Beyond All Repair - The Clancy Trial | Ep. 3: What happens next?

Episode Date: September 18, 2026

After the mistrial in the Lindsay Clancy case, one big question remains: Will District Attorney Tim Cruz retry the case — and if so, on what charges? As we wait for a status hearing on Sept. 29, new details have emerged about the holdout juror. Three jurors recently told the media he refused to go along with the other 11 jurors. Reports suggest he may have failed to disclose a criminal history. Meanwhile, a case in Massachusetts with similarities to Clancy's case is being reconsidered. Latarsha Sanders was convicted of murder for killing her two children in 2022. The charges were brought by Cruz, and her trial was presided over by the same judge who handled Clancy's trial. For Sanders's trial, Judge William Sullivan ruled her medical records inadmissible. But this summer, in the middle of Clancy's trial, the state's high court said that was a mistake and vacated the earlier conviction. Now, Sanders is getting a new trial. WBUR’s Deborah Becker explores what a retrial might look like for both women and what Clancy's future holds. She also examines what this case reveals about gaps in America's mental health system and unpacks what this case tells us about how we handle family tragedies.

Some of the big lessons from this trial really are how the criminal legal system handles mental health. A lot of things that are health related and mental health related, they don't fit into the rigidity of a courtroom. There are very strict laws and procedures, and people, especially people who are ill, can be messy. and the legal system and the mental health system collided here. And perhaps both systems have something to learn from this. I'm Deborah Becker. I'm a reporter and host at WBUR, and this is the third episode of WBUR's podcast about the Lindsay Clancy trial.

If this is the first episode you're listening to, you should go back and listen to episodes one and two. So we're going to talk about the latest developments in this case and what's happened since the mistrial was declared and where the case might go moving forward. And the next big date for all of this is September 29th. It's a status hearing where both sides will discuss what may happen next in this case after the mistrial was declared on September 4th. The defense for Lindsay Clancy has said that. he would like the judge to consider his motion for an acquittal. He is saying that the Commonwealth did not prove its case and the charges should be dismissed. I would assume we would have some

sort of decision by prosecutors as to whether they will retry the case by then. So when there's a mistrial in a case, it's really up to prosecutors what they want to do. They couldn't convince the jury to convict unanimously, so they have to decide whether they want to try another jury and see if that jury will convict. They could opt to go with lesser charges where a jury would not be required in the trial. It would only be before a judge. They could try to negotiate some kind of a plea deal and say, we won't retry if you agree that, or they could say, we're going to try again. Let's start from the beginning and we'll impanel a new jury and we'll start this all over again and see if we get a different verdict. Or a verdict, right?

The district attorney in Plymouth County, who is overseeing the prosecution of the Clancy trial, is Tim Cruz. He is one of 11 district attorneys in the state. He's the only Republican. He's been in office for more than 20 years and he's running for re-election on a post. in November. He's known as a tough on crime prosecutor. It is widely expected that he will decide to retry the Clancy case, although there could be some changes. And that's primarily because there have been a few things that have happened to district attorney Cruz and to his office over the past couple of months that may cause him to rethink things or perhaps try to

negotiate something else. I think that a case that might have implications for the Clancy case and for Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz's decision on whether to retry this case is a case involving another mom charged with killing her two children. Her attorney had also argued that her mental health was really weakened at that point and led her into this state where she killed her two children and the judge, Judge William Sullivan, the same judge who oversaw Lindsay Clancy's trial, prosecuted by the same district attorney Tim Cruz, the judge ruled that this woman, Latarsha Sanders, her medical records could not be allowed at trial. And the SJC, the highest court in the state, then ruled that that was a mistake. That was erroneous. And the judge should

have allowed those medical records. So the SJC ordered a new trial for Latarsia Sanders, and I think that ruling will probably be something that the district attorney considers in the Clancy case. Whether the Clancy case is retried, that is up to Plymouth County District Attorney, Tim Cruz. But also on his plate, the case of Latarsia Sanders, a black mother who also was charged with killing her children. And the SJC recently ordered that her conviction be thrown out. Now, NBC-10 Boston... He could try Latarsher Sanders with first-degree murder again, or he could reduce the charge.

