A Massachusetts judge cleared the way on Monday for Lindsay Clancy to be tried again on murder charges for killing her three young children at her home in 2023, saying a retrial would not unconstitutionally subject her to a double prosecution for the same crime.
Judge William Sullivan in Plymouth rejected a bid by Clancy’s attorneys to have the case against her dismissed. The judge on 4 September declared a mistrial after the jury reported that a holdout juror was preventing it from reaching a unanimous verdict.
The judge has scheduled a 16 November hearing to discuss when to hold a second trial, which he has suggested could occur in March.
No one at Clancy’s initial trial disputed that she strangled daughter Cora, five; son Dawson, three; and eight-month-old son Callan with exercise bands on 24 January 2023, in the basement of their home in the Boston suburb of Duxbury.
She then cut herself with a knife and jumped from a second-story window in an attempt to end her own life, leaving her paralyzed.
Her lawyers have argued Clancy was in the throes of postpartum psychosis and should be found not guilty by reason of insanity, known in Massachusetts as lack of criminal responsibility.
Some of the jurors in televised interviews later said that, but for one holdout juror, they had been prepared to find Clancy not guilty by reason of insanity. Such a verdict would have resulted in her commitment to a state psychiatric hospital, subject to regular court review.
In Massachusetts, a conviction on first-degree murder charges carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.
Defense lawyers argued that a retrial would violate Clancy’s constitutional protection against being tried twice for the same crime, known as double jeopardy, saying Sullivan acted prematurely in declaring a mistrial and should have pursued a viable alternative.
Citing jury notes that stated the holdout juror was not following the law on reasonable doubt despite the judge’s instructions, defense lawyers said Sullivan should have instead questioned the holdout and potentially removed the juror.
Prosecutors under Plymouth county district attorney Timothy Cruz countered that the judge handled the jury impasse appropriately and that questioning the holdout could have risked the judge inappropriately interfering with jury deliberations.
