The jury weighing Lindsay Clancy’s criminal responsibility will return on Thursday after again failing to reach a unanimous decision.
Guardian US Crime reports that the panel was dismissed Wednesday evening after nearly 30 hours of deliberations. Judge William Sullivan told the 12-member jury that the day had been lengthy before sending its members home. The jurors had earlier informed Sullivan that continued discussion had not produced agreement, prompting the judge to issue a legally required instruction encouraging further deliberations.
The panel must decide unanimously whether Clancy is criminally responsible for the deaths of her children. If the jurors remain unable to agree after another round of deliberations, a mistrial is expected in the case.
Clancy does not dispute strangling her young children at the family’s Massachusetts home in 2023, but maintains that postpartum psychosis caused her actions. Prosecutors contend that Clancy understood what she was doing, while the 36-year-old has entered a not-guilty plea based on a claim that she lacked criminal responsibility.
Deliberations resumed after Sullivan questioned jurors individually following the arrest of Dawn Light, who was accused of filming jurors as they left the courthouse on Tuesday. Light, 56, was arraigned Wednesday at the Plymouth courthouse in connection with the filming allegation.
Light said she had been waiting to record Clancy, while her lawyer, Jennifer White, characterized the incident as a misunderstanding and said the intended subject was Clancy rather than the jurors. Light pleaded not guilty to intimidation of a witness, jurors or a person furnishing information in connection with criminal proceedings.
She was released without posting bail and ordered to avoid the court, the jurors and witnesses. Assistant district attorney Nicole Piacentini said Light had parked in a restricted area and was accused of recording jurors as they departed. Piacentini also said Light denied filming jurors to state police, but video showing jurors was found in the deleted-files folder of her phone.
The livestreamed trial has drawn reporters and spectators and has fueled disagreement over Clancy’s culpability and maternal mental health after childbirth.