Lindsay Clancy’s mother says daughter thought medication was ‘destroying her mind’ as defense begins case in murder trial

By Nicki Brown, CNN

(CNN) — Lindsay Clancy’s defense on Monday started calling its own witnesses – several of whom described her as a dedicated and loving parent – after prosecutors rested their case against the Massachusetts mother accused of murdering her three young children.

“She always wanted to be a mother, have many children, and I felt it was the best thing that ever happened to her,” Clancy’s mother testified, before describing her daughter’s apparent spiral into darkness and paranoia in the months before the killings.

“She would mention that this wasn’t her mind,” Paula Musgrove said. “She would say to me, ‘This isn’t me, I’ve never been like this before.’ And I would agree, because she wasn’t.”

Clancy, 36, does not deny she fatally strangled her children – Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and 8-month-old Callan – in the basement of their family home in January 2023. But her attorney argues the former labor and delivery nurse should not be held criminally responsible because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and extreme mental illness when she strangled her kids and then attempted to kill herself.

The Plymouth County District Attorney’s Office, meanwhile, argues Clancy acted “intentionally, rationally, and swiftly” to kill her three children. Over several weeks, prosecutors elicited testimony from more than 70 witnesses – including Clancy’s former husband and her medical providers – as they endeavored to prove she was not experiencing psychosis when she strangled her children.

Through his questioning of the prosecution’s witnesses, Clancy’s defense attorney, Kevin Reddington, has sought to portray her as a caring mother who suffered from extreme mental illness and was not properly treated by her medical providers.

Clancy, who has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder, could face life in prison if convicted. If jurors find she cannot be held criminally responsible, the court will likely begin the process to have her committed to a psychiatric hospital. She is currently being held at the public Tewksbury Hospital in Massachusetts.

Defense witnesses describe Clancy as caring nurse, loving mother

Musgrove appeared to grow emotional as she took the stand Monday and described the love she had for her late grandchildren.

“I love my grandchildren with all my heart. And you’ll never know what it’s like to love a grandchild until you become a grandmother,” she said. “It was the most beautiful thing.”

Clancy was an attentive mother and a compassionate nurse, said Margaret Hamp, a nurse who worked with the defendant. Clancy would often become emotional when helping strangers give birth, she said.

“She would just say, ‘That was so beautiful,’” Hamp testified. “You could just tell that she really loved being in that setting.”

Hamp recalled a day early in Clancy’s career when their unit treated a pregnant patient who was planning to harm herself.

“I asked (Clancy) if she had ever heard of the Andrea Yates case and she hadn’t,” the nurse testified, referring to the mother who in 2006 was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the drownings of her five children. “I explained that to her and she cried, and she said: ‘How could a mother hurt her children?’”

Clancy was happy the summer after her third child was born in May 2022, her mother testified, but her mood shifted in the fall.

“She told me she was anxious about going back to work because Callan was having trouble taking a bottle and she didn’t feel right about leaving him,” Musgrove said.

According to a text message displayed in court, Clancy wrote to her mother in October 2022 asking whether Musgrove would stay with her as she struggled with insomnia after taking anxiety medication.

“It’s just really scary and I don’t want to be alone,” Clancy wrote. Musgrove testified she stayed with her daughter for about a week.

Clancy had low energy and “seemed off” around Thanksgiving 2022, her sister Allison Ozga testified, and her condition deteriorated in early December.

“She was having more suicidal thoughts, insomnia continued to be an issue,” her sister said. “She was really not feeling like herself.”

Later that month, Clancy told her then-husband and her mother she had thoughts of harming the children, Musgrove testified. At the end of the year, Clancy said she was feeling numb, hopeless and had experienced suicidal ideation every day that month, Ozga said.

After a multiday stay at a psychiatric facility in early January 2023, Clancy appeared to be improving, her sister testified. But her mother said Clancy lost a lot of weight that month and became paranoid about things that “really weren’t logical.”

“She said that she couldn’t remember anything. The medication was pretty much just destroying her mind, and it wasn’t her,” Musgrove said. “She said, ‘This isn’t me. I just want to feel better and enjoy my kids again.’”

Prosecutors say Clancy sought ‘quick and easy’ fix for mental health

The prosecution’s case in chief began last month with two days of heartwrenching testimony from Clancy’s ex-husband, Patrick Clancy, who described how his wife’s stress, anxiety and other mental health problems intensified in the months after the birth of their third child.

