been caught on a hot microphone saying
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[SPEAKER_00]: Rednting was furious, and when Judd Sullivan initially tried to take the issue to sidebar, Rednton resisted.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He said he did not want to go to sidebar.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He compares the idea of silencing Lindsey to the handmaid's tale.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But there isn't an important fact that must be included.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The district attorney's office disputes Rednton's interpretation.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their spokesperson says the
19:06.686 --> 19:12.170
[SPEAKER_00]: And that the comment referred to me moving the optopsi photographs from the courtroom monitor.
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[SPEAKER_00]: They also say that remark did not come from either prosecutor.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So I am not going to tell you that a prosecutor definitely said, shed her up.
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[SPEAKER_00]: We don't have enough to say that.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But we can say is that the incident became serious enough that just Sullivan later issued a broad warning.
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[SPEAKER_00]: No inappropriate or disruptive comments in his courtroom.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Anyone responsible them could be removed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: It was one of those rare moments when the temperature in an otherwise remarkably controlled courtroom suddenly shot through the ceiling, but I have to say that my own ears when they played that back, it definitely sounded like shut her up to me.
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[SPEAKER_00]: And now that brings me to attorney Kevin Reddington, whatever verdict you believe should
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[SPEAKER_00]: He understood from the beginning that trying to convince jurors that Lindsey did not kill these children would destroy his credibility.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So he didn't.
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[SPEAKER_00]: His strategy has been brutally straightforward.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, something horrific happened.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, Lindsey calls it.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, answer why.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That single question has allowed him to turn virtually every witness back toward Lindsay's psychiatric condition.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Doctors, hospital workers, family, medication records, psychiatrists.
20:40.940 --> 21:03.931
[SPEAKER_00]: psychologists, the months before January 24, the cries for help, the changes in behavior, the insomnia, the suicidal thoughts, the fear that something was wrong with her, and perhaps most importantly, he has a tactic idea that somebody cannot be psychotic if they occasionally appear normal.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Because that'sburg Dr. Philip Resonate is particularly
21:10.188 --> 21:17.195
[SPEAKER_00]: Resonate has extraordinary experience involving maternal philosophies and previously testified in the Andrea Yates case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: His conclusion here was that Lindsey was psychotic and experiencing hallucinations and delusional thinking when she killed the children.
21:26.964 --> 21:33.290
[SPEAKER_00]: Redington also aggressively challenged the commonwealth's expert about their actual experience with postpartum psychosis.
21:34.060 --> 21:48.871
[SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Heraldburn acknowledged extremely limited experience treating the condition including that his last such treatment experience date of back decades and acknowledged receiving approximately $54,000 for his work in this case.
21:49.831 --> 21:51.432
[SPEAKER_00]: Then there was Dr. Aver Mac.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their cross examination became so heated that ridden finally stopped and asked, what are you smiling for?
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[SPEAKER_00]: This is not funny, sir.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Judge Sullivan had to intervene multiple times and direct back to answer the questions being answered.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That was one of the few times we saw Reddington Jr. lose, so if his usual courtroom restraint, another came during the optopsia injury testimony.
22:17.182 --> 22:24.105
[SPEAKER_00]: As Lindsey repeatedly broke down, Reddington objected several times and became visibly frustrated.
22:24.765 --> 22:26.986
[SPEAKER_00]: For most of this trial, he has been controlled.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now let's talk about Judge William F. Sullivan, because he deserves his own discussion.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I have watched plenty of trials where judges turn the courtroom into a second prosecution table or practically become another defense attorney.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I've also settled Jerry's, but did the same thing.
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[SPEAKER_00]: I do not think that is what happened here.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Sullivan has struck me as extraordinarily patient.
22:56.545 --> 22:59.228
[SPEAKER_00]: He has allowed both sides room to make their case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He has stopped testimony when Lindsey became overwhelmed.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But at the same time, he'd be peeling me mindedure is that sympathy cannot decide this case.
