Lindsay Clancy’s mother and sister took the stand to testify on her alleged mental state in the months leading up to the day she killed her three children.
Clancy’s mother, Paula Musgrove, testified on Monday, August 17, that her daughter was a dedicated and loving mother. She added that Clancy’s mental health started to decline in October 2022, roughly three months before she killed Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, in January 2023.
The jury was then shown a text that Clancy, 36, sent Musgrove.
“Mom, will you please come up and stay with me for a bit? I’m really sick. Something is wrong,” the message read, according to the Associated Press. “I had horrible insomnia all night, and I just don’t know how I am going to get through the day. … It’s just really scary, and I don’t want to be alone.”
Musgrove went on to share that Clancy appeared nervous during an incident in December 2022, in which she told her mother and her then-husband, Patrick Clancy, that she “had thoughts of harming the children.”
Musgrove lived in Connecticut at the time her grandchildren were killed, though she spent a lot of time with Lindsay at her Massachusetts home between October and December 2022. She said that Lindsay was scared to sleep alone and had become increasingly paranoid. Lindsay also allegedly believed that the medications she was prescribed and had been taking “were destroying her mind.”
Lindsay’s sister, Allison Ozga, also testified on Monday, recalling a conversation she had with Lindsay via phone in December 2022. During their conversation, Ozga testified that her sister admitted to having suicidal thoughts every day for a month.
Lindsay is currently on trial for the murder of her three young children. Her attorney, Kevin Reddington, has not denied that she killed her children, instead arguing that the mother should not be held criminally responsible because she had postpartum psychosis at the time of the killings.
Reddington also said that Lindsay has bipolar disorder and that the antidepressants described to treat her postpartum depression actually made her condition worse and, in part, contributed to her strangling her children before throwing herself out of a second story window.
Prosecutors are arguing that the killings were intentional and premeditated, adding that she purposefully sent her husband to run errands on January 24, 2023, so she would be alone with the children.
When Patrick, 36, returned home, he found his wife had jumped from the window, called 911 and later discovered their three children unresponsive in the basement.
If you or someone you know is pregnant or just had a baby and is in crisis, help is available. Call or text the National Maternal Mental Health Hotline for free, confidential support 24/7 in English and Spanish at 1-833-TLC-MAMA (1-833-852-6262).
