PLYMOUTH, Mass. (Court TV) — A woman on trial for killing her three young children sobbed in court on Monday as her now-former husband testified about their life together.
Lindsay Clancy wipes away a tear in court on July 27, 2026. (Gregory Derr/The Patriot Ledger)
Lindsay Clancy, 35, has admitted that she killed Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, but maintains that when she strangled the children to death in 2023, she was overcome by postpartum psychosis and not in control of her behavior.
Assistant District Attorney Shanan Buckingham delivered opening statements for the Commonwealth on Monday morning, telling the jury that the defendant plotted to send her husband out of the house so that she could kill her kids. Buckingham said that after sending Patrick Clancy to pick up takeout from a restaurant and medicine from CVS, Lindsay Clancy took the children down to the basement and used exercise bands to kill each one.
Lindsay Clancy then allegedly grabbed a knife from the kitchen and went upstairs to the master bedroom, where she realized she had missed a call from her husband and called him back. “They talk for 14 seconds,” Buckingham said. “Nothing that she does or says in that phone call is of concern to Patrick. He proceeds on his task, and she proceeds on with hers.” After hanging up, Lindsay Clancy slashed her arms and neck with a knife and jumped out of a window on the second floor of the family’s home.
“She shattered, exploded her thoracic spine,” Lindsay Clancy’s attorney, Kevin Reddington, told the jury in his opening statement. “Shattered her cervical spine, first disc. Broke every rib.”
Patrick Clancy testifies on July 27, 2026. (Court TV)
Buckingham aimed to portray the defendant as a sane woman who plotted her children’s deaths. “She was someone who liked to control every little detail of her life, of her family’s life. In contrast to pictures you’ll see of the doting mother, the dedicated nurse, you’ll also see a side of Lindsay Clancy that’s different. Somebody extremely controlling, meticulous, manipulative,” Buckingham said. “This was a woman who no longer liked the life she thought she wanted. It was getting harder and harder to control. And when she saw the opportunity to escape, she made the selfish choice to take it.”
“She didn’t want to get rid of her kids because of her selfish life,” Reddington told the jury. “She loved these children right up to the time of their deaths.” Reddington said his client was “living in a nightmare” that hasn’t ended. “She’s not going to get up miraculously and walk out of this courtroom. She was paralyzed and will be paralyzed for the rest of her life. She’s living her own hell. She knows what happened with those kids and she wanted to die when she was in the hospital.”
Lindsay Clancy wiped away tears as both sides delivered opening statements. Those tears turned to sobs after Patrick Clancy took the stand.
Patrick Clancy testified that he and the defendant are now divorced and that he’s moved to New York. He walked the jury through a timeline of the couple’s relationship that saw Lindsay Clancy go from working more than 40 hours a week as a labor and delivery nurse before they had children to working just two shifts a week after having their first child.
Cora, Callan and Dawson Clancy sit in a wagon. (Commonwealth exhibit)
Patrick Clancy said that Lindsay Clancy struggled with the idea of returning to work after having each child, with her anxiety growing more severe after each birth. By the time Callan was born, he said, Lindsay Clancy was visibly suffering from stress and anxiety. “We didn’t have a diagnosis,” he said. “We didn’t know what was wrong.”
Lindsay Clancy visited several doctors, was prescribed a list of medications and was hospitalized in the weeks before the children were killed. She was discharged from one hospital on Jan. 5, just days before taking the kids’ lives on Jan. 24. “I was hopeful,” Patrick Clancy said. “She seemed much better.”
It was Lindsay Clancy’s improved mood, Patrick Clancy testified, that made him comfortable leaving the children alone with their mother on the day they were killed.
Court adjourned for the day moments after Patrick Clancy described his last moments seeing his children alive: He kissed Cora on the head and saw Dawson eating a bowl of chicken nuggets on the couch. Patrick Clancy was the one to call 911 after returning home from the errands to find the defendant bloody outside and the children dead in the home’s basement.
Testimony will resume on Wednesday, July 29.
