PLYMOUTH, Mass. (Court TV) — Lindsay Clancy’s attorney clashed with the judge on Monday while pushing for access to documents about the holdout juror who deadlocked the jury and forced a mistrial.
Clancy, 36, has pleaded not guilty to three charges of first-degree murder in the deaths of her children — Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months. At her first trial, Clancy’s attorney conceded that she had killed the children by strangling them with exercise bands in the basement of her family’s home, but argued that she was not legally responsible for their deaths because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis at the time.
Lindsay Clancy sits in court on Nov. 2, 2026. (Court TV)
After hearing weeks of evidence and deliberating for days, the jury reported an 11-1 deadlock, leading Judge William Sullivan to declare a mistrial. Most jurors said they wanted to find Clancy not guilty by reason of insanity. Notes they sent the judge during deliberations expressed growing frustration with the lone holdout. That holdout juror later identified himself to the media as Michael Desronvil, but court documents refer to him as “Juror Doe.”
On Monday, Clancy appeared with her trial attorney, Kevin Reddington, and two other attorneys as the team renewed its bid to dismiss the charges. Reddington filed a motion seeking Desronvil’s juror questionnaire and permission to question him further. Reddington’s motion had referred to Desronvil as Juror Doe, but when Reddington began to speak in court and addressed the juror by name, Sullivan stopped him.
Sullivan: I’m going to stop you right there.
Reddington: No, you’re not going to stop me.
Sullivan: Well, no, I am.
Reddington: No, you’re not.
Sullivan: All right then, this hearing’s — you know, because there’s no need to bring out that juror’s name.
Reddington: It’s all over the internet.
Sullivan: That’s through the internet. That’s through other people. There’s no need, here in this courtroom, to use that. Everyone else has referred to him as “Juror Doe” and if you want to refer to him, that’s the way he’s to be referred to. That’s all.
Reddington: He’s got more face time than I do.
When Reddington tried to discuss the juror’s criminal past, prosecutor Jennifer Sprague asked to handle it at sidebar or in a closed courtroom. “No,” Reddington snapped back.
“Well, hold on, I think I make the decision on that objection,” Sullivan countered.
After a brief sidebar, Reddington reiterated his belief that the documents should be preserved and made available to his team; Sullivan took the issue under advisement.
Attorney Martin Weinberg, who joined Clancy’s team after the mistrial, urged Sullivan to reconsider his initial denial of the defense’s motion to dismiss the case. Weinberg argued that the notes sent by the forewoman should have prompted Sullivan to conduct a more thorough voir dire of the holdout juror.
“Excuse me, but didn’t I do that?” Sullivan asked. “Didn’t I bring the jurors in? Didn’t I swear them in? Didn’t I ask each individual one?”
Weinberg said Sullivan’s single question to jurors — whether they could follow his instructions on the law — fell short of what was required. “A single question that led to the adoption of, you know, an assurance by all 12 jurors is simply constitutionally insufficient to probe what was going on in that jury room,” he said.
Sprague argued there was no indication that the holdout juror wasn’t following the law. “There was no indication in these notes that there was an issue personal to that one juror,” she said. “It is clear from the record that this juror did not refuse to deliberate. He refused to agree.”
Sullivan said he would take that issue under advisement as well, along with the Commonwealth’s request to issue a gag order. “Counsel for the defendant has engaged in substantial publicity pretrial, during the trial and post-trial that has inevitably tainted potential jurors with inflammatory statements about the prosecution of the case, the facts of the case, the evidence presented, evidence not presented at trial and jury deliberations,” Sprague said.
When the defense asked if she was willing to be subject to the same rules, Sprague immediately agreed. “I am not looking for 15 minutes of fame in this case,” she said. “What the Commonwealth wants is justice for Cora, Dawson and Callan.”
While Sullivan had initially asked both sides to be ready to set a trial date at Monday’s hearing, prosecutors said they wanted to wait until the judge issued rulings on the motions before committing to their next steps in the case. “Why do we not know if the next trial is going to be murder in the first-degree or a lesser charge or no charge? To suggest that they need to find out what you’re going to do on these motions and if there are going to be any appeals, assuming they’re denied, is specious,” Reddington said. “I want a trial, and I want it with you and I want it this spring.”
Sullivan said he would announce his rulings on Nov. 16; if the charges are not dismissed, they will set a date then. “I don’t want anybody reading the tea leaves into my scheduling language,” Sullivan cautioned as he set the date.
