Lindsay Clancy returns to court as the prospect of a retrial remains unclear

Greg Derr/Pool/The Patriot Ledger/AP

Lindsay Clancy is set to return to a Massachusetts courtroom Monday for a hearing that could determine the date of her retrial on triple murder charges for the killings of her children – or whether it is held at all .

The parties are expected to discuss scheduling a retrial and defense attempts to investigate a holdout juror whose belief in Clancy’s guilt led to a mistrial in September.

While Judge William Sullivan has already rejected several defense requests, a motion to dismiss the case over double jeopardy and other matters remain unresolved.

Prosecutors have not yet said whether they intend to try Clancy for a second time. And there remains the remote possibility of a plea deal that could end the case outright .

The hearing Monday is the latest development in a triple-murder case that became one of the most hotly debated criminal trials in recent memory this summer before it ended in a mistrial.

Greg Derr/Pool/The Patriot Ledger

A timeline of Lindsay Clancy’s postpartum struggles, killings and legal case

Prosecutors had argued Clancy, 36, “acted intentionally, rationally and swiftly” when she fatally strangled her three children in their Duxbury home and attempted suicide in January 2023. Her defense argued she was suffering from postpartum psychosis at the time and was not criminally responsible for the deaths of Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and 8-month-old Callan.

Clancy’s trial put a spotlight on maternal mental health , the internet’s tendency toward conspiracy and the ongoing skepticism of the so-called “ insanity defense .”

After more than a month of testimony, the 12-person jury was unable to come to a unanimous decision due to a lone holdout juror , leaving an 11-1 split in favor of not guilty due to a lack of criminal responsibility. Sullivan declared a mistrial due to the deadlock.

Clancy did not testify in the trial. She has been held in Tewksbury Hospital since shortly after the killings and remains partially paralyzed due to her suicide attempt.

She could face life in prison if convicted. If jurors find she cannot be held criminally responsible, the court will likely begin the process of committing her to a psychiatric hospital.

In the wake of the mistrial, Clancy’s defense attorney Kevin Reddington has made several motions seeking to prevent a retrial. In late September, Clancy appeared in court for the first time since the trial ended, and the parties debated several of them.

Reddington is seeking further information on the holdout juror, including certain cell phone records and his juror questionnaire, and asking the judge to question him about some of his sworn statements, according to a filing.

The holdout, Michael Péguy Desronvil, has said his position was misrepresented by some of his fellow jurors who spoke to the press.

Reddington previously asked the court in a filing to hold an evidentiary hearing to further question the lone holdout juror. Sullivan rejected that request on October 21, saying it was raised too late and was an “inappropriate” violation of jury privacy.

“This Court concludes that any further judicial inquiry is inappropriate, given the mandate that the court must not delve into a juror’s subjective reasoning, thought process, view of the case, or relationship to the other jurors, and must not inquire into the jury’s deliberative content, collective thought process, or any disagreement among the jury,” the judge wrote.

In another filing, Reddington asked the judge to dismiss the charges to avoid violating Clancy’s rights protecting her from double jeopardy, a legal ban on prosecuting a person more than once for the same offense. He argued the judge improperly declined to further question the holdout juror or the jury foreperson during deliberations and declared a mistrial without “manifest necessity,” a high legal burden meaning all other options to reach a verdict were exhausted.

In contrast, prosecutors argued in a filing the judge properly questioned the jurors in court and followed the law in declaring a mistrial.

At that September court hearing, Reddington asked the judge to enter a finding of not guilty, arguing prosecutors did not provide sufficient evidence that she killed her children. “Where is the evidence that she did this?” he said.

The prosecution called that argument “laughable,” and Judge Sullivan rejected the defense’s argument days afterward.

CNN’s Lauren del Valle contributed to this report.

