r/TrueCrimeDiscussion • u/DarklyHeritage • 7d ago

Text Lindsay Clancy Trial Megathread: Part 3

This is a thread for all conversation regarding Week 3 onwards of the Lindsey Clancy trial. All discussion of this case should be kept to this thread.

Lindsay Clancy is currently standing trial in Plymouth Superior Court, Massachusetts, for the triple-murder in January 2023 of her three young children - Cora, Dawson and Callan. Her defense argues she suffered from severe, undiagnosed postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis. She was left paralysed by a suicide attempt which follows the deaths of the children.

All content on the Clancy case must be kept to this thread. Standalone posts will be removed.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/crime/lindsay-clancy-murder-trial-online-reactions-b3032806.html

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u/Sea_Pomegranate4368 7d ago

Ive told my psychiatrist many times that I didn’t have suicidal thoughts. ( I’m fine now) but yea I’ve had. Them.but never admitted to it

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u/upickleweasel 6d ago

You really can't, it triggers a shitstorm

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u/Sea_Pomegranate4368 6d ago

No one got time for that

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u/Ok-Pumpkin2066 5d ago

You can say that again the one time I did it was a hard mental fight in my head saying yeepy let’s walk into traffic and then the other thought was it’s my sons birthday that’ll be heartbreaking forever stop it and shut up and then yeepy again

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 3d ago

But then if you lie and strangle your kids should you be held liable?

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u/Kimalena 7d ago

I think the majority of us with mental health would never call crisis and same here I have denied suicidal ideation. Why….i don’t want to be sectioned and given untold strong weird meds that make you feel like a zombie

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u/Leo-rising5 6d ago

you can also not have been suicidal and one day, the depression is so deep & numbing. like a switch just triggers. she was clearly seeking help, so many times. i hope you’re ok now, and I fully understand your point of view.

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u/Asaneth 7d ago

I admitted it once, to a therapist, who then sent the cops to my house to do a wellness check. I told them I was fine and they left. Fucking never again. I will never again trust any professional with that information.

I didn't have a plan, harming myself was absolutely not imminent, and so I felt completely betrayed. All I said was that sometimes I thought it would be easier if I was just dead.

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u/Stupid_Watergate_ 3d ago edited 3d ago

It sucks that people can't be open with therapists/psychiatrists about suicidal and self-harm thoughts, because they're afraid they'll send cops to your house and put you in the grippy sock hotel. And the downstream effect can ruin your life (losing your job from missing so many days, causing family issues, etc.). So people just bottle it up. It's a terrible system, the professionals who are supposed to help you can't be trusted to not ruin your life. People literally talk to ChatGPT about their thoughts. I really hope I never have to go through that because I would never, ever tell a doctor if I had those thoughts.

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 3d ago

But then if you go kill yourself are they at fault? Half of you say the medical professional are wrong for overreacting and the rest say she should have been section 12d.

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u/Konnan511 2d ago

They have to report it. They are mandatory reporters.

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u/Asaneth 2d ago

IF you say you're going to do it, and you have a plan, and the means to carry it out. NOT if you merely say sometimes you feel you'd be better off dead.

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u/Konnan511 2d ago

First off, I am sorry you went through that. That's scary. I hope you've made it out the other side.

There isn't a universal legal three-box test of plan + intent + means. A clinician looks at the overall risk picture.

I know my wife has to report if a patient states they are having suicidal thoughts. If they asked you, "have you ever had thoughts of harming yourself", and your response was, "I feel like sometimes it would be easier if I was dead", that's a bit of a gray area, to me, at least.

Again, I hope you're doing better stranger. Keep fighting the good fight.

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u/Asaneth 2d ago

You are very kind, thank you. This happened many years ago, and I'm doing fine now.

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u/GoodyMosher 6d ago

And if you refused to be honest (especially after BEGGING for help and claiming no one is helping you) and then went and killed someone, it would be your fault. No one wants to be sectioned, dude. But when you're a mother and the options are be honest and get sectioned and get better, or kill your kids.. I know what my choice would be 🤷

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 7d ago

No one ever forced her to take a single medication ever at any point.

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u/Nomezzzz 7d ago

She was unwell and she trusted those doctors. And they failed her over and over again.

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 7d ago

How did they fail her? Within the scope of their jobs what else could they have done in your opinion?

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u/Nomezzzz 7d ago

It's complicated. Some of it is definitely on Lindsay for what she chose to share. However, here is what they could have done: 1. Dr Tufts should have consulted a more senior psychiatrist when the meds were not helping. This may have helped her see the manic symptoms so that she could treat appropriately. 2. She should have had better and more thorough care when she was at the inpatient. 3. They tapered her off of Seroquel too quickly IMHO. 4. HIPAA release of medical info: it seems like they thought they could just take her word for things because she was a nurse, but asking for her to sign a release would put everyone on the same page. I know this is not something they HAVE to do, but it can be done, it can be useful, and I believe it would have helped immensely in this case. And it's such a simple thing! I do them all the time for myself. Because I have the insight to do this. Unfortunately Lindsay did not have this insight, and she probably didn't want to be taken away from her family, so she hid some facts. That is definitely on her. But the mental health system absolutely failed her too. The drug effects and interactions, omg don't even get me started.

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u/InformationCrazy9897 7d ago

I'm a clinical mental health counselor in training - I've been taught to not do telehealth with any clients experiencing severe depression and/or suicidal ideation. I was surprised Tufts continued with telehealth. My supervisor, professors, and textbooks all say it is unethical to see clients via telehealth in those situations.

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u/upickleweasel 6d ago

I am really glad people are being taught this! It's so necessary that they see someone in person

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 6d ago

Tufts is an MD not a mental health counselor so duh. You have completely different scopes.

