Lindsay Clancy could face another murder trial for the deaths of her three children after a Massachusetts judge denied her legal team’s motion to dismiss the case.
Judge William Sullivan turned down the motion to dismiss the murder charges against Clancy on Monday, November 9, after her attorneys argued she had a constitutional protection against double jeopardy, when a person is prosecuted for the same offense, Reuters reported.
Sullivan suggested Clancy could face a retrial as soon as March, per the outlet. He set a Monday, November 16, hearing to discuss potentially scheduling another trial date.
“Because the Court concludes that there was a manifest necessity for a mistrial based on the jury’s deadlock, a retrial on the murder indictments does not violate Clancy’s right not to be placed in double jeopardy,” Sullivan ruled, according to ABC News.
The judge additionally denied the defense team’s motion to investigate the lone holdout juror during her murder trial and also turned down a gag order sought by prosecutors, the outlet reported.
Sullivan’s decisions came more than two months after he declared a mistrial in the Clancy case on September 4, amid a deadlocked 11-1 jury.
Jurors failed to unanimously decide whether Clancy was criminally responsible for the deaths of Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, at her Duxbury home in January 2023, when she was accused of strangling each of her children in the basement of her residence.
Her attorneys have maintained that Clancy, who attempted to die by suicide immediately after her children’s deaths, shouldn’t be held criminally responsible because she was experiencing postpartum psychosis along with additional mental health struggles at the time of the incident.
During Clancy’s initial trial, the jury foreperson handed the judge a note stating the person identified as the holdout juror was “unable to follow the instructions regarding reasonable doubt,” Boston 25 News reported.
Her defense team argued Sullivan should have questioned the juror and determined whether there was grounds for their removal and replacement instead of declaring a mistrial, per the outlet.
Sullivan reportedly wrote in his Monday ruling that questioning the holdout juror during deliberations could have pressured them to change their stance.
“The Court’s primary concern must be protecting the fairness of the proceedings and avoiding the possibility of a coerced verdict,” the judge wrote, according to Boston 25 News.
Clancy’s attorneys recently shared in an interview with CBS News that she fears the possibility of a retrial and has been on suicide watch since the killings of her children.
“She wants to be with her children. … And if given the opportunity, I have no doubt in my mind at all that she would take her own life,” one of the attorneys, Rosemary Scapicchio, told the outlet.
Call or text the National Maternal Mental Health Hotline at 833-852-6262 for free, confidential support, available 24/7 in the U.S.