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[SPEAKER_00]: When Lindsey saw doing the testimony about her children's injuries, selling the scent jurors out, allowed the situation to settle, and then reminded them that their verdict cannot be based on sympathy, anger, passion, or prejudice.
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[SPEAKER_00]: That is exactly what he judge is supposed to do.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Protect the defenders right to participate, protect the jury from emotional contamination, protect their prosecutions right to present relevant evidence, and protect the children's case from becoming laws in the mental health debate.
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[SPEAKER_00]: But even Judge Sullivan has had his limits.
23:46.400 --> 23:48.803
[SPEAKER_00]: The religious references clearly bothered him.
23:49.451 --> 23:58.059
[SPEAKER_00]: The second incident earned the prosecution of direct reprimand, and the hot mic controversy resulted in a courtroom wide warning.
23:58.860 --> 24:04.265
[SPEAKER_00]: And Sullivan has also corrected Reddington and Reddington became too aggressive or argumentative.
24:04.946 --> 24:05.826
[SPEAKER_00]: That is important.
24:06.747 --> 24:09.470
[SPEAKER_00]: Being a fair judge does not mean agreeing with everybody.
24:10.171 --> 24:14.575
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes fairness looks like making everybody at council table equally unhappy.
24:15.492 --> 24:19.676
[SPEAKER_00]: Now there's a question, did police decide what happened too quickly?
24:20.477 --> 24:25.982
[SPEAKER_00]: Because another theme, Redington has increasingly emphasized, is the investigation itself.
24:27.243 --> 24:31.467
[SPEAKER_00]: His argument is essentially, police arrived at a horrific scene.
24:32.189 --> 24:40.591
[SPEAKER_00]: Three children, dead or dying, their mother was critically injured, and investigators rapidly concluded that they knew what happened.
24:41.311 --> 24:45.052
[SPEAKER_00]: What Reninton says they did not adequately investigate was why.
24:45.812 --> 24:50.473
[SPEAKER_00]: Today, as testimony ended, his theme became especially clear.
24:51.493 --> 24:58.055
[SPEAKER_00]: There was no investigation in his view into Lindsey Psychiatric Condition sufficient to explain the event.
24:59.165 --> 25:08.310
[SPEAKER_00]: Judd Sullivan declined to give a special jury instructions concerning a layered shortcomings in the investigation, but he will allow ready to argue those shortcomings during closing.
25:09.210 --> 25:18.755
[SPEAKER_00]: That could become one of tomorrow's most important arguments, because investigators apparently even floated a theory that psychologists Paul Zazel
25:22.989 --> 25:26.895
[SPEAKER_00]: But testimony established police found no evidence supporting that theory.
25:27.656 --> 25:33.023
[SPEAKER_00]: Insysel testified that he did not coach Lindsey and did not tell her what to say.
25:34.085 --> 25:36.789
[SPEAKER_00]: And that takes us into another controversy.
25:37.538 --> 25:41.540
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, you will sometimes hear people say, why are we even having this trial?
25:42.040 --> 25:42.921
[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsey confessed.
25:43.701 --> 25:45.182
[SPEAKER_00]: That needs clarification.
25:45.922 --> 25:48.864
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense is not denying that Lindsey killed the children.
25:49.484 --> 25:51.365
[SPEAKER_00]: Kevin Reditton has said that openly.
25:51.945 --> 25:56.247
[SPEAKER_00]: That is very different from saying there was some conventional police interrogation.
25:56.648 --> 26:02.891
[SPEAKER_00]: It was Lindsey gave detectives a recorded, detailed confession while competent and able to be questioned.
26:03.742 --> 26:06.223
[SPEAKER_00]: her defense conceded the physical acts.
26:06.823 --> 26:09.784
[SPEAKER_00]: Their argument is about legal responsibility for them.
26:10.504 --> 26:18.667
[SPEAKER_00]: And while Lindsey was hospitalized after the killings, Redington obtained a court order allowing psychologists Paul Zayzel access to her.
26:19.607 --> 26:24.489
[SPEAKER_00]: Doing one of those visits, Lindsay asked to use Sicell's phone to call Patrick.
