Authorities have reported that a young girl is in critical condition following an incident where she was found unresponsive in her family’s swimming pool on Long Island.

The tragic scene unfolded around 4:50 p.m. on Monday at a residence on Mill Drive in Mastic Beach, as per the Suffolk County Police Department, when the 2-year-old was discovered lifeless in the home’s pool.

A family member managed to pull the child from the water and performed CPR until emergency services arrived, police stated.

Initially taken to NYU Langone Hospital – Suffolk in Patchogue, the critically injured toddler was subsequently transferred to Stony Brook University Hospital, according to officials.

Investigators are currently looking into the circumstances surrounding the incident.

No arrests have been made.

On a chilly January 24, 2023, Lindsay Clancy found herself worn out after a long day of caring for their three little ones. Feeling drained, she casually asked her husband, Patrick, whether he could run a quick errand. The task was simple—pick up some children’s medication and grab a takeout dinner since exhaustion had left her unable to prepare a meal.

Patrick, 36, a software sales professional at Microsoft, readily agreed to help out. However, his return to their welcoming home in Duxbury, a picturesque and affluent suburb of Boston, was met with a horrific scene. Arriving back under an hour later, around 6 PM, he was confronted with a dark and unforeseen tragedy that shattered their seemingly idyllic family life.

Expecting to find his wife tending to the children’s nightly bath, Patrick headed upstairs. To his bewilderment, the bedroom door was tightly locked. Determined to get inside, he forced the door open, revealing a heart-wrenching sight. Blood stained the floor, a knife lay ominously on the nightstand, and an open window allowed a chilly draft to flow through the room.

Rushing downstairs in a panic, Patrick found Lindsay barely conscious in the backyard. She had attempted suicide, cutting her wrists and neck, before leaping from the window, plummeting twenty feet onto the frozen earth. In agony, she confessed her suicide attempt to Patrick and shockingly revealed that the children were in the basement.

Gripped with anxiety, Patrick stayed by Lindsay’s side for what felt like an eternity, keeping vigil after making a frantic call to 911. Those precious ten minutes felt crucial, as he feared she might succumb to her injuries before the paramedics could arrive and provide desperately needed medical aid.

Only when they turned up did he hurry inside to find the children – five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson and Callan, just eight months. They were indeed in the basement – they had all been strangled with exercise resistance bands.

Cora and Dawson were pronounced dead that night while the toddler, who was airlifted to hospital, died a few days later.

Now their mother, Lindsay Clancy, a 36-year-old former labor and delivery nurse now confined to a wheelchair after her fall left her paralyzed, has gone on trial for a crime – the murders of her three little children – that many will find incomprehensible.

As a result, although both the prosecution and defense agree she killed her children, two radically different explanations for the tragedy will be presented at Plymouth County Superior Court after jury selection is completed this week.

The battle will not be over whether she did or did not commit the crime, but over her mental state at the time – and specifically whether she had been driven insane by a rare psychological condition known as ‘postpartum psychosis,’ or instead acted with calm and murderous deliberation after tiring of bringing up three youngsters while still working as a nurse.

On one side of court, prosecutors will outline how Clancy carefully planned the killings, arranging for her husband to be out of the house. They say she was sufficiently compos mentis that day that she managed to take her daughter to a pediatric appointment in the morning.

They also say that she’d looked up the takeout restaurant’s location online to calculate how long her husband would be gone, so she would have ‘the time and privacy needed to commit these murders.’

They alleged she had previously Googled the phrase ‘ways to kill.’ Four days before the children died, their mother allegedly had searched the phrase ‘can you treat a sociopath’ on her phone.

At an earlier hearing, the prosecution claimed that Clancy’s suicide attempt was only half-hearted and may have been staged.

They called the cuts on her neck and wrists ‘minor scratches’ and have argued she ‘slid down’ the side of the house rather than jumped to slow her descent. She only ended up paralyzed, having suffered traumatic spinal cord injuries in the fall, because she hadn’t taken into account that the ground would be frozen hard.

Prosecutors say she acted with ‘deliberate, premeditated and extreme atrocity and cruelty.’

As for motive – a particularly challenging issue for prosecutors given all the evidence that Clancy was a loving and devoted mother – Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Sprague has portrayed the accused as selfish and disillusioned with motherhood.

Sprague has read out a note in court at an earlier hearing that Clancy wrote herself five months before Callan’s birth, in which Lindsay said: ‘I think I sort of resent my other children because they prevent me from treating Cal like my first baby… I want to feel love and connection with all of my kids.’