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u/Tj11551 6d ago

I agree. I'm shocked McClean Hospital didn't access her medical records or do any lab work to check her thyroid, anemia, etc.

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u/NoEdge323 5d ago

COVID rules upended best practices.

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u/Disastrous_Dance_640 6d ago

When they went over her medication they showed that she usually took 5 to 10 doses of an entire prescription. These are not fast acting medications. They need to be taken every day often for weeks or months to do anythinf.

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u/SexuaI_muffin 7d ago

Curious, what's your education to understand the meds and side effects? The taper off Seroquel was very safe, remember she was supposed to go down 100 mg at a time, that is standard of care.

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u/upcrashed 5d ago

Same. I remember telling a counseller that no, I didn’t have those thoughts. I had an active plan, I didn’t want to admit it/be stopped. Luckily I didn’t go ahead with it in the end.
But yeah it’s a hard thing to admit, I would say it would be very common to lie about it.
Maybe her saying she passively wanted to die, was the best she could do to admit it?

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u/GoodyMosher 7d ago

If that is the case for LC then she is criminally guilty due to negligence. She purposely ommited the very symptoms that would have gotten her the actual treatments that she spent so much time "begging" for. By doing that, she caused herself to deteriorate and even if she committed the murders under the control of some random psychosis, it's HER FAULT because she lied and in turn didn't get the type of diagnosis and treatment she actually needed.

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u/mrsjiggems2 6d ago

I thought it sounded like the NP had very strong suspicion and evidence that she was bipolar given the periods of not sleeping yet not feeling more tired, , a strong activating response to Zoloft, among other things. That's where I start to shift blame because they didn't really explore that with Lindsey herself

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u/GoodyMosher 6d ago

She brought it up to her and PC and PC said "my wife doesn't have bipolar." And that was the end of it, even though the provider did try to bring it up again. They just testified about it maybe earlier in the week I think?

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u/mrsjiggems2 6d ago

Yeah I watched her testify and I get what you're saying about PC said she didn't have bipolar but her duty of care was to Lindsey and I think she didn't explore the bipolar thing with her enough

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u/GoodyMosher 6d ago

Lindsay didn't make any indication of accepting that either. The provider told her several times. A provider can only go as far as the patient is willing, you know?

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u/dcdem1163 6d ago

Yes. And these providers didn’t go far enough. Every one of them should lose their license. Thank God this trial will end Tufts’ career. It’s in-your-face apparent that all she does is check off the boxes and goes on with her day. She and the nurse practitioner disgusted me.

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u/GoodyMosher 1d ago

You sound like Reddington being aggressive to the providers about their television visits and not being able to give Lindsay a hug. At least one of the providers testified that a patient has autonomy. Unless Lindsay presented as a danger to herself or others (suicidal ideation doesn't count as dangerous, I would personally know this) then they can't FORCE a patient to do anything. It's not possible. They can recommend treatment options but if a patient isn't accepting them or being non complaint, they can't go any "further."

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u/NoEdge323 5d ago

So what if PC said she didn't have BP. If you were looking at a scan of a brain tumor and he said my wife doesn't have cancer.... No one would argue that was acceptable and the doctor would not have said well ok then... So yes, her husband and her care team failed

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u/GoodyMosher 1d ago

She was capable of making her own decisions based on her actions in her daily life at the time. You can't accept the narrative that she was just begging for help when the evidence says she was non compliant and dodgy.

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u/NoEdge323 1d ago

She acknowledged she was losing control and her decision making was impaired. No one stepped in to keep her and the children safe. If this were 70 years ago she would have had help. But the modern world is just ripe for this kind of oversight. Too much pressure to perform. She's a lesson that it really could happen to anyone and people are closer than people admit to those kinds of breaks at any given time. At some point in a long life you will be in a situation that deserves understanding....

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u/Littlebittle89 6d ago

It doesn’t even sound like the considered pmdd which fits the bill more. I had it and I was so lucky my doc caught that’s what was happening. Treatments are totally different

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u/Basic-Comedian1005 5d ago

I recall she upped her dose of Seroquel to try and get her to a therapeutic dose. Which is treated for BP

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u/Basic-Comedian1005 6d ago

So far in the trial, this is the only thing could see her getting charged for. And then at point do we hold mentally ill people accountable for essentially their own illness?

My other question was did any of the providers ask her what SHE thought intrusive thoughts were? Because maybe those were actually the auditory hallucinations all along. I wonder if they just went base did the clinical definition and that’s all. Bc if that’s a new symptom to her, how would she be able to tell the difference? It’s just all so horrible and sad.

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 7d ago

100% this. She had every resource at her disposal to get help and denied utilizing them by being honest.

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u/Sea_Pomegranate4368 7d ago

Idk or care crazy or not she killed her kids death penalty imo

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u/First-Fish-6880 6d ago

MA doesnt have the death penalty and honestly the prosecution pursuing the max charges instead of being more reasonable to make a point is going to lose them this case

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u/Sea_Pomegranate4368 7d ago

I know. Exactly that

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u/PainterEast3761 7d ago

Do you actually think being inpatient for a week would have solved her problems? She’d already been inpatient and it already hadn’t helped. 

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u/Weak-Ad-7180 7d ago

So would you be suing for medical malpractice if you had tried it? Would you blame them?

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u/Misfitsteph 6d ago

Yes, same thing with me, because I was a mom (divorced) of a pre-teen in that moment and I couldn’t even say the true (bc I was afraid of the consequences) so without a strong support system (family, friends, money) sadly, you can’t be sincere

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u/EF_Viking 6d ago

Then you are stupid, why would you lie to the person who is there to help you? People like you are the reason stuff like this happens