26:25.009 --> 26:26.389
[SPEAKER_00]: Patrick eventually answered.
26:27.169 --> 26:34.832
[SPEAKER_00]: Sicell testified that Lindsay told Patrick he loved him and that she had heard of Mel voice ordering her to kill the children and then herself.
26:35.672 --> 26:39.173
[SPEAKER_00]: Sicell testified that he did not suggest that account to her.
26:39.933 --> 26:45.755
[SPEAKER_00]: So when people say simply, she confessed, they can accidentally erase the actual legal issue.
26:46.395 --> 26:50.637
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense is not asking the jury to find that somebody else committed these acts.
26:51.338 --> 26:58.282
[SPEAKER_00]: They are asking the jury to find that the common world has failed to prove Lindsey was criminally responsible when she committed them.
26:59.022 --> 27:02.184
[SPEAKER_00]: Those are not remotely the same defense.
27:03.520 --> 27:17.774
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we have to enter on countable territory, because there is a growing online movement arguing that Patrick Clancy either killed the children himself, participated somehow, or knows more that he has admitted.
27:18.697 --> 27:25.640
[SPEAKER_00]: I have seen those theories, I know many of you have seen them as well, but here is where I have to draw a line.
27:26.260 --> 27:33.964
[SPEAKER_00]: There is currently no credible, publicly established evidence proving Patrick Clancy participated in the deaths of his children.
27:34.804 --> 27:44.589
[SPEAKER_00]: He has not been charged, he has not been identified by authorities as responsible, and Lindsey's own defense has not presented Patrick as the secret killer.
27:45.657 --> 27:54.481
[SPEAKER_00]: social media speculation has become so intense that Patrick attorney, how a Cooper issued a warning over accusations being circulated against him.
27:55.401 --> 27:58.403
[SPEAKER_00]: Does that mean nobody is allowed to ask questions about Patrick?
27:59.243 --> 28:00.003
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course not.
28:00.704 --> 28:03.125
[SPEAKER_00]: It is completely legitimate to examine the timeline.
28:03.785 --> 28:05.846
[SPEAKER_00]: It is legitimate to examine his statements.
28:06.386 --> 28:09.007
[SPEAKER_00]: It is legitimate to ask what police investigated.
28:09.588 --> 28:09.728
[SPEAKER_00]: It is
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[SPEAKER_00]: Those are questions about an investigation, but saying police should have investigated this borethorly is different from saying Patrick murdered his children.
28:26.611 --> 28:31.336
[SPEAKER_00]: We cannot leap across the canyon without evidence, and ironically we don't need to.
28:32.144 --> 28:40.610
[SPEAKER_00]: because the potential and adequacy of an investigation can matter to the defense even if Patrick can absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the deaths.
28:41.251 --> 28:44.613
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm going to let you guys know what's my already is a lot do have some questions.
28:45.054 --> 29:00.225
[SPEAKER_00]: This is just a preview before we get the verdict, but when I come back and do the whole case, believe me, we will examine these questions of Patrick Clancy, and I will tell you exactly what I think when it comes to this case, when it comes to him.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the case that may have heard the coming wealth the most.
29:05.507 --> 29:11.608
[SPEAKER_00]: See, to me, the coming wealth's biggest problem is something surprisingly simple.
29:13.129 --> 29:18.630
[SPEAKER_00]: After five weeks of testimony, they have largely stopped arguing that Lindsey was mentally healthy.
29:19.430 --> 29:22.891
[SPEAKER_00]: Their own experts recognize serious psychiatric illness.
29:23.651 --> 29:28.132
[SPEAKER_00]: That means the battlefield has narrowed dramatically where she's sick,
29:29.225 --> 29:31.427
[SPEAKER_00]: isn't increasingly difficult to say no.
29:32.368 --> 29:38.412
[SPEAKER_00]: The question becomes, how sick was she at the precise moment her children died?
