The Lindsay Clancy trial.

[beccahamlet]

Is anyone following it? Absolutely heartbreaking. All such lovely people.

No, she was prescribed 13 different medications over the course of 4 months which is absurd, and had 6 in her system when tested in hospital after this happened (including an anti-psychotic).
Crushed pills were found in the house, and bottles of part full medication bottles she was no longer taking were in Patricks car.

It is not uncommon for patients to struggle with side effects & not give them time to settle, which is why support alongside prescribing is so important rather than just prescribing different ones.

Ok, somehow I got the timeline of when they were prescribed wrong.

My point is that perhaps she became more (?) psychotic and spiralled further precisely because she wasn’t giving each medication long enough to work. My dh has been through about 6 or 7 different medications until he finally got to one that he felt worked for him, all of them had various horrendous side effects to be honest. Just because they found evidence of 6 medications in her toxicology report from the hospital doesn’t mean she was taking 6 medications at once, consistently. Just that she’d taken them before the event, ie crushed up before the suicide attempt.

Presumably your husband did not also have PPD.

She was asking for help, very recently in a psyche ward, and seeking medical care.

Everyone around her failed her, and the medical system was criminally negligent.

The only good that may come out of this is if people are able to recognize other mothers struggling and intervene because of this tragedy.

Well yes, prescribing different ones isnt the answer though. Loathe to comment specifically on this case beyond what has been stated in court (like the meds), but generally its expected patients have a high risk of stopping before they have really started them, and while you cannot force someone to take them (save very rare circumstances that require a legal wrap), prescribing a random cocktail isnt ethical or safe either.

Divorced, remarried and child on the way within three years of his family being destroyed.

Defense Diaries podcast is covering this too - I haven’t watched anything yet but have been listening to this.

The presenters are a husband and wife lawyer duo who explain the legal terms and arguments.

Yes of course. I feel like you’re arguing with me and there’s not really anything to argue about. We are basically saying the same thing.

Maybe she didn't give it enough time, 30-50% of people don't take their psychiatric medication as prescribed or followed the plan so there's nothing unusual or shocking about someone not taking them for long enough, especially if they feel like it's making them worse when they're trying to cope.

But as I said she was not prescribing them to herself, as far as I remember we didn't hear the doctors saying I would prefer you to stay on these for another couple of weeks first, or I will need you to wait X amount of time to make sure they're all out of your system before I prescribe the next one. She went and reported she was feeling worse or having X side effect and her prescription was switched.

There's no guarantee there would have been a better outcome if she had taken them for longer either, especially as the defence are saying that they missed that she may have bipolar and the medications prescribed initially were not suitable for bipolar.

She was psychotic and had been over-prescribed medications that she had paradoxical and neuro-toxic reactions to.

Her DH doesn't really come into it.

It’s interesting isn’t it. I suppose I am thinking about it from the point of things like the 2023 Nottingham stabbings - VC wasn’t taking medications he was supposed to be taking (he was sectioned several times and was obviously made to take medications during those times, but when released there was no force involved in ensuring he kept taking those medications that had stabilised him enough to be discharged). I’m not suggesting medication is always a miracle cure - I’ve experiences of both sides of it, and my Mum had schizophrenia so had quite a bit of experience of sectioning / meds / psychosis etc but I just wonder if sometimes NOT taking the meds and / or giving them long enough to see if they work is as dangerous as not trying any at all. And yes I can see that with LC there is the obvious error that she was prescribed SSRIs when she may have had bipolar and that was questionable (my dh has bipolar and has tried many of them too, gave him horrific side effects and took him a long time to become settled on the drug he takes now).

Jennifer Tufts is NOT coming across well on the stand today!

She was dreadful. Is it really believable the prosecution didn't try and prep her?

