The holdout juror in Lindsay Clancy’s trial said in his first televised interview that she was “methodical” when she killed her three children.
The juror, Michael P. Desronvil, told Fox News that he felt that Ms. Clancy had clearly thought through the killings, and that was one of his most significant reasons for refusing to acquit her last month.
“The focus has to be on the children,” he said, adding, “They’re the ones that don’t have anyone that’s fighting for them.”
In September, the jury in Ms. Clancy’s seven-week trial could not reach a verdict after nearly 40 hours of deliberation, saying that one person was at odds with everyone else. That juror was later revealed as Mr. Desronvil.
Ms. Clancy never denied that she killed her children at her Massachusetts home in 2023. Her then-husband found Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months, in the basement. They had been choked with exercise bands. Cora and Dawson were dead; Callan would die days later.
Ms. Clancy, who had a history of mental illness, cut her wrists and neck and jumped from a second-story window, suffering traumatic spinal cord injuries, and is partially paralyzed.
Her trial centered on her mental state, with her lawyer, Kevin Reddington, arguing that she could not be held criminally responsible because she was dealing with postpartum psychosis. He swayed most of the jurors, but not Mr. Desronvil.
Mr. Reddington asked the judge to remove Mr. Desronvil after several jurors said he would not agree to a not-guilty verdict for Ms. Clancy. Those jurors also complained that Mr. Desronvil had not followed the judge’s instructions or the law in reaching his decision.
But Mr. Desronvil has repeatedly asserted that he had no doubts that Ms. Clancy was guilty.
In the Fox News interview, Mr. Desronvil said that he had never served on a jury or sat through a trial before Ms. Clancy’s. He added that he was also initially unaware of the intense public attention on Ms. Clancy’s case.
The interviewer, Kayleigh McEnany, a former White House press secretary during President Trump’s first term, did not ask Mr. Desronvil about specific events in the jury room, but he said that there had been tense moments.
“I definitely listened,” he said. “Some moments in that deliberation room felt like that decisions were being swayed toward one way.”
Mr. Desronvil said that he had leaned on his Catholic faith and that he had made his decision “strictly on the evidence that was presented to me.”
The post Clancy Trial’s Holdout Juror Says That the Defendant Was ‘Methodical’ appeared first on New York Times.