Critics of Clancy have also pointed to a post on an online parenting forum in which Clancy described her middle child Dawson as ‘the most difficult human I have ever encountered.’

But does this amount to proof of murderous intentions?

Clancy, who worked at Massachusetts General Hospital, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of first degree murder and faces a penalty of life imprisonment without parole if convicted.

Her defense lawyers – and her husband, who says he has forgiven her – counter that she was not responsible for her actions by virtue of insanity. They say her behavior was contaminated by more than a dozen medications – some of them, such as Ambien, Prozac, Klonopin and Valium, very powerful – that she’d been prescribed over several months as she’d experienced depression, insomnia and intense anxiety.

Her team filed lawsuits earlier this year accusing her medical providers of failing to properly diagnose, treat and monitor her for a ‘severe postpartum psychiatric condition.’

In a legal action against a psychiatrist who prescribed her myriad medications, her husband Patrick said that experts had simply kept throwing drugs at her, failing to monitor what effect they had or ‘attend to her worsening psychiatric condition.’

The lawsuit claimed that by the month before the killings, Clancy was reporting alarming symptoms such as panic attacks, racing thoughts, suicidal urges and a growing fear that ‘something awful might happen.’

After admitting herself to a day program for women with postpartum depression, a severe mood disorder occurring after childbirth, she even spent five days – at her instigation – at a psychiatric hospital weeks before the killings.

‘Lindsay Clancy did everything a mother in her situation could do,’ said her lawyers in their legal suit.

‘She recognized something was wrong with her. She sought medical treatment. She went to emergency rooms. She called crisis hotlines. She admitted herself to hospitals. She took the medication prescribed to her. She communicated her worsening symptoms to her providers. She told them the medications were making her worse.’

The gathering storm came to a head on the day before the killings, when Clancy claimed she heard a ‘compelling and unrecognizable singular male voice’ telling her that ‘she should die, that this is her last chance and that her children would suffer if she was gone.’

Just a few days after the killings, Patrick appealed to others to follow his example and forgive his wife – even though he simultaneously described his family as ‘the best thing that ever happened to me’ and said of his children: ‘They gave me purpose… There is now a massive void where that purpose once was.’

He insisted that his marriage had been strong and ‘grew diametrically stronger as her condition rapidly worsened.’

The ‘real Lindsay,’ he said, was ‘generously loving and caring towards everyone… the very fibers of her soul are loving.’

In an interview with the New Yorker magazine, he said his wife told him that she’d never planned to kill the children and hadn’t sent him out on an errand as a pretext so she could do it, but it instead happened ‘like a snap of the fingers’ – like a bolt of lightning out of the blue.

He said she also told him that she’d only looked up online how long it would take him to collect the food because she was worried he’d get stuck in rush hour traffic. As for Googling ‘ways to kill,’ she did it only because she’d been suicidal for two months, she said.

Some might be unconvinced by those explanations and Mr Clancy conceded that he might want to believe her. ‘I think it’s a lot more hurtful if she did plan it and tricked me into believing she was having a great day,’ he told the New Yorker.

Maternal infanticide – Clancy’s alleged offense – seems such an unnatural and monstrous crime that it’s not difficult to see why, for much of history, it has been treated as a capital offense.

However, that attitude started to shift in the 19th and 20th centuries as the medical community began to better understand postpartum depression. As a result, juries became reluctant to sentence women to death, often acquitting them or only convicting them of a lesser offense.

Some have questioned whether the pendulum might now have swung too far in the other direction, with people automatically assuming that no mother – least of all a maternity nurse like Lindsay Clancy who colleagues described as ‘born to be a mother’ – would ever in her right mind contemplate killing her children.

That being the case – so the argument goes – there must always be compelling, mitigating circumstances, thereby making the killer as much a victim as the dead children.

Many clearly believe Clancy is a victim. Almost as soon as prosecutors said they were charging Clancy with murder, a group of her fellow nurses set up an online group called LAOL, for ‘Lindsay’s Army of Love,’ to coordinate support for her.

Nearly 100 local women wrote to the judge, pledging to stand by her, vowing to stand by her ‘in her darkest hour as we wish any other mother would do for us.’ Other women who’ve struggled with postpartum depression have also expressed support.

However, legal experts told the Daily Mail that the defense will have extreme difficulty arguing insanity.

