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🇬🇧 United Kingdom /Crime & Justice

Deadlocked jury resumes deliberations in Lindsay Clancy trial after dispute

From The Guardian · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources In the courts
  • Jurors resumed deliberations for a seventh day in the Massachusetts trial of Lindsay Clancy, who is accused of killing her three children.
  • The foreperson said one juror would not follow the court’s reasonable-doubt instructions, but Judge William Sullivan declined to remove that juror.
  • Clancy’s defense cites postpartum psychosis, while prosecutors argue she understood her actions; a hung jury would result in a mistrial.

The Lindsay Clancy jury returned to deliberations Friday for a seventh day, despite an extraordinary dispute over whether one juror is following the judge’s instructions on reasonable doubt.

The jury’s foreperson raised the issue in a note to Judge William Sullivan on Thursday. The disclosure offered the clearest indication yet of what may be preventing the panel from reaching a verdict on whether Clancy is criminally responsible for killing her three children.

Reading that note carefully and strictly, that note does not indicate this is a person who refuses to follow the law.

· Judge William SullivanSullivan explained why he would not remove the juror whose approach to reasonable doubt had been challenged.

Sullivan questioned jurors individually in private, then reread his instructions. He reminded them that the prosecution carries the burden of proof and that proof beyond a reasonable doubt does not mean proof beyond all possible doubt. He rejected a request from defense lawyer Kevin Reddington to question the juror again or remove that person from the case.

“Reading that note carefully and strictly, that note does not indicate this is a person who refuses to follow the law,” Sullivan said. He added that he could not side with one juror or the other 11 while the panel was deliberating.

I don’t feel it is proper for me to side with one side or the other of the deliberations.

· Judge William SullivanThe judge rejected the defense request to dismiss the juror.

Clancy, 36, a former labor and delivery nurse, has not denied strangling Cora, Dawson and Callan Clancy, who were five, three and eight months old, respectively, in the basement of the family home in 2023 before attempting suicide. Her lawyers argue that postpartum psychosis drove her actions. Prosecutors say she knew what she was doing, including when they allege she sent her husband out on errands.

The trial has drawn intense public interest and divided opinion over punishment and maternal mental health after childbirth. Clancy uses a wheelchair after becoming paralyzed from the waist down in the suicide attempt. A second failure to reach a verdict would produce a mistrial.

She has a right to know what’s going on.

· Kevin ReddingtonClancy’s lawyer explained why she joined a sidebar conversation with the judge.
About this summary

Originally published by The Guardian in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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