A Massachusetts woman used exercise bands to strangle her three children at the family home in a well-planned assault while her husband was gone for about 20 minutes picking up medicine from a pharmacy and takeout, a prosecutor said. at his arraignment on Tuesday.
Pleas of not guilty have been entered on behalf of Lindsay Clancy, 32, on charges including two counts of murder, three counts of strangulation and three counts of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.
Clancy, wearing a surgical mask over her face, was arraigned at Plymouth District Court remotely from hospital, where she is recovering from spinal injuries sustained when she jumped from the house’s window. She may never walk again, her defense attorney said.
Judge John Canavan III did not set monetary bail or send her to jail, but ordered her to remain in the hospital until she is well enough to be transferred to a rehab facility.
She did not speak except to say “Yes, Your Honor” when the judge asked if she could hear the proceedings.
The prosecution and defense painted widely divergent pictures of Clancy, a labor and delivery nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, in the weeks and days before she allegedly assaulted her children at the family home in Duxbury.
The children were found by their father with the exercise bands still around their necks. Cora, 5, and Dawson, 3, were pronounced dead at the hospital. Callan, 7 months old, was also taken to hospital where doctors restored his pulse but were unable to restore brain activity. He died several days later, prosecutors said.
The deaths have shocked the coastal city about 30 miles (48 kilometers) south of Boston.
The prosecution said Clancy behaved and appeared normal to everyone he interacted with, including his mother and husband.
On the day of the murders, she asked her husband if he wanted takeout and went online to time how long it would take her to get to the restaurant and pick up some medicine for the children at the pharmacy, prosecutor Jennifer Sprague said.
“She planned these murders, gave herself the necessary time and privacy to commit the murders, and then strangled each child in the place where they should have felt safest: at home with their mother,” Sprague said. “She did it with willful premeditation, extreme atrocity and cruelty.”
Mother accused of killing her 3 children prosecuted.
Prosecutors say a Massachusetts woman used exercise bands to strangle her three children in a well-planned assault while her husband was outside the family home picking up medicine from a pharmacy and a take-out dinner. (February 7th)
Defense attorney Kevin Reddington, who has indicated he plans an insanity defense, painted a picture of a woman battling mental illness, who had been prescribed about a dozen medications to try to control it.
“This is not a situation, your honor, that was planned in any way,” he said. “This was a situation that was clearly the product of mental illness.” Clancy may have been suffering from postpartum depression or postpartum psychosis, she said.
Reddington has hired a psychologist to evaluate her.
The prosecution countered that Clancy had previously been evaluated by mental health professionals and was told she had no postpartum depression or symptoms of postpartum depression.
Clancy’s husband, Patrick, forgave his wife in a post on a fundraising site to help with medical bills, funeral services and legal aid.
“Recently she has been largely portrayed by people who never knew her and never knew who the real Lindsay was,” she wrote. “Our marriage was wonderful and grew stronger as her condition rapidly worsened. I took as much pride in being her husband as I was in being a father to her and felt persistently lucky to have her in my life.”