Add The New York Post on Google PLYMOUTH, Mass. — The final witness in Lindsay Clancy’s high-stakes murder trial testified Tuesday that her recollection of the voice that told her to kill her three kids in 2023 was “markedly inconsistent.”
Dr. Gregory Saathoff, a prosecution expert and forensic psychiatrist, testified that Clancy gave him a different version of the Jan. 24, 2023, murders than she gave to defense expert Dr. Margaret Spinelli.
The 36-year-old Duxbury, Mass., mother told Saathoff during interviews in May and June of this year that it was after she had gotten off the phone with her then-husband, Patrick Clancy, at 5:34 p.m. that she started to hear a male voice say one phrase on repeat.
“This is your last chance. You have to kill your kids and kill yourself,” the voice commanded her, Saathoff said.
She obeyed the hallucinatory voice when she used exercise bands to strangle Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and 8-month-old Callan and attempted to take her own life, the psychiatrist told the jury.
But Clancy told Spinelli the voice began around 5:15 p.m., right after Patrick left the house to get a medication at CVS and pick up their takeout order from a restaurant, Saathoff said.
“It’s markedly inconsistent,” Saathoff said. “Ms. Clancy was very clear with me about the time the voice started and that it was constant until the children were killed and then it stopped.”
“We are talking about a significant difference in time and those two [accounts] they don’t match so it’s hard to know which version is the one that I should consider,” the doctor said.
The psychiatrist — who has decades of experience working in hospitals, in prisons, and with the FBI — also noted differences in Clancy and Patrick’s versions of events in the hours before she carried out the horrific acts.
Saathoff is expected to wrap up his testimony Wednesday, after roughly 90 witnesses, including 10 from the defense, were called since the trial kicked off on June 27.
Deliberations could potentially start on Thursday, Judge William Sullivan told jurors before they left for the day.
Earlier, psychologist Dr. Kirk Heilbrun told jurors Clancy told him she felt like “it wasn’t her” murdering the children.
“She recalled feeling like it wasn’t her,” Heilbrun said. “Like she was watching herself. No thinking, no decision-making, only responding to the voice and taking action.”
Both Heilbrun and Saathoff said the fact that Clancy only ever heard an auditory hallucination one time — and never before the murders or again after — was highly unusual.
Heilbrun said he believed the voice “was a convenient way of lessening your responsibility” and said Clancy was criminally responsible for the acts.
“She retained an awareness of the illegality of killing others, including killing her children, her moral awareness of the wrongfulness of this killing was influenced by her strong desire to die,” Heilbrun testified.
Clancy’s lawyer, Kevin Reddington, wants the jury to find her not criminally responsible on the grounds she was suffering from severe postpartum psychosis made worse by the slew of powerful prescription medications she was given in the four months leading up to that day.
Supporters of Clancy, the majority of whom are women, have shown up to court by the dozens over the past few days wearing pink t-shirts and arguing that she should not be found criminally liable as they have shared their own postpartum experiences.
Baltimore, Maryland, couple Maria and Shane Bloyer lined up outside court at 5:30 a.m. Tuesday to get a spot inside the Plymouth courtroom.
“We have a lot of empathy towards her,” Shane told The Post. “She needs help. We feel like the children – we’re people of faith – so we believe the children are in Heaven and they’re fine and Lindsay’s now the human that’s hurting.”
Shane said he and his wife — both “true crime fanatics” — sympathize as they have two daughters who are mothers and one of whom has three young boys, “so we know and we see the struggles.”
He said they hope Clancy will remain in the hospital where she’s been held during her case rather than be convicted and sent to prison.
One 16-year-old Plymouth resident, Ariana Anthony, said she hoped the case would bring awareness and help improve health and mental health care.
She said if Clancy’s healthcare providers had “done the right thing, if they acted the right way,” Clancy’s kids would still be alive.
“I’m not in support of Lindsay killing her kids, but I do understand where she comes from when all of her doctors were dismissing her and just overall not listening to her,” the teen said.
Jurors have heard testimony that Clancy was seeing a psychiatrist for her crippling insomnia, anxiety, depression and intrusive thoughts about suicide and harming the kids, in the four months leading up to their deaths.
She had called a suicide hotline twice, had checked herself into a mental institution and sought help from two perinatal clinics during that time, jurors have heard.
Clancy had also been given 30 prescriptions for 13 meds in that period and was found with six of those drugs in her system after, according to testimony.
But prosecutors say Clancy wasn’t experiencing psychosis. They claim she she carefully planned the heinous acts because she was tired of taking care of the kids.
If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) or text Crisis Text Line at 741741.
If you are struggling with suicidal thoughts, you can dial the 24/7 National Suicide Prevention hotline at 988 or go to SuicidePreventionLifeline.org.
