PLYMOUTH, Mass. — One juror in the Lindsay Clancy triple-murder trial is holding up deliberations, according to defense attorney Kevin Reddington.

“There is one juror who refuses to listen to the law,” Reddington said in open court Thursday. “My motion is to remove the juror.”

Reddington made the motion after jurors sent in a note in the afternoon raising the issue, and Judge William Sullivan individually asked all of them at sidebar if they could follow the law as he instructed.

They were all sworn in and answered yes, Sullivan said.

Clancy, who is accused of murdering her children, Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, eight months, in January 2023, was wheeled over to be present during the questioning.

The Duxbury mom is paralyzed from jumping out a window during a suicide attempt after the killings. She isn’t disputing that she strangled the kids; instead, Reddington argued that she can’t be held criminally responsible because she was suffering from postpartum psychosis at the time.

“I want to remind you that you are required to follow my instructions on the law,” Sullivan said when the jury was brought in after the sidebar questions. The judge then proceeded to give them instructions on reasonable doubt.

“The burden of proof is on the prosecutor,” he said. “It’s not enough for the Commonwealth to establish a probability.”

When Sullivan told the jury to resume their deliberations, people in the room gasped. Twice this week they sent in notes telling Sullivan that they couldn’t come to a unanimous decision.

The first time, Sullivan sent them back, noting what a long trial it had been, with more than 80 witnesses and hundreds of exhibits. The second time, he gave a Tuey-Rodriguez charge, which limits how many more times he can send the nine women and three men deliberating back without their consent.

After the jury returned to the deliberation room Thursday, Reddington asked to speak in open court, rather than at sidebar.

The defense attorney objected to Sullivan only giving the instruction, saying that if the jury came back later that day hung because of one person who “spurned the instruction of this court … it’s a shame.”

Assistant District Attorney Jennifer Sprague agreed with Sullivan’s instruction and said it was in line with Massachusetts case law.

“I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to agree with the one juror over the other 11,” Judge Sullivan said.

Reporters and members of the public barely returned to their seats after a recess was called following the note arguments. They almost immediately started to line up outside the courtroom’s doors.

The jury was sent back into the deliberation room around 3:30 p.m., and Sullivan brought them back a half hour later to send them home.

By the end of the day Thursday, they’d deliberated for about 36 hours total.

While Reddington left the court, mobbed once again by reporters, he said that the juror in question was identified by the foreperson’s note and that “there will be an inquiry from the judge,” when everyone returns Friday morning.

“I don’t know what this question is going to be yet,” Reddington told reporters. “We’ll have an argument about it. I don’t think it’ll be at the sidebar. I think it’ll be in open court, which is my concern that we have our arguments in open court, not at the sidebar.”

Reddington said that the juror is holding up the deliberations, saying, “It’s basically that there’s a person who has doubt but will not listen to the judge’s instruction.”

A reporter asked if Reddington was told if the 11 other jurors were all going the same way. “They don’t tell me anything,” he said.

He was also asked whether he wanted the juror to be replaced or for a mistrial to be declared, and Reddington replied, “I don’t want a mistrial.”

Clancy was brought to the sidebar because she had “a right to know what’s going on,” he noted. “I just want to make sure she’s there and understands what’s going on.”

Defense attorney Joseph Krowski, who is representing a Wellesley mother accused of killing her children earlier this year, said that replacing a juror isn’t unheard of, but it is rare.

It usually happens when a juror is being “tumultuous” or brings in outside information, he told the Herald outside the courthouse.

“It’s one thing to disagree factually; it’s another thing to not follow the law,” he said, explaining that if it’s the latter with this juror, that could be grounds for dismissal.

If it were his case, he said he would understand Reddington feeling frustrated or even angry.

Krowski said that it seems like the juror is on the side of guilt while the 11 others are moving for a not guilty verdict.

He didn’t see the foreperson’s note, but based on what Reddington reported, Krowski said, “I don’t know how else you read that.”

________

©2026 MediaNews Group, Inc. Visit at bostonherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.