BostonGlobe.com46%
Lindsay Clancy trial: What we learned from Patrick Clancy’s 911 call 7%
By Sean Cotter27% Shelley Murphy15%
7/30/2026, 8:03:07 AM
BS Summary: This article contains 14 faulty reasoning types, including Availability Heuristic, Framing Effect, and Confirmation Bias, with Appeal to Emotion as the most egregious example at 15.2% saturation with 130 hits. Analysis detected 740 faulty-reasoning hits from 854 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 20.9% and a BS Rank of 7% (22,189 of 23,846 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 93.10% of the article peer group.
PLYMOUTH — In the high-profile murder trial of Lindsay Clancy, the 911 call her then-husband Patrick made that Jan. 24, 2023 night had been one of the most anticipated pieces of evidence.
It was a harrowing call, roughly eight minutes long, capturing the Clancys speaking to each other.
He had just found her face-up in the backyard of their Duxbury home, badly wounded after an apparent suicide attempt.
Then, halfway through the call, he found his three children dead, killed by his wife.
Lindsay Clancy has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity to first-degree murder charges.
She admits she killed their children but maintains she was deeply in the throes of postpartum depression and psychosis and should not be held criminally responsible.
She is in the midst of a trial that’s drawn national attention for its unfathomable details, but also for the questions it raises about postpartum care, mental health, and prosecutorial discretion.
The 911 call, and Patrick Clancy’s testimony around it, brought to light new details in the case.
While the recording was played Wednesday, several members of the jury fought back tears and others appeared shaken.
It was so graphic that Plymouth Superior Judge William F.
Sullivan previously took the extraordinary step of prohibiting its release to the public, allowing only those present in the courtroom to hear it.
Here is what we learned:
<i>He had cell trouble as he tried making the call.</i>
Before jurors heard the 911 call, they listened to Patrick Clancy’s testimony about what happened leading up to it — coming home to find a quiet house and then blood in the bedroom, where the wind blew in through an open window on that January evening.
When he ran outside, he found his then-wife lying injured on the ground, and tried to call 911.
But he had issues with cell service, he testified: “It took a few minutes.”
His phone kept jumping on and off their Wifi network, making it difficult for the call to go through.
He considered simply yelling for the neighbors, but he finally reached a dispatcher, he said.
<i><b>At first, he was calling just about Lindsay. </b></i>
As Lindsay Clancy lay in the backyard, drifting in and out of consciousness, he asked her what happened, he said.
“She said, ‘I tried to kill myself,’” she said.
He said he asked where the kids were.
“She said, ‘They’re in the basement’,” Patrick Clancy testified.
Prosecutor Jennifer Sprague asked if Lindsay Clancy had said anything about the children in danger or hurt.
He said she did not.
This is reflected in the recording of the 911 call that the jury heard.
Patrick Clancy was led from the courtroom midway through his testimony before it was played, sparing him the trauma of having to listen to it.
At the start of the call, he told the 911 dispatcher,“My wife tried to commit suicide.”
<i><b>He described her wounds — which are already a point of contention in the trial</b></i>
The 911 dispatcher asked about her injuries, and Patrick said she had cuts on her neck and wrists.
The dispatcher said they could tell him how to apply pressure and stop the bleeding as he waited for emergency medical personnel to arrive.
“It’s not really bleeding,” he said.
“It’s an open wound.”
This gets to one of the points of contention brought up in the opening statements – the seriousness of Lindsay Clancy’s suicide attempt.<i> </i>The prosecution called Lindsay Clancy’s wounds “superficial” and cast doubt on the seriousness of them.
Kevin Reddington, Lindsay Clancy’s attorney, has sharply pushed back, noting her injuries from leaping out the window left her paralyzed.
During Patrick Clancy’s testimony, he said blood had been “everywhere” in the bedroom where she’d cut herself, and that she had “deep” cuts when he’d found her.
Prosecutors had pushed back on those characterizations by showing photos of some splashes of blood in the room and presenting him with what he’d said during the 911 call.
<i><b>He stayed with her — and on the phone with 911 — as he waited for first responders.</b></i>
The 911 call captured Patrick Clancy talking to Lindsay as she lay on the ground.
He begged her to open her eyes, <b> </b>and asked her of the suicide attempt: “Why did you do it?”
Emergency personnel arrived in about five minutes and began tending to Lindsay.
After they arrived, he said, “I need you to stay here — I got to go check on my kids.”
He headed to the basement.
<i><b>Jurors heard his horror as he found the children dead. </b></i>
Because he stayed on the line with 911 for another few minutes, jurors heard the moments he found their bodies and began to scream.
According to his testimony, he found 5-year-old Cora, then 8-month-old Callan, then Dawson, 3, each strangled with knotted exercise bands and frantically removed them.
He screamed in anguish, unable to find the words to describe the horrific scene as the dispatcher repeatedly asked, “What’s going on?”
“She killed the kids!”
he said.
“Ohhhhh, oh my God.”
Analysis
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