Lindsay Clancy's attorney stunned a Massachusetts courtroom Tuesday by arguing that prosecutors never proved she killed her three young children, a dramatic reversal from his defense at her murder trial, where he did not dispute that she took their lives.
"This entire case is based on speculation," attorney Kevin Reddington told Judge William Sullivan at Plymouth County Superior Court, in the first hearing since Clancy's trial ended in a mistrial on September 4.
Reddington asked Sullivan, the same judge who presided over the trial, to acquit Clancy of murder. He argued that prosecutors had failed to prove conclusively that she killed the children in 2023, or that she was in her right mind at the time.
At trial, Reddington did not contest that Clancy killed her children at the family's home in Duxbury in January 2023. His defense rested on the argument that the former labor and delivery nurse was in a state of postpartum psychosis and should not be held criminally responsible.
Clancy's then-husband and first responders testified that they arrived at the house and found that she had tried to kill herself immediately after killing the children: Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and 8-month-old Callan.
Assistant District Attorney Shanan Buckingham called the defense's new argument "laughable," pointing out that Clancy had agreed to certain facts in the state's case. "I suggest to you that the entire record is voluminous as to the information supporting the fact that she did this," Buckingham said.
The trial ended in a mistrial after more than a week of deliberations, when the jury deadlocked 11 to 1 in Clancy's favor, with a single juror preventing a unanimous verdict.
Sullivan took the acquittal motion under advisement and issued no immediate decision. No date was set for a retrial. Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz said outside court that his office has not yet decided whether to retry Clancy.
The judge is also weighing motions to make public information previously shared only at sidebar during the trial, including notes from the deadlocked jury. Martin Weinberg, an appellate attorney for Clancy, argued that the material would shed light on the defense's motion. Prosecutors, meanwhile, have asked for a gag order, saying it is needed "to prevent the carnival atmosphere" surrounding the first trial and its aftermath.
The attorney for the holdout juror said her client wants privacy.
Clancy, who was left paralyzed from the waist down after her suicide attempt, remains in state custody at a psychiatric hospital.
