Minute-by-minute breakdown of day Lindsay Clancy killed kids as she played with them in snow just hours before deaths
LINDSAY Clancy was having one of her “better days” on January 24, 2023, before she allegedly strangled her three kids to death with exercise bands, her ex-husband testified.
The cold winter day appeared to begin as usual, with Lindsay taking her daughter to the doctor and playing with the kids, hours before Patrick Clancy found them dead in the basement.
Lindsay’s murder trial began on Monday, where she has pled not guilty to three murder charges in connection with the deaths of her three children: five-year-old daughter Cora, three-year-old son Dawson and eight-month-old son Callan.
Lindsay’s attorney, Kevin Reddington, is planning to seek an insanity defense, arguing that she is not criminally responsible for murder because she was suffering from undiagnosed postpartum psychosis when she allegedly took her kids’ lives.
Here is everything we know about January 24, 2023.
Lindsay took Cora to the doctor’s office around 8am that morning for a scheduled checkup.
Lindsay drove the two to the doctor while Patrick stayed home with Callan and Dawson.
During the visit, the doctor recommended Cora take a children’s laxative as she was having stomach troubles from being embarrassed about using the bathroom at preschool.
At 8:17am, Patrick sent Lindsay a photo of Dawson because “he dressed himself completely for the first time,” he said in his testimony.
Lindsay replied a minute later with a photo of Cora at the doctor’s office, wearing a gown and a mask. Patrick recalled in his testimony that he was able to understand Lindsay’s messages throughout the day.
When Cora and Lindsay got home around 8:30am, Patrick started getting ready for work.
While he was working remotely in his home office in the basement, Lindsay put Callan down for a nap and bundled up Cora and Dawson to go play in the snow.
Lindsay texted him throughout the day as they built a snowman outside, and Patrick came up once or twice to say hello, recalling work had been busier than usual.
“She was having one of her best days,” he testified, saying she seemed happy and there was no sort of concerns.
At 4:53pm, Lindsay texted Patrick about dinner, saying “Any chance you want to do takeout from ThreeV? I didn’t cook anything, it’s been a long day.”
ThreeV is a local restaurant in Plymouth, Massachusetts, where the family had eaten around three times previously.
Three minutes later she asked him to take a look at the menu, and at 5:06pm Patrick texted asking if Callan took a nap, which she said he took a shorter nap and was awake.
The two exchanged more messages about what to order from ThreeV and Lindsay later called in the order.
“I came upstairs, I took Callan for a minute and I rocked him by my knees, kissed Cora on the head and said, ‘be right back,’” he said, which was the last time he saw them alive.
Patrick saw Dawson eating chicken nuggets on the couch out of a bowl and recalled Lindsay’s demeanor seemed “normal” as she held Callan while standing near the basement door right before he left to pick up dinner.
Lindsay had asked Patrick to pick up stool softener for Cora while he was out, and earlier in the day she called a local CVS asking if they had any in stock.
Patrick asked Lindsay to text what she needed to him, which she did around 5:15pm.
Patrick drove to CVS first, where he later called Lindsay around 5:33pm. Lindsay didn’t immediately pick up, but she called back a minute later.
“It was very brief,” he said of the phone call, telling her the item they wanted was out of stock, but a generic brand was available, which she said was fine.
“She was pretty quiet, it sounded like she was busy. I remember hanging up, thinking she’s probably in the middle of giving baths or something like that,” he recalled.
After Patrick bought the laxative and a pack of Skittles, he drove to ThreeV, went inside, grabbed their order before going home.
Patrick parked in the driveway, went inside to an unusually quiet house, where he called out to his family but received no response. Patrick opened the basement door, yelled down, but again heard nothing.
He called Lindsay’s phone at 6:09pm to see if she was home and got no answer. He checked upstairs, looking in the bathroom first thinking maybe the kids were taking baths.
He looked in the kids’ bedrooms but didn’t find anyone and then approached his and Lindsay’s room, which was locked. He used a key from the previous owner to unlock the door and found the window open, the bed moved and “blood everywhere.”
While Patrick was out of the house, Lindsay allegedly strangled her three children to death with exercise bands in the basement of their house.
The prosecution alleged Lindsay wrapped exercise bands around her children’s necks, first Dawson, then Cora and lastly Callan.
She then went upstairs, locked the bedroom door, crushed pills, took a knife from the kitchen to cut her wrists and neck before jumping from the second-story window.
Patrick ran downstairs and out the back door, where he found Lindsay face up at the bottom of the window. He recalled seeing “deep cuts” on her wrists and neck.
Lindsay told Patrick she tried to kill herself, and he asked where the children were, which she said in the basement.
Patrick called 911, and while first responders arrived to tend to her, he went into the house to check on his children.
Patrick was still on the phone with 911 while he screamed in agony as he found his children lifeless on the ground.
He first found Cora who was face down with a band around her neck.
“I immediately ran over and tried to take the band off,” he said.
Callan was in the same position next to Cora, and Patrick said he took the band off him as well.
Patrick went to look for Dawson, who he found in the opposite side of the basement.
“I knew he was going,” he recalled, saying he took the band off of him and kept going back and forth between his three children.
Patrick said he tried giving Cora CPR and that first responders took over once they came down to the basement.
Callan was scooped up by paramedic Jennifer Stratton and carried to an ambulance after they had to take off his Mickey Mouse pajamas to try and give him medical aid.
PJ Hussey, a paramedic and captain with the Duxbury Fire Department, said in his testimony that the scene at the Clancy house “turned very chaotic very quickly,” after they learned the three children were in the basement.
Firefighter Keith Nette said he helped care for Dawson and first responders attempted to restart his heart in the ambulance.
First responders tended to the three children, giving chest compressions and using a bag valve mask to give rescue breaths.
Cora and Dawson were pronounced dead at the hospital that day, while Callan died in the hospital three days later after officials found he had no brain activity.
Lindsay’s murder trial began on Monday and is expected to last several weeks, where the jury will hear from dozens of witnesses.
In the years since the Clancy children died, Lindsay has been held at the Tewksbury Hospital in Massachusetts.
