Former Mother-in-Law Describes Lindsay Clancy’s Mental Health Struggle in Murder Trial

A M***achusetts mother standing trial for murder was “begging for help” in the months before she strangled her three children in the basement, her former mother-in-law testified on Tuesday.

“We were all concerned,” Susan Clancy said when called to the stand by defense lawyers for Lindsay Clancy, 36, who does not deny killing Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8, in January 2023. She has pleaded not guilty, citing postpartum psychosis.

Susan Clancy said Lindsay had reached out to her in November 2022, saying that she had been struggling with anxiety, depression and insomnia. At the time, Lindsay had been prescribed anti-depressants that made her feel worse, Susan said.

The high-profile trial began three weeks ago, with prosecutors arguing that Lindsay Clancy had carefully planned the killings, plotting to get her husband, Patrick Clancy, out of the house before she choked their children with an exercise band. The prosecution rested on Monday after more than 70 witnesses.

The defense started on Monday by calling people to the stand who could paint Lindsay Clancy as a warm mother. Her former mother-in-law, whose son divorced Ms. Clancy after the killings, described the defendant as “very nurturing, very loving.”

In text messages with her mother-in-law in the months leading up to the children’s deaths, Ms. Clancy expressed concern that she had developed a dependency on benzodiazepines, powerful psychiatric drugs that can cause an overdose if misused.

“We are just throwing different meds in the mix that are not addressing the real issue,” Lindsay Clancy wrote on Nov. 29. The following day, she texted her mother-in-law: “I’m not OK, and I’m terrified of taking meds tonight.”

Susan Clancy said she worked for nearly four decades as a labor and delivery nurse. She testified that she had reached out to her colleagues who ran a clinic for women struggling with postpartum depression in hopes that they could help Lindsay, and connected her to a nurse practitioner who ran the clinic.

Several medical professionals testified on Tuesday about indications that Ms. Clancy had displayed symptoms consistent with postpartum depression in the months before the killings.

Dr. Donald Condie, a forensic psychiatrist who did not treat Ms. Clancy but reviewed her medical records, said a diagnosis of bipolar disorder was also “a very serious possibility.” He listed several medications that different providers had prescribed starting in September, when Ms. Clancy sought psychiatric help.

After that, he said, she called a suicide hotline twice. “In October, she felt that she was numb,” Dr. Condie said. “She talked about not being herself, being worse not better.”

After the killings, Ms. Clancy cut her wrists and neck and jumped from a second-story window, in what her lawyers have called a suicide attempt. She experienced traumatic back injuries and is paralyzed.

Dr. Paul Ziesel, a forensic psychologist, testified that he had visits with Ms. Clancy more than 60 times after the killings, starting in February 2023, to doblockent her mental health and determine whether she was fit to stand trial.

Ms. Clancy said during one of those visits that she had “heard a male voice telling her that she didn’t have any choice but she had to kill her children, and then kill herself,” Dr. Ziesel said.

During cross-examination, prosecutors tried to cast doubt on whether Ms. Clancy had truly experienced auditory hallucinations. Dr. Condie, who reviewed her case, acknowledged that there was no record of her telling health care providers about hearing voices until after the children’s deaths.

But he said records indicated that she was scared her children would be taken away by the state if she displayed severe symptoms, and he speculated that fear might have led her to withhold some of what she was experiencing from doctors.

The defense will continue calling witnesses on Wednesday. If Ms. Clancy is found guilty, she faces life in prison without the possibility of parole. If she is found not guilty, she would be committed to a state psychiatric hospital.