It's a decision he must make at almost the same time he considers how to retry the Clancy case. Asking a court to hold another trial because the conviction is in question, because medical records weren't allowed, is very significant. And that's the court saying, no, this is an issue here.

And it's an issue that the judge should have allowed and the court should have been allowed to consider, especially the jury. I think that on the heels of the Sanders ruling, it might cause the district attorney to think about the increased awareness about mental health when there's a crime. And I think clearly the Clancy case has shown these factions. There are real divides, right? There are people who are saying, this woman is a monster. and should go to jail for the rest of her life.

And there are people who say, no, this woman was a devoted mother who was sick. And it was a tragedy and still is a tragedy, but does she belong in prison? Or don't we need to have more attention to how mental health can contribute to this kind of behavior? This is an illness that absolutely blindsides families. Nobody wants this to happen. And I think that the more that we demonize, this person and this illness, the less likely moms and birthing people are going to feel comfortable

speaking up and it's going to be further in the shadows. My message is justice for Cora Dawson and Callan that their mother is accountable for murdering them, violently murdering them. So you think she should be convicted of first-degree murder? Absolutely. Even though she had mental health issues. Yes. Yeah.

Because that wasn't a reason, do you think? I don't think that's, in my opinion, that's not a valid reason to strangle your children to death. And perhaps the Sanders case will allow district attorney Cruz to think about how people are viewing mental health and what people are saying about that in a criminal context. Certainly, politics are never supposed to be at play when a district attorney is deciding whether to take on a case or not take on a case. case, right? But I do think that we've seen some political maneuvering already in this case. The defense attorney, Kevin Redington, asked President Trump to perhaps pardon Lindsay Clancy. And of course, President Trump cannot do that. The president oversees federal crimes, not state crimes. But when asked to clarify Kevin Redington said that he was hoping that the president might nudge his fellow

Republican, District Attorney Cruz, to perhaps think about that when he makes his decision about whether to retry this case. And the district attorney is an elected official. So I think there are certainly some political considerations. So most recently there has been a lot of discussion and a lot of reports about the holdout juror. According to now five members of the Clancy jury, the vote was 11 to one to find her not criminally responsible, otherwise known as not guilty by reason of insanity. And the one holdout juror, they've identified as a man, and they said that this holdout juror would not listen to the law

and said he had reasonable doubt, but he was still not going to go along with a not guilty by reason of insanity verdict. We read him on numerous occasions, the definition of reasonable doubt from Judge Sullivan's instruction. He actually said one day in the end, well, why don't we have the judge come in and read it again?

And we were like, no, we have it in front of us. We don't need that. And so in this particular case, they said this holdout juror did have doubt as to whether Lindsay Clancy was criminally responsible, but he still thought, apparently, that she should have been convicted of murder. Even though this juror acknowledged that the Commonwealth did not prove that she was mentally well enough to be criminally liable for this. So the judge did re-instruct the jury on reasonable doubt. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt does not mean proof beyond all possible doubt. For everything in the lives of human beings is open to some possible or imaginary doubt. If you evaluate all the evidence and you still have a reasonable doubt remaining,

the defendant is entitled to the benefit of that doubt and must be acquitted. If the Commonwealth has not proven its case beyond a reason, reasonable doubt, you cannot reach a guilty verdict. But the juror apparently wouldn't go along with that, and the mistrial was declared. There's been a lot of controversy about this juror. There are some reports that this holdout juror may have been involved in the criminal legal system before, and if it's proven to be true, could be problematic to the case, I'm told. I think it would all depend on the juror questionnaire. So during the voir dire process, when the judge and the attorneys question potential jurors, they've also filled out a questionnaire about all kinds of details, their occupation,

their spouse's occupation, and their involvement in the criminal legal system and whether they have ever had charges against them. Now, having charges against you does not disqualify you from serving on a jury. That would be up to questioning by the judge and the attorneys involved, the prosecutors and the defense. We don't know if this holdout juror was forthcoming about his past. And if he was not honest, then he could be prosecuted for not telling the truth. And the juror questionnaire specifies that if you are not truthful on this document, you can face a fine, I think, of up to $2,000. and you could face prosecution for lying on the juror questionnaire. It's unclear at this point.

