As Lindsay Clancy returns to court following her recent mistrial over the killings of her three children, questions remain as to whether she should be criminally charged once again. Many believe that Clancy shouldn’t face murder charges at all because of her mental state.
Legal analyst and ‘Crime Stories’ host Nancy Grace joins Billy Hallowell on ’The Dialogue’ to discuss her thoughts on the Clancy case. Hallowell shares several clips from Clancy’s trial along with reaction clips to Grace, who doesn’t hold back on her thoughts about how the case should be handled.
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The claims discussed are those made in the debate and do not represent the views of The Washington Times.
[HALLOWELL] Welcome to The Dialogue from The Washington Times. In this episode, we are revisiting the Lindsay Clancy case. Now, Clancy is the mother accused of killing her three young children, and her trial, which resulted in a mistrial, has shocked the nation and the world.
I’m joined today by TV host Nancy Grace. I want to dive right into this. We normally start the show with something we call The Pitch, and we do a lot of debate shows. We give our guests 30 seconds to basically… their position on one central statement. And I’m going to throw the statement out to you and I want to hear your position. And then we’re going to work through some video here. But the statement is: Lindsay Clancy should be held criminally responsible for the killing of her three children. What say you?
[GRACE] Lindsay Clancy’s case evokes a split down my psyche. One side of me feels incredibly sorry for her. As the mother of twins, my beloved twins, I can’t think of anything worse than being away from them, much less than being dead. It hurts me to even say that in the same sentence. The other side of me knows the black-and-white letter of the law, and it is the old McNaughton test, the insanity law brought over from Great Britain as part of our American jurisprudence and common law. And it says, if you know right from wrong at the time of the incident, then you are not legally insane. Yes, according to street vernacular, she may be crazy, but under the law, she is not insane. Why? Because she created a plan and methodically carried it out.
[HALLOWELL] Being a former prosecutor, you know these cases well. You know how this works. And I want to run some clips by you, and then we’re going to get reaction to them. The first video we’ll watch is Kevin Reddington, her attorney. He’s in court. Let’s watch what he had to say:
Case further indicates that the evidence must not just be some record evidence. It has to be reliable and it has to be sufficient. that would allow a rational juror to make a determination beyond a reasonable doubt. Not just that there’s some record evidence that touches on each element of the offense. So I asked the court to hearken back to the evidence that was presented and ask yourself, where’s the evidence that she did this? Where is the evidence that she did? - Attorney Kevin Reddington
[HALLOWELL] You have watched this case closely. I’m not even going to lead any questions here. What’s your reaction? I know you’ve seen that clip before, but watching it again?
[GRACE] Reddington, full of BS, technical legal term. Now, after all those weeks and weeks and weeks telling us. NGBRI, not guilty by reason of insanity. You know what that means, right, Billy? NGBRI means I did it, but I was crazy at the time. Now he’s saying there’s no evidence that she even did it. When he has been telling, with a straight face, a jury and the world his client is NGBRI, that’s what NGBRI means, Billy. I’m not guilty by reason of insanity. That’s not. I’m not guilty. I didn’t do it. All this time he’s been saying she did it, but she’s insane. Now he says, oh, erase, erase, Jurassic erase. Forget everything I’ve been saying for the last year. Now just listen to what I’m telling you today. She didn’t do it at all.
[HALLOWELL] Were you shocked, Nancy, to see that?
[GRACE] No. Why? Because he’s desperate. His client did it. He knows she did it. He thinks that the next go around, the next trial, and I predict there will be one, the state can’t just walk away and say, yeah, we know she killed her three children, but not interested. That’s not going to happen. He knows there’s likely going to be another trial. He knows that.
Typically, the state’s going to do better the second time around because the state knows everything they’ve got to say in their defense, and they’re going to combat that. Because, Billy, when the state takes a case to trial, they have to essentially hand over their whole file to the defense. It’s called discovery. The defense does not have to hand over their whole file to the state. But after the first trial, the state knows everything they’ve got to show. Right? They’ve seen up. There’s Kurt. They know it all. Nothing left to the imagination. That gives the state an incredible advantage the second time around. You with me?
So what’s he going to do now? He’s going to have to think of something else. Let’s see. Let me throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. This is the only place he’s got to go. He’s already tried NGBRI. So what now? S-O-D. Some other dude did it. I can’t wait to hear this
[HALLOWELL] Well, it seemed like that’s where they were leading when you watch the entire thing. And it seemed like it was almost feeding into some of the conspiracy theories that had been floating around without actually going there, almost going there.
Watch the video for the full conversation.
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