Letters written by greater than a dozen pals and colleagues of Lindsay Clancy painting the Massachusetts mom accused of strangling her three young kids as somebody who “lived and breathed for her youngsters” and all the time wished one of the best for them.
The letters, which had been submitted to Plymouth District Courtroom and obtained by NBC Information, additionally describe the labor and supply nurse as a serene presence on the hospital, with one colleague referring to Clancy as “the nurse you’ll need caring to your spouse, sister, or daughter as they welcome their little one into the world.”
Clancy, 32, is charged with a number of counts within the deaths of her 5-year-old daughter, Cora; her 3-year-old son, Dawson; and her 8-month-old son, Callan. Prosecutors stated she strangled the kids Jan. 24 on the household’s Duxbury, Massachusetts, house, after which tried to kill herself. She was arraigned final week from a hospital mattress.
Clancy’s legal professional, Kevin Reddington, stated she is paralyzed from the waist down on account of her suicide try.
The letters despatched to Reddington had been written earlier than Clancy’s arraignment and distinction sharply with the portrait that prosecutors painted of her.
“I can attest to Lindsay’s true character and know that no matter occurred that day was not the actual Lindsay whom all of us love and cherish,” wrote Juliet Pollander, a nurse who labored with Clancy for eight years. What she is accused of, Pollander wrote, “had been unthinkable acts, to date out of contact to what the actually loving mom I knew would have dedicated.”
Prosecutors allege Clancy meticulously planned her kids’ deaths and despatched her husband, Patrick, on errands that she knew would give her sufficient time to strangle them. They stated she used the Apple Maps app to time a visit to a restaurant in a neighboring city the place he picked up takeout.
But the letters about her laud her parenting expertise.
“I have no idea a greater mom than Lindsay Clancy. She lived and breathed for her youngsters,” wrote Erika Sevieri, a fellow nurse at Massachusetts Common Hospital, the place Clancy labored. “I not often heard her discuss the rest however them.”
It was not clear whether or not the 20 or so letters had been submitted on the request of the protection or if pals and colleagues volunteered them, though one letter was described as a “character reference requested by Patrick Clancy.”
NBC Information reached out to the authors of the letters cited on this article, who declined additional remark or didn’t instantly reply.
Their letters describe Clancy as so laser-focused on her youngsters’s well-being that she was nearly obsessive. One stated she would generally verify her children with a stethoscope.
“She had a particular bond with all her youngsters and was so proud to be a mother.”
Lindsay Clancy’s Lengthy-time Pal
In one other, a buddy since first grade stated Clancy would do something to guard her children.
“When Cora was born her mommy nursing expertise took over and she or he would verify Cora’s vitals at house simply to ensure she was okay,” Michelle DaConto wrote. “She had a particular bond with all her youngsters and was so proud to be a mother.”
A ‘calming presence’ for moms-to-be
Clancy’s colleagues additionally famous how attentive she was to her children even whereas she was at work.
“She spied on them in the course of the night time by way of child displays and shared with us, her coworkers, the photographs of her sleeping youngsters,” wrote Margaret Hamp, a nurse at Mass Common. “She watched them sleep whereas she took breaks to pump breastmilk in the course of the night time.”
Clancy shined as a lot as a nurse as she did as a mom, different nurses wrote.
Heather Fraser wrote that Clancy introduced “a relaxing presence to any room and by no means engages in any nonsense or gossip.”
Clancy was identified to mentor new nurses, desirous to be a useful resource to them, and sufferers “raved in regards to the loving and compassionate care she gave them,” Sevieri wrote.
Affected person Shelby Oster described Clancy in a letter as “one of the best nurse I’ve ever had” and “my cheerleader by way of 2.5 days of labor that ended with an emergency C part.”
“She all the time remained balanced and calm, even throughout the many aggravating conditions that developed throughout our labor and supply expertise,” Oster wrote.
Clancy is due in courtroom Might 2. She was ordered held with out bail within the hospital for psychological well being remedy. The decide stated she may very well be ordered to house confinement, including {that a} listening to could be held earlier than that would occur.
A necessity for assist that was not fulfilled
Reddington, Clancy’s legal professional, stated that the mom had postpartum despair “and presumably postpartum psychosis” — a rare condition through which hallucinations alter individuals’s sense of actuality after childbirth, generally driving them to hurt themselves or their youngsters.
He advised the decide that she had been “totally destroyed” by a number of drugs — together with Valium, Prozac, Klonopin and Zoloft — which he stated masked her signs slightly than handled them.
Prosecutors, in the meantime, stated Clancy by no means used the phrase “psychosis” to explain her signs till after she was arrested whereas chatting with her husband on a cellphone belonging to a forensic psychologist whom her lawyer organized to look at her.
Extra protection of this case
Michele Davidson, a psychiatric perinatal nurse practitioner and a board member for the advocacy group Postpartum Assist Worldwide who shouldn’t be concerned in Clancy’s case, stated those that commit infanticide normally don’t suppose they’re doing one thing evil. Slightly, infanticide “is often out of an act of affection the place persons are making an attempt to save lots of their youngsters,” she stated.
In instances the place moms intend to kill themselves, they often commit infanticide in order to not abandon the kids, she added.
Regardless, those that wrote letters of assist stated it was clear Clancy didn’t obtain the assistance she wanted.
Stacey Kabat, who stated Clancy shadowed her when she was a nursing pupil, wrote that she and her members of the family “had been betrayed by an insufficient medical system that has not devoted sufficient assets nor time studying assist our new moms.”
“Please know that if our Lindsay had correct remedy this household would nonetheless be collectively,” Kabat wrote. “Please know that she deserves no additional punishment.”
In case you are pregnant or a brand new mom and you might be in disaster, the National Maternal Mental Health Hotline offers free, confidential assist 24/7 in English and Spanish. Name or textual content the hotline at 1-833-9-HELP4MOMS.
In the event you or somebody you understand is in disaster, name 988 to succeed in the Suicide and Disaster Lifeline. You can too name the Nationwide Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255, textual content HOME to 741741 or go to SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for added assets.
