Lindsay Clancy defense returns to court to argue there’s no evidence she killed her children

Lindsay Clancy and her legal team returned to court Tuesday, arguing that the state of Massachusetts failed to prove she killed her children — a claim that prosecutors called “laughable.”

This marks the first hearing since Clancy’s triple murder trial ended in a mistrial this month.

The hearing in Plymouth Superior Court, which began just before 10 a.m., included a number of motions filed since the trial concluded.

Judge William Sullivan immediately punted some of those motions to a later date, noting that he, and some parties, were not ready for them to be argued. One of those motions is defense attorney Kevin Reddington’s effort to dismiss Clancy’s case.

Sullivan heard arguments as a part of that motion Tuesday, but pushed his decision on those arguments, as well as those relating to other motions, until Nov. 2.

The judge also declined to set a new trial date, with both Reddington and prosecutors agreeing that with so much still to decide, it could be premature to do so.

Reddington on Tuesday offered arguments on Massachusetts’ Rule 25, which states that if prosecutors do not argue their case effectively, the defendant should be found not guilty.

He first lamented that Clancy had been demonized by politicians “from Donald Trump all the way down.”

And in a new approach that seemed contrary to the defense’s strategy in the trial, Reddington then argued that there is no proof Clancy killed her children and that the commonwealth did not provide evidence she did so.

Prosecutors, in response, called that allegation “laughable.”

“And now, for the first time, the defendant is arguing that there’s no evidence that she did this,” Assistant District Attorney Shanan Buckingham said. “I’d suggest to you that the entire record is voluminous as to the information supporting the fact that she did this.”

Sullivan said he would take that motion “under advisement.”

Clancy, 36, is accused of fatally strangling her three children — Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months — using exercise bands Jan. 24, 2023. Her defense team, led by Reddington, argued she was in a state of psychosis at the time of the killings, a result of the postpartum psychosis she was suffering from, and was therefore unaware of and unable to control her actions.

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The prosecution, however, said that Clancy knowingly planned the killings ahead of time, arguing for a first-degree murder conviction.

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After a weekslong trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision. The group of nine women and three men deadlocked three times, forcing the judge to declare a mistrial Sept. 4.

After the trial concluded, several jurors spoke publicly and described a single holdout juror who they said refused to meet the required reasonable-doubt standard. Eleven of the jurors wanted to find Clancy not guilty by lack of criminal responsibility, and the holdout wanted to convict, they have said.

That man has since identified himself as Michael P. Desronvil. The jurors said he was the sole reason they could not reach a conclusion, describing someone who refused to participate in negotiations and seemed uninterested in hearing the other jurors out.

Desronvil has denied the other jurors’ allegations, saying in a statement that he “didn’t have any doubts” Clancy was guilty.

In a statement given to Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Monday, Desronvil said he wants to turn the focus away from him and back to Clancy’s children.

“I know the whole focus has been on me, but we want to reel everything back and put the focus on the three angels that is that hand — the ones that can’t speak for themselves, the ones that can’t defend themselves, and the one that can’t fight the battles, and those are Cora, Dawson, and Callan,” Desronvil said in the statement.

Also Monday, the commonwealth of Massachusetts filed a motion asking Reddington to stop making “extrajudicial statements to the media” ahead of a potential retrial.

In the days after the first trial concluded, Reddington spoke with several media outlets, including NBC News, to outline what happened in court and what he’d like to see for his client going forward.

The Boston Globe and the WBZ-TV of Boston jointly filed opposition to the motion, claiming that it would restrict free speech. Sullivan decided to hear the arguments related to both of these motions at the November trial date.

Reddington got heated toward the end of the hearing, angrily stating he is “so tired” of people saying he has persecuted and attacked the holdout juror. In his motion, he argued that the judge should have dismissed the juror after the foreperson told Sullivan he was refusing to follow jury instructions.