Juror questionnaires are not public record, so we don't know what this juror was asked or how this juror may have answered, and we don't know if it's going to be an issue, but I would suspect it will probably come up at the status hearing. A judge has ordered the juror list in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial to be indefinitely impounded. That's after the alleged holdout juror was identified on social,

media. We have not publicly identified the jurors by name. Now, the judge impounded the names of these jurors. So the only way they come forward is if they willingly decide to reach out to a media outlet. I spoke as a retired judge about this juror and about the reports of his past alleged criminal history. And what this retired judge said that he thought, that he thought, thought it was shameful to drag a juror through this. And he said someone with criminal allegations is perfectly suited to be a juror if they are impartial. He thinks that going through someone's past criminal record to see if they have some sort of dirt in their background, he called it an example of cheapening the public discussion of the criminal legal system. So he thinks it's

It's something that should have been handled during questioning with the judge and the lawyers involved. And bringing it up now is something that shouldn't be done. For Lindsay Clancy, I think regardless of the verdict, she is going to be in custody somehow for quite a long time. So she is still at Tewksbury Hospital, which is a state facility run by the state, a psychiatric hospital, where she has been since she was released from the hospital because of her severe medical issues in 2023. She's under a 24-7 suicide watch and has been since she got there.

And she will stay there waiting for the outcome here, whether there will be a new trial or not. If she somehow gets some kind of a plea deal or perhaps lesser charges, she would stay probably in some kind of, kind of a specialized medical unit, even if she's convicted. The Department of Correction would probably have to put her in a special medical unit. She's paralyzed from the waist down.

So I think her life is tragic and will remain so. I don't see any way she's going to be released or getting out anytime soon regardless. We're going to take a short break. We'll be right back. There is something powerful about the sound of the human voice. Beautifully produced audio has the unique power to connect and inspire. Tell your organization's story with a custom podcast from City Space Productions, the Creative Studio from WBUR's Business Partnerships team.

Become a thought leader. Recruit new talent. Reach new audiences. Whatever your goal, we can help. Discover how the magic is made at WBUR.org slash creative studio. If Lindsay Clancy is retried, the defense would probably stick to the same sort of strategy. And that would be to continue to say and maintain that Lindsay Clancy had significant mental health issues that weren't addressed, that she was prescribed 13 different medications that may have exacerbated some of her symptoms. And that's what led her to kill her children in a moment.

of sort of psychotic delusion. I think it would continue to rely on experts who would testify that she was experiencing postpartum psychosis and that this is what happened. The key defense expert was a gentleman by the name of Dr. Philip Resnick, and he did not appear in person. He testified on Zoom,

and he's like an internationally known expert on this and not necessarily postpartum, but on violence risk and malingering, which is not telling the truth about your mental illness or trying to fake it, if you will. After time of the crime itself, his plancy was frankly psychotic. He's elderly and he has health issues. So if, for whatever reason, they couldn't have someone of his, of Dr. Resnick's stature testify again. I think that might present. a difficulty for the defense. If there's a retrial, the prosecution will probably do things very differently. I think the prosecution would have different experts testify. It's rebuttal experts,

as they're known, who could counter the experts the defense brought in. They were not postpartum experts. And I think that there were a lot of questions about the credibility of the prosecution experts in this particular case and evaluating Lindsay Clancy years after it happened and saying it definitely wasn't postpartum psychosis. Some of the evaluations were done just a few months before the trial, even though the killings had happened three years prior. So I think the prosecution would probably change its strategy. One of the things I found so interesting about this trial was when the prosecution was when the prosecution was, The prosecution started, in its opening statements, the prosecutor said Lindsay Clancy was a

manipulative woman, a controlling woman. She mapped out her kids' nap schedules and sleeping schedules, and she just didn't like her life anymore. And so that's what led her to commit this crime. She was someone who liked to control every little detail of her life, of her family's life. somebody extremely controlling, meticulous, and manipulative. The days were laid out with specificity. Strict schedules were expected to be maintained. Food was planned carefully. Sleep was scheduled to the minute.