Under Massachusetts law, the burden is on the defense to persuade jurors that, because of a severe mental disease or defect, Lindsay Clancy lacked criminal responsibility at the precise moment the children were killed.

And that, said attorney and victims’ rights advocate Shari Karney, will be a challenge for Clancy’s lawyers.

According to Karney, such harrowing cases are usually decided on emotion and so another big hurdle for the defense will be ‘overcoming the natural bias many people have when a mother is accused of killing her own children.’

She went on: ‘This case ultimately turns on one invisible piece of evidence — the defendant’s state of mind. No one can see it. Jurors have to reconstruct it through competing psychiatric experts, medical records and her conduct before, during and after the alleged killings.’

‘Mental illness and legal insanity are not the same thing. That distinction may ultimately decide this case.’

Duncan Levin, a former federal prosecutor and criminal defense attorney whose clients have included Harvey Weinstein and con-woman Anna Delvey, said the prosecution will point to any evidence of planning, preparation or purposeful action.

However, he said: ‘Planning is not necessarily the opposite of psychosis. A person can act methodically while still operating within a profoundly delusional reality.’

Another key issue for the defense will be educating the jury about the distinction between the relatively common postpartum depression and the little-known postpartum psychosis – the latter sufficiently rare that it’s estimated to affect only two women out of 1,000 births. And even then, research suggests that, if untreated, there is only a four to five percent chance of a mother killing herself or a child.

The condition usually strikes within the first few weeks following childbirth and symptoms – reflecting the sufferer’s drastic break with reality – included hallucinations, delusions, extreme confusion and paranoia. Experts say it requires immediate medical intervention and hospitalization.

Dr Susan Hatters Friedman, a forensic and reproductive psychiatrist and expert in postpartum psychosis and depression, told the Daily Mail it was ‘one of the most serious mental disorders there is.’

She said it can develop ‘very quickly,’ which sets it apart from schizophrenia, which has similar symptoms. Lindsay Clancy, of course, hadn’t just had a baby – her youngest was eight months – but Dr Hatters Friedman said it can be triggered later, for example by a mother cutting down on breastfeeding, thereby going through hormonal changes.

And even postpartum depression, she said, can lead to homicidal tendencies when a suicidal mother becomes convinced that she has to take her offspring with her.

The expert also said that, as with schizophrenia, some postpartum psychosis sufferers would be perfectly able to plan to kill herself and her children, adding: ‘That doesn’t negate the idea of insanity.’

Kevin Reddington, the defense attorney representing Clancy, has called her case ‘probably the most emotionally disturbing and challenging’ of his long career.

It will be his task to ensure that jurors can separate the same feelings likely to afflict them from the evidence he’ll present that his client was not responsible for what she did.

In a chilling development, four individuals suspected in the Virginia teen murder case now stand accused in a second homicide, shedding light on a complex web of connected crimes. Authorities have tied the deaths together after unravelling the identity of a woman left unidentified for over three months, suggesting these acts were deliberate and intricately planned.

The woman, Helen Marie Pullen Banks, aged 56 and a resident of Culpeper, was identified through detailed and sophisticated DNA testing finalized on July 7. Her remains were initially found on March 27 on private land in Caroline County, as reported by the local sheriff’s office.

Earlier this month, authorities disclosed that Rashad Antonio Mayfield, 21, Devonti Gregory Pettaway, 19, Jaden Lamont Phillips, 20, and Kennady Jade Lambert, 18, now face multiple charges. These include first-degree murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and using a firearm in committing murder, specifically in connection to Banks’ tragic death.

Currently, the four suspects are detained without bond, already facing murder accusations related to the death of 18-year-old Jayden McComber.

Investigators say they suspected early in the case that the two homicide investigations were linked.

McComber disappeared the same day Banks’ remains were discovered. His vehicle was recovered the following day in Virginia Beach with assistance from the Virginia Beach Police Department, according to the sheriff’s office.

Authorities said the vehicle was thoroughly processed and produced “valuable investigative leads” that helped investigators locate McComber’s remains and identify the suspects.

McComber’s body was found March 31 in a pond near the Caroline County line.

During an April 2 search of a Henrico County residence believed to be associated with Mayfield, investigators recovered personal belongings thought to have been in McComber’s possession when he disappeared, authorities said.

Mayfield was arrested on charges during a traffic stop conducted while investigators were searching the residence. Authorities said a handgun was seized from his possession, though they have not disclosed whether the firearm has been linked to either homicide.

