Clancy, a former labor and delivery nurse, has pleaded not guilty to three counts each of murder and strangulation for the January 2023 deaths of her three children.
The trial for a Massachusetts mother charged with killing her three children before attempting to kill herself began on Monday, with the defense and a witness speaking on the cocktail of medications including antipsychotics, antidepressants, and benzodiazepines that she was prescribed by multiple doctors in the months after she gave birth. Lindsay Clancy continued to see doctors, via telehealth, with concerns about her mental condition and she was given more and more drugs in return.
In opening statements delivered on Monday, Lindsay Clancy’s defense attorney, Kevin Reddington, said that Clancy “knows that she killed these children. The issue for consideration is what was going on in that woman’s mind.” He described her as a loving and attentive mother. “She loved those children right up to the time of their death.”
He said that after having her second child, Clancy “had postpartum. You’re gonna hear evidence that was one of the issues that was important because it can lead to bipolar. One of the things you don’t do, which is taboo, is if someone is bipolar, you don’t put them on an antidepressant … on Zoloft.” He added, “It messes with your brain and it was done in this case.”
Clancy’s third child, Callan, was born in May of 2022. Clancy, a former labor and delivery nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital, has pleaded not guilty to three counts each of murder and strangulation for the January 2023 deaths of her three children. Clancy is alleged to have jumped out of her home’s second-story window after the killings, leaving her paralyzed in a suicide attempt.
During his opening statements, Reddington went over the vast number of medications that Clancy was put on beginning in September of 2022, including Zoloft, Lorazepam, Hydroxyzine, Diazepam, Amitriptyline. He outlined the numerous attempts Clancy made to seek help, only to be placed on more medication types or higher doses.
Reddington said, “this is a woman that did not get the … medical treatment that she so deserved. This is a woman that was suffering from psychosis at the time that she went down to that basement. She had no motive. She loved her children. She intended to kill herself.” He said that when she was taken to the hospital, she said she wanted a DNR, or do-not-resuscitate order, indicating that she “wanted to die.”
First to testify was Clancy’s ex-husband and the father of her three deceased children, Patrick, who said that his ex-wife had been prescribed 13 different medications in the months leading up to the killings. He said he had pushed for an in-person appointment because he believed there had been a “disconnect” between the seriousness of the situation and the short telehealth sessions she had been getting. “It seemed like most of her telehealth appointments were pretty quick, and there just wasn’t, like, a lot of attention.”
In October, Clancy had been prescribed Zoloft, Ativan, and Benadryl. In November, she was prescribed Trazodone, Prozac, Ambien, Remeron, Klonopin, and Seroquel. In December, she was prescribed Valium and Lamictal. In January, she was prescribed Trazodone, Valium, and Amitriptyline. The cocktail of medications includes sleep aids, antidepressants, anti-anxiety medications, and mood stabilizers. The final medication, Amitriptiline, is a tricyclic antidepressant that is noted as having significant side effects.
Under cross-examination, Patrick estimated that his ex-wife was taking three or four of the medications at a time.
Prosecutors said that the three young children were “deliberately and meticulously killed” by their mother, while the defense has argued that Clancy was suffering from psychosis and was not criminally responsible when she strangled her three young children. Her attorney said that on the day of the killings, she heard voices telling her “This is your last chance. Kill the children so you can kill yourself.”
