Lindsay Clancy Judge Officially Declares Mistrial After Jury Says Unanimous Verdict Can't Be Reached

Judge William Sullivan has officially declared a mistrial in Lindsay Clancy's murder trial following days of deadlock from the jury.

He announced the decision to a full courtroom on Sept. 4, which marked day seven of deliberations. It was on day four that jurors first submitted the first of several notes to the court confirming they were at an impasse.

"It is with a heavy heart that we report," Sullivan read aloud from their final note, "that we're unable to come to a unanimous decision and will not be able to."

After reading the note, the prosecution and defense each shared their opinions on what should come next.

Plymouth County Second Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Sprague argued a mistrial was at this point necessary, considering jurors had already received Tuey-Rodriguez instruction to compel them to reach a unanimous decision, after which they continued to deliberate at length.

Meanwhile, Clancy's defense attorney Kevin Reddington argued that the court still had the discretion to have the jury sent back again to deliberate and should do so rather than declare a hung jury at this juncture.

"Under the statute and the case law," Sullivan replied, "I don't feel that I have any choice but to declare a mistrial."

As he called for the jury to return to the courtroom, Reddington asked the judge to take an emergency request for relief to the state's Supreme Judicial Court before a mistrial was officially declared. The request was granted, giving the defense an extra hour.

In the defense's petition, which was obtained by MS NOW, Clancy's attorneys asked the higher judge to look into one juror's ability "to apply the law." It argued that the juror was "identified by the jury foreperson as biased and refusing to follow the court's instructions on reasonable doubt."

While the petition was heard, the Supreme Judicial Court judge ultimately denied it, which allowed the mistrial to move forward.

The single juror's alleged lack of adherence to reasonable doubt instructions came to light on Sept. 3 after the jury's foreperson submitted a note to the judge on the matter.

In response, Sullivan individually sidebarred with each juror, reemphasized to the group the rules he'd given them about reasonable doubt and asked them to resume their deliberations.

Afterward, Reddington argued that the judge's approach was not sufficient. He requested inquiry into the juror—and moved for them to be dismissed.

In his ruling on the motion, Sullivan did not remove the juror, noting that the discharge of a member of the jury mid-deliberation is "a sensitive undertaking."

"I don't feel that it is proper for me to side with one side or the other of the deliberations. I don't feel it's appropriate for me to say I agree with one juror or 11," he explained. "At this point, I've asked if they are able to follow my instructions. They swore earlier that they could. They've said at this point that they can. That was specifically addressed towards the specific question, and that's what I'm doing."

Oxygen has reached out to attorneys for the prosecution and defense for comment on the mistrial outcome but have not received an immediate reply.

Lindsay's murder trial centered on the harrowing events of Jan. 24, 2023: the day she acknowledges she killed her and Patrick's kids—5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson and 8-month-old Callan—in their Duxbury, Mass., home, before attempting suicide.

In their opening statement, the prosecution argued that during the time frame that Patrick was out of the house, Lindsay executed the children's killings with "deliberate premeditation and extreme atrocity and cruelty."

"This was not a woman in the throes of psychosis on Jan. 24, 2023," Plymouth County Assistant District Attorney Shanan Buckingham told jurors. "This was a woman who acted intentionally, rationally and swiftly to accomplish a very specific goal: to kill."

Reddington did not dispute she killed the children, but he argued that her actions were driven by postpartum psychosis, not malice, and that she was therefore unable to understand the wrongfulness of them.

"This is a woman that was suffering from psychosis at the time that she went down to that basement," he told jurors during his opening statement. "She had no motive. She loved her children. She intended to kill herself. She didn't fake that."