A Massachusetts mother who strangled her three children and then attempted suicide by jumping off the roof of their house is permanently paralyzed from the waist down.
Lindsay Clancy, 32, strangled her five-year-old daughter Cora, three-year-old son Dawson and seven-month-old son Callan in the basement of their home in Duxbury on January 24.
She battled postpartum depression and begged doctors for help for death and her slit her own wrists, then jumped out of a window on the top floor of the family’s home.
Lindsay has been receiving intensive medical care for the past four months and was recently transferred to another hospital awaiting a grand jury decision on whether or not she will be charged with murder.
Now her lawyer has revealed that she has permanent damage and can no longer move her legs. according to the Boston Globe.
a GoFundMe page set up for her bereaved husband Patrick Clancy in January has raised more than $1 million and the lawyer insisted that “not one penny” of this was used to pay for her defense.
Lindsay Clancy who strangled her three children and then attempted suicide by jumping off the roof of their house is permanently paralyzed from the waist down
She strangled her five-year-old daughter Cora, three-year-old son Dawson and seven-month-old son Callan in the basement of their home in Duxbury on January 24.
Battling postpartum depression and begging doctors for help before death, she slit her own wrists and then jumped out of a window on the top floor of the family’s home.
Kevin J. Reddington revealed “she will be paralyzed from the waist down forever” after the jump from the window, citing media reports and his conversations with doctors.
She is currently being treated at Tewksbury Hospital and is being cared for by the State Department of Mental Health after clinicians determine she needs long-term psychiatric help and medical care.
It’s unclear if a jury has already been formed, or if it has yet to be convened, but if she’s charged with murder, Lindsay faces life in prison.
Her lawyer is fighting for more compassionate charges and says she will need round-the-clock medical care for the rest of her life.
District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz’s office has alleged that she plotted to kill her children and asked her husband Patrick to pick up food from a restaurant so she could have time to commit the murders.
The next court hearing is scheduled for July.
Reddinton said the defense has appointed a national expert on parents who kill their children, and Dr. Phillip Resnick, a psychiatry professor at Case Western Reserve University, and psychologist Paul Zeizel to look into Lindsay’s mental health.
And the attorney is looking into whether Lindsay can make a defense of diminished capacity.
She was arraigned in her hospital bed at Brigham and Women’s Hospital on February 7, where she pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder charges pending in Plymouth District Court.
The community has erected a memorial to the three children who murdered
Lindsay Clancy with husband Patrick and their oldest children, Cora, five, and Dawson, three
District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz’s office has alleged that she plotted to kill her children and asked her husband to pick up food from a restaurant so she had time to kill the children.
Lindsay was previously treated at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital before being transferred to Tewksbury Hospital two weeks ago.
Reddington has said she suffered from postpartum depression or psychosis and was incorrectly prescribed multiple medications for anxiety and psychosis.
Lindsay’s defense was funded by her parents, but she will now likely need financial backing from the court, her attorney said.
“They’re pretty much using everything they’ve got to help her,” Reddington added.
Patrick publicly forgave his wife in January, but Reddington declined to say whether he also helped fund her case.
He said, “I’m not going to comment on Patrick, but every penny spent on her defense came from her parents.”
A GoFundMe on behalf of Patrick has raised more than $1 million since January and he made his only public statement about the tragedy.
“I want to ask all of you that you find it deep within yourselves to forgive Lindsay, as I have,” he said.
“The real Lindsay was generously loving and caring to everyone — me, our children, family, friends, and her patients. The fibers of her soul are loving. All I wish for her now is that she can somehow find peace.
“She loved being a nurse, but nothing beat her intense love for our children and dedication to motherhood. It was all she ever wanted. Her passion taught me how to be a better father.”
Reddington made it clear that the money raised was Patrick’s and that “not a dime” was used to pay for Lindsay’s defense.
He said, ‘That’s Patrick’s money. Her parents pay for her defense.”
On January 1, Lindsay — who was herself an occupational nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital — checked herself into McLean Mental Hospital in Belmont.
Lindsay was arraigned in her hospital bed on February 7, where she pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder charges pending in Plymouth District Court
Her defense is being funded by her parents, but she will now likely need financial support from the court
The Clancy house in Duxbury, Massachusetts, where the children were murdered in the basement
According to her attorney Reddington, she spent five days there, complaining of addiction to benzodiazepines.
Doctors at the hospital decided to take her off Seroquel – a drug used to treat schizophrenia and depression.
She was then given trazodone, another antidepressant, and Ativan, a branded version of lorazepam, according to her attorney.
The circumstances surrounding Lindsay’s release from the hospital remain unclear, and it’s also unclear if she ever told doctors she felt murderous.
In the weeks before the murders, she told her husband she was suicidal.
Her lawyer says she went back to the doctor after she left McLean, but he hasn’t specified what drugs she was given at the time.
Twenty days later, she strangled her three children and then attempted suicide by slitting her wrists and jumping from a bedroom on the top floor of the family home.
A spokesperson for the hospital declined to provide details about her care or discharge, citing privacy laws.
Due to federal privacy laws and our ethical standards, we cannot comment on specific patient cases.
“The complexity of mental health is different for each individual, and treatment strategies also vary depending on each person’s unique needs.
“Whether it’s proven and effective medications, psychotherapy, peer support, complementary and alternative medicine, or a combination of multiple approaches, it’s important that any plan of care is evidence-based and derived from patient-centered discussions and shared decision-making,” he said.
Prosecutors told a court that Lindsay told her husband she heard a “man’s voice” telling her to kill the children and herself, and that it was her “only chance.”
Her attorney says that in the months following the birth of her third child, she had become all her own and was given an amazing combination of 13 different medications to help her cope.