By the end, after its own experts testified that, yes, Lindsay Clancy was suffering from a severe mental illness, the prosecutors' tone softened and realized that everybody, said that Lindsay Clancy was a devoted mother and that she was functioning very well up until a few months before this happened. There's no dispute that Lindsay Clancy was suffering for mental illness and that she tried to kill herself. That's not the issue in this trial. The issue is whether at the time she killed Cora, Dawson, and Callan. She knew the difference between right and wrong and whether she could conform her behavior to the requirements of the law.

So then the prosecutor said, yes, she was a mother struggling with mental illness, but it wasn't to the point where she couldn't understand or control her behavior. So therefore, she should be found guilty because it was a horrific crime. So I think the prosecutors learned that along the way. and this time around, if there is another trial, they will take those lessons into the courtroom. You know, I've spoken with a lot of therapists

about watching this trial. So many people were just watching the trial every day and they were live streaming it at their offices and I think there were a lot of lessons learned. But the therapists I've spoken with who've watched it felt like the trial really raised for them a lot of questions about how we diagnose and how we try to put a patient's symptoms into a certain criteria so insurance will cover the cost of treatment or so they'll qualify to try a type

of prescription drug and is it enough to see a mental health professional virtually? Many times in this trial, what we heard was that Lindsay Clancy's mental health clinicians were seeing her for about 17 minutes and changing your prescription. So some of the therapists I've spoken with said that they felt the trial really showed that there was sort of a formulaic path that the mental health system is going on. And what people really need, especially people in mental health crisis, is more human connection. And that may have benefited Lindsay Clancy, but it may benefit the system as a whole in the future. I do think that something that everyone has learned about this case is that there are many

different ways of treating postpartum mental health in some countries, even states, do it better. There's movement in Massachusetts to change the law and allow for treatment when new moms are charged with crimes and evaluations to see how their mental. health may have affected their behavior. And the only other state that does that right now is Illinois. But we also, we learned a lot about how other countries do this because there was a lot of discussion about this. And there is in the legal system in the UK, I'm told, more of a consideration of maternal mental health when these types of things happen. It's not an immediate it rushed to put someone in prison for the rest of their life.

There are different kind of laws when it's someone who's having a psychotic break. I think Australia is another country that is known to have better care for postpartum mental health. So that's been eye-opening to see that, at least in this regard, the U.S. healthcare system seems to be behind. I think I felt so drawn to this case because I do think that, there are a lot of women who struggle and don't admit to their struggles. And this was a case of a woman who didn't fully admit to her struggles, and then it was too late. So I think that was a real theme for me that made me very interested in all of this and in this trial in particular.

And I think for me, I've always covered the law and mental health. And I do think that I've learned a lot. lot more. I think that this trial will have an effect going forward. I think there were enough people saying something has to shift here that there will be changes. So I'll continue to monitor that and monitor this case. I'm still texting the reporters. I was in the courtroom with every day. Did you see this? Did you know this? Look who this one spoke with, right? Like we are all, it's like a trauma bond right we we were all in this together and I think I'll um we'll be talking with them for a very long time to come covering the trial of Lindsay Clancy has been emotional it's

obviously been very long and thank you very much for listening and following along with all of this and we're going to keep telling you more about it as of right now, this is the information that we have. We don't know when the next episode will come out, but we're covering this story, and as soon as we have more, we'll bring it to you. So again, thank you for listening. And, you know, if this is your first time listening to Beyond All Repair, I encourage you to follow us for more stories about the Lindsay Clancy trial or all of the stories that we'll be following on the Beyond All Repair feed. And if you want to reach out, With any questions about this case or about the show, you can email us.

Our email is Podcasts with an S at WBUR.org. This episode was reported and voiced by me. Deborah Becker was produced by Ben Brock Johnson, Samata Joshi, and Amy Gorell, editing by Dave Shaw. Additional editorial guidance from Elizabeth Harrison, sound design by Paul Likis.