First male juror in Lindsay Clancy trial speaks out about ‘note’ sent to judge
Warning: This article contains mentions of child death that some readers may find upsetting
A fifth juror in the Lindsay Clancy trial has spoken out against the alleged hold-out juror who forced the case to end in a mistrial.
Nick Dargie, 25, is the first of the three male jurors to provide a look inside the controversial deliberations and says he was 'devastated' that a not guilty verdict for Clancy, 36, was not secured.
Clancy was standing trial accused of murdering her three children in January 2023, but after five weeks of testimony and seven days of deliberations, a mistrial was declared as the jury of nine women and three men were unable to reach an unanimous decision.
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The jurors were 11-1 in favour of not guilty, but one holdout juror, a male, is said to have maintained his guilty verdict, resulting in a deadlock.
The hold out juror 'couldn't provide evidence for his stance
Dargie says the juror in question could not provide evidence for his stance.
“There was... There was several times I would ask him to show us evidence or, you know, describe a witness testimony that helped to prove what he was saying," Dargie told ABC News.
"And he couldn’t.
"There wasn’t a single piece of evidence or witness testimony that he used to prove why he was thinking the way he was, which is why we ultimately sent in that note."
The jury sent a note to Judge William Sullivan on what proved to be the penultimate day of deliberations, suggesting the holdout juror was not following the court's instructions on reasonable doubt.
Kevin Reddington, Clancy's lawyer, attempted to have the holdout juror removed for 'refusing to listen to the law' but Judge Sullivan declined the motion, explained the law of reasonable doubt to the jurors again, and sent them back into deliberations.
Sullivan was forced to declare a mistrial the following day, despite the defence's last gasp appeal to the Supreme Court.
Dargie added: "Otherwise, like, there’s nothing wrong with somebody having a completely opposite opinion. That would be a hung jury. That — like, that is our justice system.”
What other jurors have said about Clancy mistrial
Clancy's defence did not dispute that she had killed her three children - Cora, five, Dawson, three, and Callan, eight months - but argued she could not be held criminally responsible due to suffering from postpartum psychosis and severe mental illness at the time of the killings.
In the aftermath of the mistrial, several jurors have spoken out against the holdout juror.
The foreman of the jury, who could not be named for legal reasons, told NBC 10 Boston: “He admitted he had reasonable doubt and I started filling out the forms.
“I was so excited. There were three forms I had to fill out and I started filling them out. I wrote my signature on each one and then he said, ‘But I’m still not going say that she’s not guilty by reason of insanity.’”
One of the jurors branded the ‘holdout’ as ‘arrogant’ and said he refused to talk to other jury members.
“We read to him on numerous occasions the definition of reasonable doubt from Judge Sullivan’s instruction,” she said.
“He actually said one day in the end, ‘Why don’t we have the judge come in and read it again?’ And we were like, ‘No. We have it in front of us. We don’t need that.’ And we would highlight it and, you know, so and so, this is the definition of reasonable doubt. But he had the hardest time getting off the fact that Lindsay viciously killed her children.”
Another juror told CBS: "At the end of the day, there was so much doubt.
"The prosecution didn't have a figurative smoking gun. There was not a single moment throughout the presentation of that case where you could say 'Yup, 100% I'm certain she did it' or that she didn't do it. There was too much grey area."
Clancy has returned to Tewksbury Hospital, where she has been held since February 2023. The matter will be continued on September 29 for status, trial assignment and a motion to discuss rule 25.
It is not yet clear if there will be a retrial.
Everything else jurors have said about the Lindsay Clancy trial so far
In the US, once a trial is over, jurors are allowed to speak out about the case they were assigned to and what happened in their deliberations. So far, five jurors have opted to go public about what went on during the high-profile trial.
All but one agreed on a not guilty by insanity verdict
The foreperson, Roni Carlson, confirmed that they had all agreed to return a not guilty verdict, having not been swayed by the prosecution's case; however, one holdout juror refused to find Clancy not guilty by insanity, resulting in a mistrial being declared.
