Paralyzed mother pleads NOT GUILTY to killing her three children on Zoom from her hospital bed
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A Massachusetts mother pleaded not guilty to strangling her three children to death during a Zoom court appearance as she lay paralyzed in her Boston hospital bed.
Lindsay Clancy, 32, was charged with three counts of premeditated murder for strangling her three children on January 29 at the family home in Duxbury, 35 miles southeast of Boston.
Clancy’s lawyers say she was severely depressed, suffering from postpartum depression and even psychosis, caused by a cocktail of prescription drugs that turned her into a “shell” of herself and robbed her of her personality and ability to feel emotions.
They say Lindsay told her husband, who forgave her, that she heard a ‘man’s voice’ telling her to kill the children and then herself because it was her ‘last choice’.
Prosecutors launched a vicious prosecution today, claiming that she was well aware of what she was doing and even planned it.
Clancy remains in the hospital after attempting to take his own life; he slashed his wrists and jumped from the top-story window of her house after strangling his children, five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson, and eight-month-old Callan. She has been paralyzed as a result of the jump.
After strangling the children, Lindsay attempted to slit her wrists. She then jumped from a window in the family’s home. Baby Callan, eight months old, died in hospital. Cora and Dawson died at home
They told the court that she had been behaving normally in the days leading up to the incident and had only referred to having mild “postpartum anxiety” in notes found on her iPhone.
They also referred to notes in which she described “resenting” the two older boys because they prevented her from “loving Callan like he was her first baby.”
Prosecutors say she deliberately sent her husband to a take-out restaurant that was far enough from the house to give him time to kill the children, and even investigated how long it would take to drive there and back using Google Maps.
They also noted that he would have had to strangle each child for several minutes with the exercise bands to stop them breathing.
‘The bands had to have been squeezing their minds for several minutes.
She is not well at all…she is a paraplegic, she cannot move her legs or feel sensation…she is paralyzed
“She could have changed her mind,” they said, calling it a “premeditated” crime with “extreme cruelty.”
They say the first thing Lindsay asked the doctors at the hospital was if she needed a lawyer, using a pen and whiteboard to scribble down the question because she was intubated at the time.
They also claimed that she had been behaving normally all day before the attack, taking her children to the pediatrician and then playing with them around the house.
Lindsay was denied bail but will be allowed to stay in the hospital before being transferred to a rehab facility. She was ordered to hand over her passport.
After attacking the children, Lindsay slit her wrists and then jumped from her bedroom window, landing in the family’s backyard.
She suffered several spinal fractures and is now a paraplegic, her lawyer said.
‘She’s not well, not at all. She suffered several severe spinal fractures. She is not expected to regain significant function below that level of the spinal cord.
Lindsay Clancy with her husband Patrick and their eldest children, Cora, five, and Dawson, three. She
Tuesday’s court hearing was held via zoom with Clancy visible in the courtroom on his bed.
District attorney details detail the charges Lindsay Clancy faced in a virtual court hearing on Tuesday
She is a paraplegic, she cannot move her legs or feel sensations. She is paralyzed.
“She needs significant medical treatment,” he said, pleading with the court not to jail her and instead allow her to be sent to a medical rehabilitation center.
Clancy’s lawyers say she was overprescribed a cocktail of prescription drugs to treat postpartum depression, turning her into a “zombie.”
In court today, his attorney, Kevin J. Reddington, denied that the attacks were premeditated.
“We all know that this is an individual who is in a desperate medical condition. This woman is a danger to herself. I wonder if she would ever make it to trial.
‘She’s suicidal, she’s extremely emotional. She can’t express happiness, sadness or crying,” Reddington said.
She said she was “completely destroyed” by the cocktail of drugs she was prescribed after the birth of her third child.
‘Our society fails miserably in treating women with postpartum depression or postpartum psychosis.
‘It’s ‘medicate, medicate, medicate’.
Take the pills and you’ll see how it works.
Her husband, Patrick, has forgiven her and asks others to do the same.
In court, her lawyer also referred to the many letters of support she has received from friends and colleagues, who say it was out of character for her to harm the children.
“She loved her children,” her lawyer said.
The Clancy house in Duxbury, Massachusetts, where the children were murdered in the basement.
A sea of tributes for the children was left outside the house after his death.
Patrick, Lindsay’s husband, has forgiven her. She is shown with the children, Cora, five, Dawson, three, and Callan, eight months.
Lindsay was described as a loving mother who said she wanted more children.
Clancy’s lawyer previously told a judge that the drugs Lindsay had been prescribed left her feeling like a ‘zombie’.
He is trying to fight the charges, arguing that she was not in control of herself due to the drastic effects the drugs had on her mind and body.
Investigators are now testing the theory that she might have been suffering from postpartum psychosis.
He also described the ‘horrible’ combination of prescription drugs Lindsay had been given.
Reddington says that between October and January, Clancy was prescribed a dozen medications: Zolpidem, sold under the brand name Ambien, clonazepam, sold under the brand name Klonopin, diazepam, sold under the brand name Valium, fluoxetine, which sold under the brand name Prozac, lamotrigine, sold under the brand name Lamictil, lorazepam, sold under the brand name Ativan, mirtazapine, sold under the brand name Remeron, quetiapine fumarate, sold under the brand name Seroquel, and trazodone .