Patrick Clancy has stayed out of the public eye as best he could since the death of his three children. His wife is charged with their murder.
But in the most recent issue of The New Yorker, he breaks his silence in a lengthy article by writer Eren Orbey, in which he expresses forgiveness and sympathy for his wife and anger at how she has been portrayed by prosecutors, the media, the public and even her own attorney. The writer describes a scene that includes some of his children’s items in his New York home. A photo of the three of them hangs on a wall.
It’s been nearly two years since Lindsay Clancy was charged with murder in the deaths of her three young children at the Duxbury home she shared with her husband, Patrick, on Jan. 24, 2023.
“I wasn’t married to a monster − I was married to someone who got sick,” he says in the article.
Where is Patrick Clancy now?
Patrick Clancy now lives in Manhattan and works remotely for Microsoft, the article says. The Duxbury home where the murders happened has been sold, he said in the article.
Are Patrick and Lindsay Clancy still married?
While the article’s author said Patrick Clancy would not comment his marital status “out of deference to Lindsay,” his consistent reference to her as his wife, along with comments from his mother, seemingly confirm the couple is still married.
Lindsay Clancy accused of strangling her 3 young children
Prosecutors say Clancy, a former nurse, had a a deliberate plan to get her husband out of the house. They say she strangled her children − Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months − and then took a phone call from Patrick. That was after she sent him to a Kingston CVS and before he picked up dinner in North Plymouth.
Cora and Dawson died in the home. Callan was still alive when paramedics found him severely injured the night of the slayings. He died at Boston Children’s Hospital a short time later.
Clancy is charged with three counts each of murder and strangulation.
The chief medical examiner said the children died of asphyxia. Exercise bands were used to strangle them, authorities said. Bands were collected from the home, according to police records.
Did Lindsay Clancy plan the murder?
Prosecutors have argued that Lindsay Clancy’s one search of how long the trip out for dinner and back would take her husband and another on “ways to kill” indicate her actions that evening were premeditated, a key element in a first-degree murder charge.
By contrast, Patrick told The New Yorker that his wife said what happened that night “…was, like, a snap of the fingers.”
Lindsay Clancy’s medications at time of children’s deaths
Lindsay Clancy’s attorney, Kevin Reddington, has argued that his client’s actions could have been motivated by a dual combination of severe post-partum depression (a condition with which Lindsay Clancy has still not been diagnosed) and extreme adverse side effects from a range of antidepressants and sleep-aid medications she had been on over the course of several months.
The article said most of those side effects were reported in adolescents and described Reddington’s theory as drawing a “dubious connection” between the prescriptions and her actions.
As has been stated in court and reported previously, Lindsay Clancy kept a medication diary discovered by police after her arrest.
The New Yorker article said Lindsay Clancy was taking “one benzodiazepine and two antidepressants − in the days leading up to the killings.”
Patrick Clancy says Lindsay jumped, not slid down bedroom window
Patrick Clancy arrived home to a quiet house when he knew his wife and their children should have been up and about. He began looking for them by going upstairs and found the couple’s bedroom door was locked. He forced his way in and saw blood on the floor and an open window. He went outside, where he found his wife semi-conscious on the ground. She told him she had tried to kill herself.
Patrick Clancy disputes Plymouth County prosecutor Jennifer Sprague’s suggestion in court that Lindsay Clancy’s suicide attempt was not a serious one. She said the blood streaks on the side of the house under the window might be from Lindsay Clancy sliding down from the window to the frozen ground below, with the blood coming from neck and wrist cuts that were not deep enough for her to die. Lindsay Clancy has been paralyzed from the waist down since then.
Patrick Clancy said in the article that his wife’s cut were deeper than suggested and that he believed her suicide attempt was a serious one.
Alternate explanation for Lindsay Clancy’s Google searches, including ‘ways to kill’
Patrick Clancy said Lindsay told him in phone calls from the hospital that she searched the drive time out of concern Patrick would get stuck in rush-hour traffic. As far as ‘ways to kill,” Lindsay said that the search was self-directed, as she had been suicdal for the previous two months
Clancy murder case continues without a trial date yet
While Clancy’s indictment and multiple subsequent court appearances took place at Plymouth County Superior Court in Plymouth, the case has since moved to the superior courthouse in Brockton to initially accommodate the judge’s and attorneys’ schedules.
The case will move back to Plymouth at Clancy’s next court date, which is a status review conference scheduled for Dec. 18.
This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Patrick Clancy interview: Lindsay’s husband talks to The New Yorker