Deliberations filled with 'lots of crying'
Carlson, a retired fifth-grade teacher, admitted it was 'heartbreaking' to be unable to reach a unanimous verdict in the case, adding that the deliberations were filled with 'lots of crying' and 'lots of tears and then hugging'.
"I was so sad, so sad that we couldn't come up with a verdict for Lindsay. It was so heartbreaking," she said.
Holdout juror 'admitted he had reasonable doubt'
According to Carlson, the entire 12-person jury had agreed on a not guilty by insanity verdict, apart from one, who she said was male.
She told NBC he 'admitted he had reasonable doubt and I started filling out the forms, I was so excited'.
However, when she was partway through filling out the three verdict sheets, she claims he told the group: "But I'm still not going to say that she's not guilty by reason of insanity."
The holdout juror was a point of contention in the emotionally charged trial after Clancy's defence team attempted to lodge a last-minute appeal alleging the juror was 'biased' and not following the court's instructions on reasonable doubt. The appeal was unsuccessful.
Deliberations led to fights and shouting
The group deliberated for a total of nearly 40 hours, which resulted in a lot of yelling which could be heard through the walls, according to the three jurors interviewed by NBC.
"We weren't trying to figure out if she murdered the children. She did and she's admitted that," Carlson explained. "We're trying to figure out - did she know right from wrong at that time."
Holdout juror supposedly questioned toxicology reports
Another juror, who works for a government defence contractor, said the lone juror was questioning the meds Clancy was prescribed leading up to the deaths of her three children: "We had the toxicology reports. We could see exactly the amounts."
The juror added that nurses on the panel were discussing this but the holdout juror 'just completely disregarded the information that they gave'.
The lone juror in question has not spoken out.
"Everything proved that she loved her children"
The foreperson told NBC that they weren't convinced by the prosecution's case, saying that Clancy 'had to have snapped and not known what she was doing'.
Prosecutors were 'very, very harsh'
The third juror to go public, a chef at a senior centre, said she found the prosecutors to be 'very, very harsh'.
"They had no character witness in regard to Lindsay of being a bad mother," they added.
Listening to the 911 audio was 'the most horrific thing'
When asked about the 911 call Patrick Clancy placed which was played in court, one of the jurors admitted, 'it’s something I will never not hear if I think about it'.
"It was the most horrific thing.
“When we heard it again in the jury room, we were crying again. We were just like, ‘Oh my God.’
“The desperation, the despair in his voice was again, it's something that will stick with me.
“I felt that it was genuine. It was absolutely genuine. There's no doubt about that.”
The forewoman added: "There were jurors that had to put in their ear pods and just could not hear it again. They had to turn up their music and put it in because it just it was too much.”
Holdout juror accused of being 'very arrogant'
Paula Devlin claimed the juror 'was very arrogant'. "He really did not take anything that anybody said," she added, with another juror, Kellie Farina, alleging that he 'would not interact with us'.
Anonymous juror says there was 'too much doubt' to reach a guilty verdict
A fourth juror, who opted to remain anonymous, spoke to WBZ-TV's Kristina Rex and said: "At the end of the day, there was so much doubt. The prosecution didn't have a figurative smoking gun.
"There was not a single moment throughout the presentation of that case where you could say 'Yup, 100% I'm certain she did it' or that she didn't do it. There was too much gray area."
There was 'no evidence' for why holdout juror was thinking the way he was
Nick Dargie, one of the three men on the jury, told ABC News' Aaron Katersky that the lone juror didn't provide anything to back up why he disagreed with the group.
"There was several times I would ask him to show us evidence or, you know, describe a witness testimony that helped to prove what he was saying, and ... he couldn't," he said. "There wasn't a single piece of evidence or witness testimony that he used to prove why he was thinking the way he was, which is why we ultimately sent in that note.
"Otherwise, like there's nothing wrong with somebody having a completely opposite opinion ... that would be a hung jury. That, like that, is our justice system."
The note is referring to what the jury sent the judge, leading to the mistrial.
Topics: Lindsay Clancy, US News
Daniel Murphy