Lindsay Clancy Trial Ends in Mistrial After Seven Days of Jury Deadlock

After five weeks of testimony and seven grueling days of deliberation, the triple murder trial of Lindsay Clancy ended Friday, September 4, without a verdict. Plymouth Superior Court Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial after jurors said — for a third and final time — that they simply could not agree.

Clancy, 36, had pleaded not guilty to three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of her three young children: 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson, and 8-month-old Callan. Prosecutors said she strangled them with exercise bands in the basement of the family’s Duxbury home in January 2023, while her then-husband was out running errands. The defense never disputed that Clancy caused her children’s deaths. The entire trial turned on one question: was she criminally responsible for it, or was she in the grip of postpartum psychosis so severe that she couldn’t understand what she was doing was wrong?

A Jury Split Almost Down the Line

The 12-person jury — nine women and three men — began deliberating after closing arguments and spent roughly 38 hours across seven days trying to reach a unanimous decision. They sent Judge Sullivan a string of notes. The first said they were deadlocked. He sent them back. The second said the same thing. He sent them back again. Under Massachusetts law, a judge can only order a jury back to the deliberation room twice unless jurors themselves agree to keep trying — which, notably, this jury did, returning for a fifth day even after signaling they were stuck.

By Thursday, the panel’s message was unmistakable. “It is with a heavy heart that we report we are unable to come to a unanimous decision and will not be able to,” the jury wrote, according to Sullivan. Notes made clear the split was 11 to 1.

The Fight Over the Holdout Juror

That single juror became the center of a tense final act. Defense attorney Kevin Reddington argued the holdout had effectively lied about being able to follow the court’s instructions on reasonable doubt, and asked Sullivan to question the juror further or remove them from the panel entirely. Sullivan declined, saying he saw no evidence the juror had refused to deliberate — only that they’d reached a different conclusion than the other eleven.

When it became clear a mistrial was coming, Reddington asked for, and got, a one-hour window to file an emergency appeal with the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, asking a single justice to order further questioning of the holdout or force their removal from the jury. The SJC held a hearing and turned the request down. With no path left, Sullivan discharged the jury and formally declared a mistrial.

Before ending the proceedings, Sullivan took a moment to thank both sides. “A trial like this is so hard, so difficult, and so I just kind of wanted to thank the three of you for your efforts,” he told the attorneys.

Prosecution and Defense React

Outside the courthouse, Plymouth County District Attorney Timothy Cruz made clear he stood by the case his office built. “Children were murdered, and it’s our job to seek justice,” Cruz said. “This is a case of three children who died a violent death at the hands of the person who was supposed to love them the most.” He also pushed back sharply against public sympathy directed at Clancy over her prosecutors, calling some of the online commentary toward them “disgusting” and noting that both are mothers themselves. “Criminals are being treated as victims, and victims are invisible,” he said.

Cruz did not say Friday whether his office intends to retry the case. Legal analysts note prosecutors now face a real decision: retry Clancy on the same first-degree murder charges, or explore a plea arrangement on lesser charges — a route some defense attorneys say becomes more attractive to prosecutors after a jury comes this close to acquittal on mental-health grounds.

What Happens Next

For now, Lindsay Clancy remains without a resolution nearly three and a half years after her children died. A new trial, if prosecutors pursue one, would mean assembling a new jury and revisiting the same wrenching medical and psychiatric testimony — including competing expert opinions on her bipolar diagnosis, her reaction to prescribed medication, and whether her documented daily routines in the days before the killings reflected calculated behavior or a mind unraveling under psychosis.

Judge Sullivan set a further court date to address next steps in the case. Until then, the question that split this jury 11 to 1 — whether Lindsay Clancy could tell right from wrong on the day her children died — remains legally unanswered.