The problem with mental health in this country is that the victim can become the villain. There’s maybe no more obvious example than Lindsay Clancy.
First, what has NOT been disputed in court, by her own team:
On Jan 24, 2023, Lindsay asked her husband Patrick to leave to pick up children’s medicine and takeout. While he was gone, prosecutors put it at about 20-25 minutes total, defense says up to 45, her three kids: Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months, were strangled with exercise bands.
Afterwards, she cut her own wrists and neck and jumped from the second-story window. She survived and is now paralyzed from the waist down.
There are a lot of theories floating around TikTok and social media: DNA on the bands, body temp, etc. Her team has never argued any of them. They have never argued innocence once. She admitted she did it. She says she heard a man’s voice saying “This is your last chance, you have to kill your kids and kill yourself.”
The only question for the jury is this: Not guilty by lack of criminal responsibility, or guilty.
And “not guilty” does not mean free. In Massachusetts, she is immediately held for 40 days of evaluation in a State Medical Facility, then committed for 6 months, then a year at a time, indefinitely. Defense lawyers who do this work say no one in MA found not guilty of murder by reason of mental illness has ever walked out in less than years. If guilty, it’s mandatory life without parole for 1st degree. Because of her paralysis she wouldn’t be in general population, she would be in a medical ward at MCI-Framingham or a DOC medical unit like Tewksbury.
Either way, she is locked away likely forever.
Was she a victim first? I think so, and it’s tragic.
13 different psych meds, 30+ prescriptions, from 6 different providers in 4 months.
In the 3 weeks before: 8 different meds changed.
On the day: 6 different meds in her blood
She saw at least 3 therapists/prescribers, went to the ER twice for suicidal thoughts and violent thoughts, went to Women & Infants postpartum program in Rhode Island and was sent home after a day, and checked herself into McLean Hospital in Belmont for 5 days. She was discharged 19 days before the killings as “low risk.”
She told them the meds were making her worse. That’s in her notes and her husband’s testimony.
Where I put the most responsibility after the system is on the circle around her. By her husband and mother’s own testimony at trial, she told them both on more than one occasion in December she was having daily suicidal thoughts, intrusive thoughts about harming the kids, and right before Christmas that she was hearing voices telling her to harm the children.
I don’t know about you, but if I heard the mother of my children say that, knowing about the hospital stays and the medication list — there is zero reality where my kids would be left alone with her: ever.
Patrick did not physically harm his children. Police cleared him, and he has receipts, GPS, and surveillance showing he was out getting food and medicine when it happened. He is not legally responsible. But morally, leaving three little kids alone with a mother who is telling you she hears voices telling her to harm them is like leaving them in a lion’s cage and being surprised that a lion did what lions do with their prey.
Patrick Clancy might not have gotten literal blood on his hands; but he failed his children at best or let it happen at worst.
I’m sorry for Lindsay Clancy, she’s obviously deeply disturbed, and she was a victim of a failed mental health system, and an uncaring inner circle: she was screaming for help and everyone who could have helped her plugged their ears.
But I’m more sorry for her innocent children, and I sincerely hope she spends every single day of the rest of her existence with nothing but a few walls and a window to keep her company.
And I hope everyone takes Lindsay Clancy as a cautionary tale about mental health, postpartum depression, prescription drugs, and most of all taking a cry for help seriously.
None of this is supporting her after what she did. Nothing excuses it. It’s sympathy for how we got here.
988 — Call, text, or chat 988lifeline.org — Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. Say you are postpartum / having thoughts of harming your children, they will prioritize you.
South Dakota 988 with Helpline Center: Dial 211 after hours or call 1-800-691-4336 — connects to local crisis counselors who know SD beds and mobile crisis teams.
National Maternal Mental Health Hotline: Call or text 1-833-TLH-MAMA (1-833-852-6262) — licensed counselors who specialize in postpartum, English and Spanish, interpreter for 60+ languages.
If you have a plan, voices telling you to act, or kids are not safe: Call 911 or go to your nearest ER. You will not be arrested for asking for help.
Collin Duprel is a guest columnist for the Rapid City Post. Opinions expressed may not necessarily represent the views of the Rapid City Post, its affiliates, or advertisers.
