Ex-husband says Clancy admitted intrusive thoughts about harming kids
(CNN) — Lindsay Clancy was “calm and cooperative” during a psychiatric examination days after killing her three children and attempting suicide, a psychiatrist testified at her murder trial Monday.
Dr. Sejal Shah testified she examined Clancy multiple times at Boston’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital in January and February 2023.
In a January 30, 2023 assessment, Clancy denied having suicidal or homicidal intentions, denied having hallucinations or delusions that day, and her thought-process was “organized” and “goal-directed,” Shah said. In another assessment in February, Clancy was focused on her legal and physical situation and was looking forward to her rehab, Shah said.
On cross-examination, Shah agreed Clancy was an “honest” patient. She acknowledged a person can communicate and make plans while still being in a state of psychosis.
The medical testimony came during the second week of Clancy’s trial on three counts of murder in the killings of her children Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and 8-month-old Callan. The case has explored the controversial “insanity defense” and the severity of postpartum mental illness.
Shah was one of several medical professionals who testified Monday about Clancy’s mental condition and physical injuries. Other doctors testified about the fatal injuries to the children, and detectives told the court about Clancy’s diary entries describing her struggles.
On January 24, 2023, Clancy fatally strangled her three children in the basement of their Duxbury, Massachusetts, home using exercise resistance bands. She then cut her wrists and neck and jumped from a second-story window in a suicide attempt, leaving her partially paralyzed.
Prosecutors argued in opening statements she “deliberately and meticulously” killed her children and “acted intentionally, rationally, and swiftly to accomplish a very specific goal.”
Clancy’s defense has admitted to the killings but said she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and was not “criminally responsible.”
“She had no motive. She loved her children,” defense attorney Kevin Reddington said in his opening statement.
Psychiatric evaluations of Clancy
Shah’s interaction with Clancy was part of an assessment to determine whether she was in a proper mindset to change her health care proxy from her husband to her parents. Clancy was able to explain her thought process for the change, Shah said.
“She felt they were very supportive to her and would have her best interests in mind,” Shah said.
In another hospital evaluation two days after the killings and her suicide attempt, Clancy wrote on a piece of paper that she was “horrified” and asked for an attorney, a forensic psychiatrist testified.
Dr. Jhilam Biswas said she met with Clancy in the hospital on January 26, 2023, to gauge her mental state. Clancy could not speak because she was on a ventilator, so she asked for a paper and pen to write her answers.
In addition to asking for an attorney, Clancy wrote, “is my body broken,” “are my legs straight,” can she have visitors and where her family was. She seemed anxious but she understood the questions and did not show signs of psychosis or hallucinations, Biswas said.
Under cross-examination, Biswas said she interacted with Clancy for about 20 to 30 minutes.
‘I want help,’ Clancy wrote in diary
A kitchen cabinet in Clancy’s home had books and notebooks about postpartum depression and anxiety, including a “postpartum anxiety workbook” with nothing filled in, Massachusetts State Police Detective John Santos said.
One notebook had a list of medications and when to take them, while another had handwritten notes on medications and dates, Santos said. The book, “Good Moms Have Scary Thoughts,” about mothers who have intrusive thoughts, was also found in the cabinet.
Attorneys also read aloud Clancy’s diary entries about her declining mental health while trying to care for her three children.
“It’s like I’m so desperate to get a mental break from taking care of everyone that my mind is trying to make something physically wrong with me,” she wrote.
She wrote she felt “guilty” and was struggling to sleep-train her baby Callan.
“I want help. I want to be well,” she wrote.
Medical experts testify on children’s injuries
Several medical experts testified Monday about the fatal injuries to two of Clancy’s children.
Dr. Michael Snyder, the physician who treated Cora, said the girl was not breathing and had no heartbeat when she arrived to the hospital. She had bruising around her neck, splotchy petechiae indicating broken blood vessels around her eyes, and her skin appeared blue due to lack of oxygen, he testified. Efforts to resuscitate her were not successful, and Cora was declared dead.
Dr. Andrew Capraro, the hospital physician who treated 8-month-old Callan, said the baby was cold on arrival, limp and had ligature marks and swelling on his neck. The child needed a ventilator to breathe, and he showed signs of brain damage due to lack of oxygen and blood. Capraro decided to transfer Callan to the intensive care unit for further care.
Dr. David Casavant, the intensive care unit physician, said Callan had a severe brain injury due to lack of oxygen and was not responsive to touch or light. The doctors determined Callan was brain dead and, with his father Patrick Clancy’s input, decided to stop life support. He was declared dead on January 27, 2023.
Dawson, the 3-year-old, did not have a pulse and was not breathing and was declared dead at the hospital, a doctor testified on Friday.
Further, several medical professionals testified Monday about Clancy’s injuries and their treatment. Clancy was first treated at South Shore Hospital before she was transferred to Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.
Dr. Kelly McDonough, a physician at South Shore Hospital, testified Clancy had a thoracic spine injury from her fall, but CT scans did not show a head injury. The cuts on Clancy’s neck and wrists were “superficial,” she said.
Once moved to Boston, Clancy went into cardiac arrest and had to be revived with CPR and chest compressions, ICU nurse Rachelle Amedee said. Clancy also received multiple blood transfusions, she said.
She testified Lindsay Clancy was “flat” and showed “no emotion either way” during the hospital stay. Two police officers stood outside the room at all times, she said.
How the trial has gone so far
Last week, Patrick Clancy testified about his ex-wife’s downward spiral, full of hospital visits and about a dozen medications to treat her insomnia, anxiety and depression.
On that January day, he went to pick up takeout food and medicine she had ordered, leaving her and the kids at the house. He came home to discover his bloody wife lying in the backyard and his kids in the basement with exercise resistance bands around their necks.
“She killed the f**king kids!” he said, according to a first responder.
About a week later, Lindsay Clancy called her husband from the hospital, he said.
“She didn’t talk about our kids, she talked about what she went through,” he testified. “She said she heard a man’s voice telling her that if she didn’t do it now, she would lose her chance – or something like that.”
Jurors last week also visited the family’s former home and heard testimony from more than a dozen witnesses, most of them medical personnel and law enforcement officials who responded to the grisly scene.
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