格雷格·德尔/Pool/《爱国者纪事报》/美联社

林赛·克兰西将于周一返回马萨诸塞州法庭参加听证会，该听证会可能会决定她因杀害子女而被控三项谋杀罪的重审日期，或者是否会进行重审。

预计双方将讨论安排重审事宜，以及辩方如何调查一名坚持认为克兰西有罪的陪审员，该陪审员导致9月份的审判无效。

虽然法官威廉·沙利文已经驳回了辩方的几项请求，但关于双重危险和其他事项的驳回案件的动议仍未得到解决。

检方尚未表明是否打算对克兰西进行第二次审判。此外，也不排除达成认罪协议、彻底结案的可能性。

周一的听证会是这起三重谋杀案的最新进展。今年夏天，这起案件成为近年来最受热议的刑事审判之一，但最终以流审告终。

格雷格·德尔/Pool/《爱国者纪事报》

林赛·克兰西产后困境、杀人事件及法律诉讼的时间线

检方认为，36岁的克兰西在2023年1月于杜克斯伯里家中勒死三个孩子并试图自杀时，“行为是故意、理性且迅速的”。她的辩护律师则辩称，她当时患有产后精神病，因此不应为5岁的科拉、3岁的道森和8个月大的卡兰的死亡承担刑事责任。

克兰西的审判使人们关注到孕产妇心理健康、互联网的阴谋论倾向以及对所谓“精神错乱辩护”的持续质疑。

经过一个多月的庭审，由12人组成的陪审团由于一名陪审员的反对而未能达成一致意见，最终以11比1的票数裁定被告无罪，理由是其缺乏刑事责任能力。由于僵局，法官沙利文宣布审判无效。

克兰西没有出庭作证。自凶案发生后不久，她就一直被关押在特克斯伯里医院，并因自杀未遂而导致部分瘫痪。

如果罪名成立，她可能面临终身监禁。如果陪审团认定她不负刑事责任，法院很可能会启动将她送往精神病院的程序。

在审判无效后，克兰西的辩护律师凯文·雷丁顿提出了多项动议，试图阻止重审。9月下旬，克兰西自审判结束以来首次出庭，双方就其中几项动议进行了辩论。

根据一份文件显示，雷丁顿正在寻求有关这位拒不表态的陪审员的更多信息，包括某些手机记录和他的陪审员问卷，并要求法官就他的一些宣誓证词对他进行质询。

持反对意见的陪审员迈克尔·佩吉·德斯隆维尔表示，他的立场被一些向媒体发表讲话的陪审员歪曲了。

雷丁顿此前曾向法院提交文件，要求举行证据听证会，进一步询问唯一一位拒绝表态的陪审员。10月21日，沙利文法官驳回了这一请求，称其提出得太晚，而且“不当”侵犯了陪审团的隐私权。

法官写道：“鉴于法院不得探究陪审员的主观推理、思考过程、对案件的看法或与其他陪审员的关系，也不得调查陪审团的审议内容、集体思考过程或陪审团之间的任何分歧，本法院认为任何进一步的司法调查都是不合适的。”

在另一份文件中，雷丁顿请求法官驳回对克兰西的指控，以避免侵犯她免受双重危险的权利——双重危险是指法律禁止就同一罪行对同一人进行两次以上的起诉。他辩称，法官在陪审团审议期间不当拒绝进一步询问那位持反对意见的陪审员或陪审团主席，并且在没有“明显必要性”的情况下宣布审判无效——“明显必要性”是一个很高的法律标准，意味着所有其他达成裁决的途径都已用尽。

相反，检方在一份文件中辩称，法官在法庭上对陪审员进行了适当的询问，并依法宣布审判无效。

在九月份的庭审中，雷丁顿请求法官判她无罪，理由是检方没有提供足够的证据证明她杀害了自己的孩子。“她做了这件事的证据在哪里？”他问道。

检方称这一论点“荒谬可笑”，几天后，法官沙利文驳回了辩方的论点。

CNN的劳伦·德尔·瓦莱对本报道亦有贡献。