The whole thing doesn’t make sense. The timeline of events. Her DNA not being on the exercise bands. The WiFi and cameras weren’t working that day. Him saying his phone wouldn’t connect to 911 because of no WiFi, yet you don’t need WiFi to connect to 911. Him saying she spoke to him when he found her, but she was non-verbal for 4 days. Him only agreeing to testify if his phone records were sealed……the list goes on.

She's definitely very nervous and of course she also has the civil trial because both Patrick and Lindsay have their own civil suits against her too (along with the other professionals involved).

Cross examination today was definitely a blow for the prosecution.

There seems to be a lot of strange things. I'm not sure what to believe at all.

There’s only “a lot of strange things” when you read the ridiculous conspiracy theories online.

She killed her children. This trial isn’t to determine whether she killed them. It’s to determine whether she had diminished capacity/responsibility i.e. not guilty due to psychosis.

The husband possibly made mistakes within the marriage and didn’t have the knowledge to help his wife’s MH. He may even had been a shit husband who was having an affair. He is not on trial for killing the children though.

Judging his demeanour while giving evidence is ludicrous. He has suffered an unbelievable trauma. The way he copes with this situation is just that, the way he copes. (I’ve had many a witness and victim giggle their way through a cross examination.) Being “cold and emotionless” isn’t an unusual reaction given the circumstances.

The conspiracy theories about the husband are completely distracting from the issues raised in this trial. The woman and her family were (potentially) failed by MH services.

If she wasn’t having a psychotic episode, the thought of a mother (from a certain demographic) in full consciousness killing her children is too gruesome. People want to believe it couldn’t possibly be true.

Completely agree.

People need to be careful of falling into the trap of thinking someone (ie Patrick) did something awful just because he doesn’t behave in the way they expect him to. There are plenty of very odd people in the world; it doesn’t make them murderers.

I do think he was a bit of a shit husband. As many husbands are when faced with a wife with severe mental health issues. But he didn’t kill his children. The trial isn’t about that.

He’s also been keeping his children’s memory alive. Sponsored run, help designing a park. That’s how he’s dealing with the trauma.

A lot of people seem to be more interested in their gotcha moment. I agree she should most definitely spend the rest of her life in a hospital not a prison but people almost want her exonerated.

You shouldn't be glad; the US system makes it so that justice is publicly carried out and not hidden behind closed doors.

He worked full-time from home.

That's not true. The New Yorker article has him living alone in a bachelor pad, and that was long after 4 months.

She's confessed. She's the one who did it.

The UK justice system isn't behind closed doors, its all in the public domain. All court records are publicly accessible and reported on unless there are specific reasons not to do so, to safeguard children for example.

It just doesn't make it a public spectacle so hundreds of true crime nuts and armchair detectives/psychologists can make money from it.

It's that crap that has infected the UK psyche so that even the most obvious and clear cut circumstances get over-run with conspiracy theorists and people looking to make a quick buck.

Which leads to members of the public thinking they are experts in body language, psychology and how people will behave when traumatised with zero evidence to back that up.

I've lost count of the number of cases where someone has gone missing/found dead and social media posters create narratives that just don't exist.

Nicola Bulley and Jay Slater are recent examples. Really obvious explanations for both cases and SM lost their minds over creating conspiracy theories and confidently stating that family members/friends were definitely suspicious because e.g Nicolas husband wore a hat during an interview or Jays Mum 'just wouldn't do that if her son was really missing'.

Nobody knows how they would react if something awful happened to them. And nobody can predict how other people will react either.

I watched the Elizabeth Smart documentary on Netflix. While a lot of the public were confidently stating it was obvious her Dad or her Uncle had abused and murdered her based on how 'weird' they were acting and 'inconsistencies' in the families narrative, she spent 9 months being raped daily by a Religious fanatic.

So the lack of TV cameras in courtrooms in the UK doesn't stop the crazies.

And who's going to go and look at all those records? The point of justice being publicly recorded is so that citizens can easily see justice being done, as it happens. I don't see how people make money from that.

I believe she had a psychotic episode. She was failed by her doctors. If she wasn’t psychotic what was her motive?