New Revelations in Case of Mother Accused of Killing Her Children as She "Will Be Forever" Paralyzed After Jumping From Window

The Massachusetts woman charged with murder in the deaths of her three young children in January will remain paralyzed from the waist down as a result of jumping out of a window, her lawyer said Wednesday. Lindsay M. Clancy, 32, of Duxbury, Massachusetts, is accused of killing her children and trying to kill herself afterward, lawyer Kevin J. Reddington said.

"She will be forever" paralyzed, he said. Here's what you need to know about this tragic case.

Clancy was a labor nurse at Massachusetts General Hospital. She is accused of strangling her children in the basement of her family house on Jan. 24, then cutting herself and jumping out of a second-floor window to kill herself. Clancy remains at Tewksbury Hospital, where she was moved from Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital. She needs long-term psychiatric and medical care, Reddington said.

Clancy suffered from postpartum depression or psychosis and was prescribed as many as 13 different drugs before the incident, Reddington said.

Clancy is accused of killing her daughter, Cora, 5; her son Dawson, 3; and her second son, Callan, 7 months.

Clancy planned carefully to kill her children in January, according to Plymouth District Attorney Timothy J. Cruz's office. Before their deaths, Clancy asked her husband, Patrick Clancy, to pick up food from a restaurant in Plymouth, Massachusetts. She then strangled the children in the basement of the family's house in Duxbury, prosecutors alleged. 

Lindsay Clancy jumped out of a window at the house after the children were dead, prosecutors said. Since then, she has received medical care. She pleaded not guilty at an arraignment from her hospital bed on Feb. 7 to pending first-degree murder charges. Patrick Clancy publicly forgave his wife in January.

It's possible Lindsay Clancy will mount a defense of diminished capacity to any murder charge, Reddington said. The defense retained Dr. Phillip Resnick, a psychiatry professor at Case Western Reserve University, and psychologist Paul Zeizel to examine Clancy's mental health, he added. A court hearing is scheduled for July.