29:39.733 --> 29:54.645
[SPEAKER_00]: And can become a well-proved beginner reasonable doubt that despite that disease or defect she retains a substantial capacity both to understand the roughness of what she was doing and to control her behavior according to law.
29:56.178 --> 30:01.542
[SPEAKER_00]: that as far more difficult prosecution than she planned it, therefore she was saying.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Knowing something physically happened, a meaningfully appreciating as moral wealth on this are not necessarily identical concepts under Massachusetts law.
30:12.791 --> 30:16.675
[SPEAKER_00]: That is exactly why the jury instructions matter so much.
30:18.076 --> 30:20.297
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, there is another danger in this trial.
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[SPEAKER_00]: A mental health defense can accidentally turn the defendant into the entire story.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She isn't.
30:27.957 --> 30:32.918
[SPEAKER_00]: Quar was five, Dawson was three, Kallen was eight months old.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Three children lost their lives, Patrick lost all the children in a single night.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Their grandparents lost three grandchildren, entire families were destroyed, understanding
30:49.830 --> 30:56.194
[SPEAKER_00]: Likewise, remembering the children does not require us to pretend severe mental illness does not exist.
30:57.275 --> 31:00.237
[SPEAKER_00]: Both realities can occupy the same courtroom.
31:00.938 --> 31:04.420
[SPEAKER_00]: That may be the hardest truth in this entire case.
31:06.362 --> 31:14.027
[SPEAKER_00]: So when close the argument begins, I am watching Kevin Reddington first, because I believe he has one central job.
31:14.934 --> 31:17.315
[SPEAKER_00]: Bring everything back to the burden of proof.
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[SPEAKER_00]: He does not need every Georgia diagnose linseum.
31:21.238 --> 31:22.798
[SPEAKER_00]: He does not need them to love her.
31:23.339 --> 31:27.901
[SPEAKER_00]: He does not even need them to completely understand what happened inside her mind.
31:28.602 --> 31:35.165
[SPEAKER_00]: He needs them to ask whether the commonwealth proved criminal responsibility beyond a reasonable doubt.
31:35.886 --> 31:41.189
[SPEAKER_00]: In a Redington recently, promissory porters there may be in his words, fireworks.
31:42.218 --> 31:44.840
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution has a different challenge.
31:45.620 --> 31:56.267
[SPEAKER_00]: Spray again, bucking him, have to pull this jury away from sympathy, away from systemic failures and mental health care, and away from the number of prescriptions and appointments.
31:56.967 --> 31:59.909
[SPEAKER_00]: They need to focus the jury tightly on January 24th.
32:01.190 --> 32:26.748
[SPEAKER_00]: the errands, the timing, the preparation, the exercise bands, Lindsay's behavior before and after, the inconsistencies surrounding the alleged voice, and they have to convince this jury that whatever little disease Lindsay suffered from, it did not deprive her of the legal capacity required for criminal responsibility.
32:30.675 --> 32:33.777
[SPEAKER_00]: And at that point, this case belongs to them.
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[SPEAKER_00]: So here's my final thought on this little preview here.
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[SPEAKER_00]: See I said at the beginning that I believe this is one of the most important mental health cases we have seen in a long time.
32:47.508 --> 32:52.972
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's why, whatever verdict comes back, this trial has to expose something deeply uncomfortable.
32:53.918 --> 32:56.659
[SPEAKER_00]: Lindsay Clancy Repeally entered the mental health system.
32:57.379 --> 32:58.680
[SPEAKER_00]: She saw professionals.
32:59.160 --> 33:00.360
[SPEAKER_00]: She saw help.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She received medication after medication.
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[SPEAKER_00]: She was hospitalized.
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[SPEAKER_00]: People around her new seriously deteriorating.
33:09.463 --> 33:17.146
[SPEAKER_00]: And somehow, on January 24, 2023, three children still died in the mother nearly died with them.
33:17.993 --> 33:26.339
[SPEAKER_00]: That does not tell us what verdict the jury should return, but it should force us to ask a question much larger than this courtroom.
