Lindsay Clancy Mistrial: Lone Holdout Was Fixated on ‘Too Much Blood,’ Fellow Juror Says
DUXBURY, Mass. — A juror in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial is offering new insight into the panel’s deadlock, saying the lone holdout repeatedly returned to one detail from the crime scene: what he viewed as too much blood.
What the lone holdout focused on
Paula Devlin told the Daily Mail in an interview published Friday, Sept. 11, that the holdout juror was especially troubled by the amount of blood found in the Duxbury bedroom where Clancy cut her wrists and jumped from a second-story window after strangling her three children in the basement on Jan. 24, 2023.
“He said that he thought there was too much blood for the wounds that she had,” Devlin said. “We all asked him what he meant by that, because we heard experts talk about the blood spatter and explain to us how it all was what it was supposed to be.”
According to Devlin, the holdout refused to elaborate further. She also said he grew frustrated when jurors tried to speak at once, telling them, “Listen to what she’s saying, listen to what he’s saying, be respectful.”
The jury deliberated for nearly 40 hours before Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial on Sept. 4. The panel was reportedly split 11-1, with the majority favoring a verdict that Clancy was not criminally responsible for the deaths of 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson and 8-month-old Callan. Her defense argued she was experiencing postpartum psychosis at the time.
Deadlock and what comes next
Devlin said she believed the holdout was not applying the law correctly, particularly on the issue of reasonable doubt. “I absolutely believe he did not follow the law when it came to reasonable doubt,” she told the Daily Mail.
The jury foreperson had previously sent Sullivan a note asking him to clarify reasonable doubt and alleging that the juror was not applying the legal standard properly. Sullivan declined defense attorney Kevin Reddington’s request to replace the juror and instructed the panel to keep deliberating. They ultimately could not reach a unanimous verdict.
Clancy was paralyzed from the waist down after her suicide attempt, which followed months of struggles with postpartum depression and efforts to seek treatment from multiple medical professionals, the court heard during the five-week trial.
The mistrial leaves the case unresolved rather than decided. Prosecutors have not yet said whether they will retry Clancy, and she is next due in court on Sept. 29. Several other jurors have spoken publicly about the case, despite their names being temporarily sealed by the court for 14 days.
The deadlock highlights the difficult legal question at the center of the case: whether a defendant’s mental state at the time of the deaths should bar criminal responsibility. Any retrial could turn on how a new jury weighs competing medical testimony and the state’s burden to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
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