Lindsay Clancy could face a second murder trial over the deaths of her three children after a Massachusetts judge denied her legal team’s motion to dismiss the case on November 9, 2026.
Judge William Sullivan ruled that retrying Clancy would not violate double jeopardy protections and suggested a new trial could begin as soon as 2027, according to reports.
The ruling comes after her attorneys recently spoke out about her mental state for the first time, revealing that Clancy has been on suicide watch since the January 2023 killings of Cora, 5, Dawson, 3 and Callan, 8 months, at her Duxbury home.
Us breaks down everything to know about the case and what’s next for Lindsay Clancy:
Upcoming Hearing in Lindsay Clancy Case
Sullivan turned down the motion to dismiss the murder charges after Clancy’s attorneys argued she had a constitutional protection against double jeopardy, when a person is prosecuted for the same offense, Reuters reported.
The judge set a November 16, 2026, hearing to discuss scheduling another trial date and indicated a retrial could happen as soon as March 2027. Sullivan also denied the defense team’s motion to investigate the lone holdout juror from Clancy’s first trial and rejected a gag order sought by prosecutors.
“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.
Lindsay Clancy’s Mistrial and The Holdout Juror
Sullivan’s decisions came more than two months after he declared a mistrial in the Clancy case on September 4, 2026, amid a deadlocked 11-1 jury. Jurors failed to unanimously decide whether Clancy was criminally responsible for the deaths of her children, with 11 jurors finding her not guilty by reason of insanity and one holdout refusing to agree.
During deliberations, the jury foreperson handed the judge a note stating the holdout was “unable to follow the instructions regarding reasonable doubt,” Boston 25 News reported.
Clancy’s defense team argued Sullivan should have questioned the juror and determined whether there was grounds for removal and replacement instead of declaring a mistrial.
Sullivan wrote in his Monday ruling that questioning the holdout 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.
Lindsay Clancy’s Postpartum Psychosis Defense
Clancy’s attorneys have maintained that she shouldn’t be held criminally responsible because she was experiencing postpartum psychosis along with additional mental health struggles when authorities said she strangled each of her children in the basement of her Duxbury home. She lived there with her husband, Patrick Clancy, and attempted to die by suicide immediately after the killings. Clancy is now paralyzed as a result of that suicide attempt.
Her lawyer Kevin Reddington previously did not dispute that Clancy strangled her children, instead focusing on her mental state at the time.
He has since shifted his approach, arguing at a hearing on September 29, 2026, that there was never a full investigation into the children’s deaths and that authorities “just immediately assumed that this woman was guilty.” On October 1, 2026, Sullivan denied a separate motion from Reddington to have Clancy declared not guilty on all three first-degree murder charges on the basis of insufficient evidence.
Lindsay Clancy’s Attorneys Say She Fears Retrial Possibility
Clancy’s attorneys shared in an interview with CBS News that she fears the possibility of a retrial and has been on suicide watch since the deaths of her children.
Rosemary Scapicchio, one of the attorneys representing Clancy, said her client “doesn’t want to be here” and described how she constantly faces the reality that her children are gone before sleeping and having “horrible dreams about this.”
“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,” Scapicchio told the outlet.
Clancy is in custody at a state psychiatric facility, where her parents regularly visit her, Scapicchio said.
The attorney declined to comment on whether Clancy and Patrick communicate.
“That’s a family issue that we don’t really want to get into in terms of what’s happening,” she said. “I know Patrick has moved on, he has remarried, he is having another child.”
This story was compiled with the help of AI tools and edited by journalists.
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