33:27.680 --> 33:35.826
[SPEAKER_00]: What does it actually mean to tell somebody in psychiatric crisis to get help when they have already been trying to get it?
33:37.067 --> 33:39.209
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe Lindsey Clancy was legally responsible.
33:42.968 --> 33:50.495
[SPEAKER_00]: that decision belongs to 18 jurors who have now listened to weeks of evidence with 12 ultimately deciding the verdict.
33:51.436 --> 34:00.165
[SPEAKER_00]: But regardless of what they decide, the mental health system described it doing this trial should disturb everyone of us.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Tomorrow comes the final argument.
34:04.289 --> 34:05.229
[SPEAKER_00]: Then comes the jury.
34:06.488 --> 34:18.212
[SPEAKER_00]: Then we find out whether the Commonwealth convinced 12 people beyond a reasonable doubt that Lindsey Clancy was not merely mentally ill, but legally responsible.
34:19.452 --> 34:24.834
[SPEAKER_00]: When the verdict comes down, we go, when the verdict comes down, we will come back here.
34:25.434 --> 34:27.435
[SPEAKER_00]: We were breakdown what the jury decided.
34:27.935 --> 34:30.696
[SPEAKER_00]: We will examine why they may have decided it.
34:31.497 --> 34:35.099
[SPEAKER_00]: And we will talk about what the Lindsey Clancy case may mean.
34:35.579 --> 34:39.842
[SPEAKER_00]: Long after this courtroom finally goes quiet.
34:41.923 --> 34:46.185
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if you guys have not examined this case for yourself, I encourage you guys to go do that.
34:46.566 --> 34:50.508
[SPEAKER_00]: All 21 parts of this case is online right now.
34:51.497 --> 34:54.078
[SPEAKER_00]: believe me when I come back after the final verdict.
34:54.158 --> 35:02.183
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want to say too but until we get that final verdict out and we know exactly what's coming down.
35:02.883 --> 35:07.305
[SPEAKER_00]: Then I'm going to come back and I'm going to tell you everything that I believe in this case.
35:07.326 --> 35:11.088
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I have a whole lot of questions.
35:11.828 --> 35:16.951
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you watch this case, I think you guys have a whole lot of questions too.
35:18.652 --> 35:18.932
[SPEAKER_00]: All right,
35:21.917 --> 35:22.758
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for tearing with me.
35:22.798 --> 35:29.747
[SPEAKER_00]: I know I've been gone for a little bit, but I do know that you do have many torches and true crime, and I am grateful that I am just one of them.
35:31.370 --> 35:36.953
[SPEAKER_00]: And remember always, you have been listening to the only three-faceted podcast of its kind.
35:37.653 --> 35:40.615
[SPEAKER_00]: Be good to yourself and to each other.
35:41.275 --> 35:44.237
[SPEAKER_00]: And always remember, always stay humble.
35:44.917 --> 35:47.558
[SPEAKER_00]: An act of kindness can make someone's day.
35:48.299 --> 35:50.860
[SPEAKER_00]: A little love and compassion can go a long way.
35:51.520 --> 35:55.903
[SPEAKER_00]: And that there is an extraordinary person in all of us.
35:57.123 --> 35:58.564
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll talk to you guys after the verdict.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Don't forget to write, comment, and subscribe.
36:05.729 --> 36:06.970
[SPEAKER_01]: Join us on social media.
36:07.551 --> 36:09.292
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36:09.972 --> 36:14.516
[SPEAKER_01]: Feel free to drop us a line at truecrimeantauthors at gmail.com.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Sound mixing and editing by David McClam.
36:18.298 --> 36:21.140
[SPEAKER_01]: Intro script by Sophie Wilde and David McClam.
36:21.941 --> 36:24.743
[SPEAKER_01]: theme music, legendary by new alchemist.
36:25.444 --> 36:28.326
[SPEAKER_01]: Introduction and ending credits by Jackie Voice.
36:29.156 --> 36:33.325
[SPEAKER_01]: See you next time on True Crime, Authors, and Extraordinary People.