Pettaway, Phillips and Lambert were arrested during a simultaneous operation at an apartment on Kenway Avenue in Henrico. Caroline County investigators were assisted in the arrests by the U.S. Marshals Service Capital Area Regional Fugitive Task Force.

Following the arrests, Sheriff Scott Moser described the case as a “complex and difficult investigation” and praised the “relentless work” that led authorities to the four suspects.

The sheriff’s office said ballistic testing performed with assistance from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives later produced forensic evidence linking the two murders.

Investigators say both Banks and McComber knew at least one of the suspects before they were killed. However, authorities said they have uncovered no evidence that either victim had a conflict or dispute with the suspects over what investigators described as “premeditated and deliberate acts.”

Authorities have not disclosed a possible motive or said whether Banks and McComber knew one another.

When Banks’ remains were first discovered, the property owner who found them was “understandably shaken” and did not approach the body before calling 911, according to the sheriff’s office.

“This is a deeply disturbing case,” Moser said at the time. “The scene our deputies and investigators encountered was difficult, but they remained focused and professional from the moment they arrived.”

The sheriff’s office later alleged that those responsible had taken “sick and deliberate” measures to conceal Banks’ identity, calling it one of the more disturbing cases investigators had encountered. Authorities have not publicly detailed those alleged measures.

Banks’ identity was formally confirmed July 7, and investigators met with her family that evening to notify them.

“This case reflects the relentless commitment of our investigators to pursue the truth,” Moser said after announcing the identification. “While no announcement can ease the pain of this loss, we hope today’s identification of Helen Marie Pullen Banks provides at least some measure of answers for her loved ones.”

The investigation has also involved the Caroline County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office, FBI and ATF. Authorities said they are not searching for any additional suspects, though the case remains active.

The sheriff’s office said Banks’ family was notified of her identification on July 7 after DNA testing confirmed her identity.

Banks was born in Charlottesville and lived in Rixeyville, according to her obituary. She is survived by five children, her mother, two siblings, 10 grandchildren, one great-grandchild and a large extended family.

“Helen was so much more than the circumstances surrounding her passing,” her family wrote in a GoFundMe established to help cover memorial expenses. “She was a daughter, a sister, a mother, a grandmother, and a great-grandmother.”

McComber’s family also remembered the 18-year-old in a GoFundMe created after his death, describing the week-long search for him as “a nightmare no family should ever have to live through.”

“Jayden was so deeply loved,” his family wrote. “He had the biggest heart and made sure the people around him knew it. He never missed a chance to say ‘I love you,’ and those words mean everything to us now.”

The investigation remains active, though authorities say they are not seeking additional suspects.

News Media has reached out to the Caroline County Sheriff’s Office, the Caroline County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office, the Virginia Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, the FBI, ATF, the Virginia Beach Police Department and court officials for additional information.

Tragedy struck in an Ohio river as two married couples from Honduras were among the five adults who tragically drowned while attempting to rescue a swimmer in distress. Officials and family members have stated that the young children of one of these couples are now left without any living relatives in the United States.

The ill-fated evening saw Jose Mario Pineda Dias, 33, his wife Marina Suyapa Regalad, 28, along with their two children, accompanied by another married couple and a friend, head to the Scioto River on Sunday. Unfortunately, what started as a leisurely outing quickly descended into a heartbreaking incident, as confirmed by Honduran authorities.

The group was enjoying a peaceful night of fishing along the scenic banks of the O’Shaughnessy Reservoir. However, the tranquility was shattered when one man from the group decided to take a swim and soon found himself in peril, according to Delaware County Sheriff Jeffrey Balzer.

In a desperate bid to save him, two other adults plunged into the water. But as they began to struggle too, an additional two adults entered the river to assist, Sheriff Balzer explained during a news conference.

Tragically, Dias, Regalad, and the three others never surfaced from the river, leaving behind Dias’ and Regalad’s two young children, aged 8 and 10, as orphans, according to both authorities and grieving relatives.

Two women were pulled from the water and brought to hospitals where they were pronounced dead. Three men’s bodies were recovered from the river later on Monday.

Authorities rushed to the scene after a motorist noticed a “clearly distraught” young child wrapped in only a towel running along a nearby road around 9 p.m. and called 911.

The terrified child said that his “family was in the river,” cops said.

