In the ongoing Lindsay Clancy murder trial, jurors were dismissed early once again this week due to an undisclosed matter.
“We’re going to have kind of a short day,” Judge William Sullivan informed the jury on August 20, marking the 17th day of proceedings. He mentioned that the issue was unrelated to any legal representatives involved in the case. Sullivan addressed the jury about this unexpected interruption.
Sullivan reassured the jurors, “It’s just something we’re going to work out, and I anticipate it will be resolved so that tomorrow, you should expect a longer session.” He emphasized the importance of not speculating about the cause of the delay.
The judge also advised the jurors, “You are not to hold it against either of the parties. If there’s anyone you should place responsibility upon, let it be me,” emphasizing his accountability for the situation.
“You’re not to hold it against either of the parties,” Sullivan said. “If you’re going to hold it against anybody, you can hold it against me.”
News Nation reporter Brian Etin—who was present in the court room—observed that Sullivan has “some things to work out,” he wrote on X, later adding. “Something is going on behind the scenes.”
The shortened proceedings came one day after Sullivan dismissed the jury early due to an “unforeseen circumstance.”
“This is not something we saw coming,” Sullivan told jurors on Aug. 19. “It’s just something that we have to deal with.”
Lindsay is on trial for strangling her children, Cora, 5, and sons Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, in Jan. 2023 before trying to take her own life. While her lawyer alleges the 36-year-old—who had pleaded not guilty—was experiencing postpartum psychosis at the time of the killing, the prosecution claims Lindsay intentionally planned the killings.
Earlier the proceedings, Chaplin Sheila Cavanaugh testified about meeting with Lindsay at Brigham and Women’s Hospital at least 14 times after her suicide attempt, in which she threw herself from a second-story window.
“She was dressed in medical armor,” Cavanaugh recalled Aug. 20. “She had tubes, she was intubated, she had bandages…she was just covered and layered in equipment that enabled her to breathe.”
Cavanaugh described Lindsay’s emotional state as “very neutral” with a “flat affect” during one January visit, adding, “I remember vividly the first thing she said to me.”
“We had been praying together,” Cavanaugh said, “and so when I went in on Tuesday the 31st, she said to me as I held her hand to comfort her, ‘I am so glad my children are safe.'”
Cavanaugh said she replied “theologically” to Lindsay, saying, “Your children are safe. They’re safe in heaven with God.”
According to Cavanaugh, Lindsay also alluded to hearing a “persistent” male voice that told her if she didn’t follow “the command,” neither she nor her children would be safe. Cavanaugh said conversations about the voice surfaced several times over the course of her visits with Lindsay.
In late February 2023, Lindsay was transferred to Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, and later to Tewksbury State Hospital, where Cavanaugh said she visited her approximately 200 times.
“We had built up a very comfortable, respectful rapport,” explained Cavanaugh. “I felt it was in her best interest to continue that as she healed.”
According to Cavanaugh, Lindsay is consumed by the loss of her children.
“Lindsay talks frequently about her children,” she said. “She loves them deeply; she carries immense grief.”