Lindsay Clancy murder trial: Patrick Clancy to resume testimony, jury to hear 911 call

PLYMOUTH, Mass. — Jurors in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial are expected to hear the frantic 911 call Patrick Clancy made after returning home and discovering his wife outside their Duxbury home before finding their three children in the basement.

The recording is expected to be played in Plymouth Superior Court when testimony resumes Tuesday morning. However, the audio will not be broadcast publicly, meaning only those inside the courtroom will hear the call.

Patrick Clancy began testifying Monday after opening statements from prosecutors and defense attorneys. During emotional testimony, he detailed Lindsay Clancy’s mental health struggles in the months leading up to the deaths of their children.

Jurors were shown family photographs taken just days before the January 2023 killings. Patrick Clancy testified that on the day of the murders, he believed his wife’s condition was improving when he left the home to pick up takeout.

Lindsay Clancy is charged with strangling the couple’s three children, 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson, and 8-month-old Callan, with exercise bands in the basement of their home on Jan. 24, 2023. Prosecutors allege she sent Patrick Clancy out to pick up dinner before carrying out the killings.

Boston criminal defense attorney Elyse Hershon, who is not involved in the case, said Patrick Clancy’s testimony is likely to be among the most difficult moments of the trial.

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“We’re about to hear what happened and what he saw when he came home, so certainly I expect it to be harrowing, I expect it to be upsetting and horrific,” Hershon said. “But he’s a victim in all of this, probably the biggest living victim that there is in this case. He lost his wife, essentially, to the system and a wheelchair; he lost his children, and his entire life got upended, so it will be hard to watch, but it is evidence coming into this trial.”

In opening statements Monday, prosecutors acknowledged Lindsay Clancy struggled with mental health issues for months before the deaths but argued she was controlling and manipulative and carefully planned the killings.

Defense attorneys presented a sharply different account, arguing Clancy is not criminally responsible because she was suffering from severe postpartum depression and postpartum psychosis. They contend Lindsay and Patrick Clancy repeatedly sought treatment but were unable to get the care she needed in the weeks and months leading up to the murders.

Court is scheduled to resume at 9 a.m. Tuesday with the continuation of Patrick Clancy’s testimony.

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