While the Commonwealth argues Lindsay Clancy was not in the “throes of psychosis” when she killed her children, prosecutors have acknowledged she had mental health issues and displayed some diary entries detailing her struggles.

“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,” one entry, read aloud by prosecutors, said.

However, prosecutors said in their opening statement Clancy looked for a “quick and easy fix” for her mental health issues, alleging she sought out different doctors, manipulated her providers and quickly switched medications when she didn’t get what she expected.

Dr. Jennifer Tufts, a psychiatrist who treated Clancy over roughly a dozen sessions beginning in September 2022, testified she adjusted Clancy’s prescriptions multiple times as the mother of three grappled with anxiety and difficulty sleeping. By the start of December 2022, Clancy was seeing multiple medical providers and had tried “a few different medication combinations,” Tufts testified.

The Massachusetts mother asked to change her medications nearly every day, saying the drugs were causing intrusive thoughts, insomnia and numbness, said one of her other providers, Rebecca Jollotta. In online messages read aloud in court, Jolotta – a psychiatric nurse practitioner – told Clancy she believed the problems likely stemmed from postpartum depression rather than the medication.

In a cellphone note last modified in early November 2022, Clancy wrote she was depressed because she was unable to parent her youngest child the same way as her first – an issue she identified as the “root cause of all our problems.”

“I feel not as connected with Cal now,” she wrote, in part. “I think I sort of resent my other children because they prevent me from treating Cal like my first baby. And I know that’s not fair to them.”

Clancy said she ‘heard a man’s voice’ before killings

Clancy’s ex-husband said her “big spiral” began when she started taking a new antipsychotic medication around early December 2022. Around that time, she told him she was suicidal and had “intrusive thoughts” about harming the children, he testified.

“She described thoughts of hurting the kids or them having some sort of ailment,” Patrick Clancy said, adding he wasn’t concerned for their safety because she didn’t show “any intention” of harming them.

Lindsay Clancy was “constantly worried that something was going to happen to her children, or something bad was going to happen to the baby,” said Letiesha Dukes, a perinatal clinician who diagnosed Clancy with postpartum anxiety in early December.

Clancy called a crisis support center twice that month after experiencing intrusive thoughts about wanting to die, though she did not have a specific plan to kill herself, the clinician said.

During a multiday stay at a locked-ward facility in early January 2023, Clancy reported feeling “numb,” according to Dr. Alina Goodheart, a psychiatrist at the facility. Clancy acknowledged previously having suicidal thoughts, Goodheart testified, but said she would never kill herself because of her family – namely her children and her mother.

Clancy seemed to improve after she was discharged from the psychiatric facility on January 5, 2023, her former husband testified, saying he felt “hopeful” at the time.

Multiple witnesses who spoke with Clancy in the days and hours before the killings testified they did not notice anything abnormal about her behavior.

In a telehealth session the day before the killings, Clancy told Tufts she was not having any suicidal or homicidal ideations, the psychiatrist testified, adding she did not notice any signs of psychosis.

A note titled “Medication stole my motherhood and my life” on Clancy’s cellphone was last modified the same day, according to phone records displayed in court.

“I was the healthiest, happiest mom,” the note said, in part. “I worked out every morning, meditated, and took care of myself so I could be the best for my kids. Until prescription medication stole me from my own body.”

On January 24, 2023, Clancy built a snowman with her children hours before she strangled them, her ex-husband said. “She was having one of her best days,” he testified.

First responders recounted the grisly scene at the family’s Duxbury home, where Cora, Dawson and Callan were found lying in the basement with exercise resistance bands around their necks. Medical personnel described the children’s fatal injuries and the desperate attempts to save their lives.

Days later, Clancy was “calm and cooperative” during a psychiatric examination and denied having hallucinations or suicidal or homicidal ideations the day of the assessment, another psychiatrist testified.

Clancy told her then-husband about a week after killing their children she “heard a man’s voice telling her that if she didn’t do it now, she would lose her chance,” he testified. She had never mentioned hearing a man’s voice before, he said.

During his cross-examinations, Reddington grilled some of Clancy’s medical providers on their care, implying they relied largely on what their patient told them with little independent investigation of their own.

Clancy has filed a civil lawsuit against Tufts, Jollotta and other providers alleging medical malpractice. All the providers previously declined to speak with CNN about ongoing litigation.

This story has been updated with additional information.

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