Jurors in the Lindsay Clancy trial spent a third day deliberating without reaching a verdict, bringing their total deliberation time to about 17 hours. The jury, which is deciding whether the former labour and delivery nurse was criminally responsible for killing her three children in 2023, is set to continue deliberations on Tuesday.
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According to The Associated Press (AP), jurors began deliberating Thursday after hearing testimony from more than 70 prosecution witnesses and 10 defence witnesses during a five-week trial. The case has drawn attention to maternal mental health and postpartum psychosis.
Clancy, 36, does not deny strangling her three children — Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and eight-month-old Callan — with exercise bands at the family's home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, on January 24, 2023. She then attempted suicide while her husband was away getting takeout and going to a pharmacy.
Her defence has argued that she was suffering from severe postpartum psychosis and had lost touch with reality when she killed the children. Clancy had sought treatment for her worsening mental health in the months before the killings and was discharged from a psychiatric hospital less than three weeks before the deaths.
Prosecutors have argued that Clancy knew what she was doing and deliberately killed the children before attempting suicide. They said she was depressed and overwhelmed by caring for the children and wanted to end her life while taking them with her.
Medical experts called by both sides disagreed over Clancy's state of mind at the time of the killings. Clancy did not testify during the trial.
The jury could find her guilty of murder or the lesser charge of manslaughter, or acquit her if it determines that she was not criminally responsible because of her psychiatric condition.
If convicted, she could face life in prison, while an acquittal on mental health grounds could lead to her release or confinement in a psychiatric facility.