Honduran authorities confirmed that four of the five adults who died in the horrifying ordeal were citizens of Honduras, including two married couples.

The second couple and the fifth adult have not yet been identified by authorities.

Flabia Zamora, the director of consular affairs at the Honduran Foreign Ministry, told reporters on Tuesday that they were working with US authorities to bring their bodies home.

Once US officials complete identifying all of the victims, the Central American country will begin the repatriation process, which could take at least a month.

It still remains unclear how the group became swept under the water, which was running high and fast.

The river was flowing at a rate of 350 cubic feet per second on Sunday — more than double the average rate, according to data from a US Geological Survey water gauge at the nearby dam.

A photo taken by a passing boater appeared to show the crew thigh-deep in the river in Powell, north of Columbus, with fishing poles, surrounding a big log.

The two children are currently in the care of Ohio family services, and arrangements will be made to reunite them with their relatives in Honduras.

A relative of the couple, Brenda Raya, has launched a GoFundMe to cover funeral and transportation costs, as well as childcare expenses for the two children.

With Post Wires

For one backup dancer, Shakira’s performing at the 2026 FIFA World Cup was a dream come true, marking an inspiring full-circle journey.

The 49-year-old legend behind the iconic “Waka Waka” made history once again, co-headlining the inaugural halftime show at a World Cup final on Sunday, creating an unforgettable celebration.

Among the vibrant performers sharing the stage with Shakira was Shayna-Renee Wheatley, a talented dancer who had once captivated audiences on Shakira’s show “Dancing With Myself” in 2022.

Although Wheatley’s journey on the show concluded without a victory, it was far from the end for her aspirations. Shakira lauded her abilities, suggesting she possessed the potential to dance not only for her but also for the likes of Beyoncé.

After sharing the stage with Shakira on Sunday, Wheatley took to her Instagram to post a clip of the moment Shakira encouraged her after her loss, followed by a video of them dancing together at the halftime show.

Reflecting on her journey, Wheatley shared a heartfelt message, “There are moments that remind you why you never stop believing,” capturing the essence of her incredible experience.

‘In 2022, I was on @shakira new show “Dancing With Myself” and made it all the way to the finale. I didn’t take home first place, but I walked away with something I’ll never forget.’

‘Shakira looked at me and said I could dance for her… or Beyonce one day,’ she went on.

‘Yesterday, four years later, I danced with Shakira on one of the biggest stages in the world for the FIFA Halftime Show. @fifaworldcup !! In the words of Shakira “Here in this space, you belong”!!!!’

Wheatley went on: ‘God has a way of writing stories that are bigger than the ones we could ever imagine for ourselves. This wasn’t just another job. It was a reminder that no dream, no word spoken over your life, and no season of waiting is ever wasted.’

She encouraged her followers, stating: ‘In time it will reveal itself, you just have to continue to walk in the right direction and know you have favor on your life. To everyone who believed in me, encouraged me, hired me, and most importantly prayed for me, and helped make this moment possible thank you.’

‘Today, I’m simply choosing gratitude. And maybe… this is only the beginning. Here’s to dancing with Shakira again someday. And maybe next… Beyonce like Shakira said.’

The dancer wrapped up her caption, writing: ‘To anyone chasing a dream that feels impossible: Keep showing up. Keep preparing. Keep believing. What’s meant for you will find you exactly when it’s supposed to…. as long as you PLANT THOSE SEEDS, do the work you need to do and do what makes sense.’

‘I will make another post later thanking everyone who was involved but for now shout out to Shakira and thank You, God & thank you @charmladonna for seeing me & believing in me.’

Shakira performed her hit Dai Dai with Burna Boy as her ex, Spanish former professional football player Gerard Pique, 39, watched on with their two sons Milan, 13, and Sasha, 11.

Spain eventually triumphed over Argentina 1-0 after a thrilling 30 minutes of extra time.

Shakira has performed at four of the last six World Cups. She sang Hips Don’t Lie at the closing ceremony of the 2006 World Cup in Germany, Waka Waka in 2010 in South Africa and La La La in Brazil in 2014.

Dai Dai is the official anthem of the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund.

Shakira partnered with Global Citizen and FIFA to provide access to education for children in underserved communities, with record royalties from Dai Dai being donated to the Education Fund and Sony Music will match the first $250,000 raised with a donation.

Shakira also mingled with Beyonce at the sporting event. On Sunday, she shared a snap of the pair embracing each other on Instagram.