The chilling scene was described by a psychiatrist testifying for the prosecution on Friday, who said Clancy described the murder scene when he interviewed her in custody several months ago.
The psychiatrist, Dr. Avram Mack, testified as an expert witness for the prosecution, He was been hired by the Plymouth district attorney’s office to evaluate Clancy’s claim she was suffering from postpartum psychosis.
His testimony came from two interviews of Clancy at Tewksbury Hospital in April. (Separately, in a civil lawsuit she filed against her practitioners, Clancy acknowledged using the same phrase during the killings.)
Clancy has admitted she strangled 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson, and 8-month-old Callan after sending her husband out to pick up medication and takeout for dinner. She then slashed her neck and wrists and jumped out a second-story window in a failed suicide attempt. She is paralyzed from the waist down and appears in court each day in a wheelchair.
She has pleaded not guilty to murder, asserting she was in the throes of postpartum psychosis at the time and should not be held criminally responsible.
Jurors, who may get the case early next week, must decide whether Clancy, 36, suffered from a mental health condition that made her unable to appreciate the wrongfulness of her actions, or unable to conform them to the requirements of the law.
To that end, jurors on Friday heard dueling perspectives from two psychiatrists over whether Clancy suffered from psychosis when she killed her children and was unable to resist a voice in her head.
Earlier in the day, the jury heard from the last witness for Clancy’s defense, Dr. Phillip Resnick, a forensic psychiatrist with expertise in postpartum conditions who’s testified in other high-profile murder and insanity cases.
Resnick said he evaluated Clancy four months after the slayings and concluded she was suffering from postpartum psychosis when she killed her children. He said she was experiencing “command hallucinations” and a “delusion of influence,” the sense of losing control of your body.
“She felt that her body was taken over by an external force,” he said. “It was almost like she was a puppet and someone else was pulling the strings.”
Resnick said he met with Clancy for several hours in May 2023, interviewed her parents, and reviewed her medical records as well as police reports.
Given that she had been displaying symptoms of “mild mania,” Resnick said his final diagnosis was bipolar disorder with major depression.
His assessment supports a defense theory that Clancy’s many mental health providers who treated her for postpartum anxiety and insomnia failed to properly diagnose her or prescribe appropriate medications in the months before she killed her children. Instead, the defense has argued, they kept prescribing her psychiatric medications, some of which likely exacerbated her symptoms.
Separately, Mack, who was the first rebuttal witness for the prosecution, testified Clancy has been taking medication for bipolar disorder at Tewksbury Hospital, where she’s being held and receiving treatment.
Resnick said the killings in this case meet his definition of “altruistic filicide,” which is a “murder committed out of love, rather than hostility.” Clancy was obsessive about caring for her children, as the jury has heard from her family members and others, the doctor said.
“In her mind, she believed that she would be doing her children a favor by having them go to heaven with her, rather than remain on earth without her,” he testified.
With her distorted, psychotic thinking, “she did what she believed was morally right,” he added.
Resnick also testified in the case of Andrea Yates, a Texas mother who was initially convicted of murder for drowning her five children in 2001, then was acquitted by reason of insanity after she was granted a retrial.
In Clancy’s case, Resnick rebutted the prosecution’s argument that she was in control of her actions because she hadn’t previously shown any clear signs of psychosis. He also said she likely could have downplayed her symptoms because she was scared of having her children taken away.
Even just hours before the killings, Clancy wasn’t “frankly psychotic” every minute of the day, Resnick said. She built a snowman with her children and took her daughter to the doctor for an annual checkup, a level of functioning that indicated she wasn’t psychotic — until the “command hallucination” began, he continued.
When Mack took the stand for the prosecution, however, he presented a different argument.
He testified that, in his opinion, Clancy was suffering from “major depressive disorder,” not psychosis. He said she methodically killed her children, even though she knew it was wrong. He said she should have done more to stop herself from harming them.
“While depressed, her mental state was relatively stable,” Mack said.
He said she displayed “normal thinking, the ability to think ahead and navigate the world.” For example, he said, Clancy followed the rules of the road when she drove her daughter to the doctor just hours before the killings, showing she was able to act in accordance with the law.
Mack also acknowledged that sometimes people display improved mood immediately before they attempt suicide.
Since the trial began in late July, jurors have heard a number of witnesses testify that Clancy was desperately seeking help for postpartum depression and anxiety, beginning in September 2022. Her struggles intensified when she faced the prospect of returning to work as a labor and delivery nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Now, the focus inside the courtroom has shifted to the opinions of mental health experts who have reviewed the evidence.
During cross-examination of Mack, defense attorney Kevin Reddington challenged the doctor’s credentials, suggesting he has little experience treating postpartum patients.
Much of his work has focused on child and adolescent mental health, addiction, and other areas of research, Reddington said. Mack countered that he sees himself as “a generalist who happens to have a couple areas of focus.”
“Where in here does it say that you ever came within breathing distance of a pregnant woman?” Reddington asked, reading from a record of Mack’s professional experience and research publications.
During direct examination, Mack said he hadn’t considered postpartum conditions in his evaluation of Clancy, citing guidelines limiting the postpartum period to four weeks after birth. Other experts have rejected that definition, with some saying it can last a year or more.
On Monday, Mack will resume testifying. Prosecutors are expected to call several more witnesses afterwards. Closing arguments may take place as early as Tuesday.