Lindsay Clancy’s lawyer has asked a judge to throw out the case, claiming there’s ‘no evidence’ that she was actually responsible for killing her three children.
Kevin Reddington said the entire case was ‘based on speculation’ as he challenged the prosecution at Tuesday’s hearing.
The argument appears to mark a significant change of tack for the defence.
Clancy was charged with three counts of first-degree murder after her daughter Cora, five, son Dawson, three, and eight-month-old son Callan were strangled to death. The children died in the basement of the family’s home near Boston, Massachusetts, on January 24, 2023.
Her six-week televised court case ended in a mistrial earlier in September after one juror refused to acquit her. The jury’s failure to reach a unanimous verdict left open the possibility of a second trial.
But at the first hearing since the mistrial, Reddington questioned whether prosecutors had proved Clancy killed the children at all, The Telegraph reports.
He told the court in Plymouth, Massachusetts, there wasn’t enough evidence ‘that this woman killed those children’.
‘Where is the admission? Where does she say that she did this? Where is the evidence that she did this?’ he asked.
He also repeated his argument that Clancy was psychotic and delusional at the time of the deaths.
Reddington attacked parts of the police investigation as ‘woefully deficient’ and ‘ridiculous’. He said that his client had no recollection of killing her children.
He filed a motion asking Judge William Sullivan to step in and rule Clancy ‘not guilty’. If granted, it would mean she wouldn’t face a second trial.
Prosecutors’ response was blunt. They called the claims ‘laughable’. They said that the evidence clearly showed Clancy was the only adult at home with the children when they were killed.
Her husband Patrick had left to run errands, according to his testimony. Surveillance footage and phone records corroborate his account of being away from the house.
Shanan Buckingham, for the prosecution, said: ‘She’s the only one in the home with three young children, her husband testified under oath he left the house, went to [run] errands.
‘He’s on video surveillance at the time these murders occurred.’
Prosecutors also said that the evidence showed that Clancy attempted to take her own life on the night of the deaths. She was left paralysed from the waist down.
Sullivan didn’t immediately decide on the defence’s request or how the case would proceed.
A further hearing has been set for November 2 to discuss a possible date for a new trial.
Away from the courtroom, the case has become the subject of an online guessing game. Self-styled internet sleuths have picked over livestreamed testimony, with some making baseless claims that Patrick killed the children and framed Clancy.
Those accusations come despite surveillance footage and phone records supporting his account of being out of the house. He visited a CVS pharmacy before collecting a takeaway from a restaurant.
Patrick addressed the ‘dangerous’ conspiracy theories during his only interview to date on CBS’ 60 Minutes.
‘It’s deeply harmful to the legacy of my children,’ he said, adding: ‘It is a huge distraction from what really matters here, which is perinatal mental health, and it’s done real harm to real people.’
Patrick also called the conspiracy theories ‘painful to see,’ and said they make it ‘difficult’ for him to be out in public.
‘And it’s possible that some of those people, after seeing lie after lie after lie, they start to believe it. And that’s what we’re left with.’
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