The Bioethics of the Lindsay Clancy Trial

During the past five weeks we have been getting daily updates into the Lindsay Clancy Trial deliberations. The mother in Massachusetts is accused of murdering her three young children in 2023. Since she attempted suicide by jumping from a two-story window after the killing where she injured her spine, she was seated in a wheelchair and made no verbal testimony during the trial.

Her judge in the case just declared a mistrial because the jury could not make a unanimous decision. One person on the jury saw things differently from the others. So did many Americans.

When you have a situation such as this and something can be declared a mistrial means we have come into the arena of bioethics. They are the tough decisions that can be argued both ways about something that is as important as justice and life.

The course that I took on the phenomenology of perception at Berkeley at Yale was helpful because depending on what you are looking for, you can see different things. Hence, those drawings in psychology textbooks that can be viewed as a beautiful woman or old hag depending on what we are told to look for is exactly what we will see.

The case was flawed from the beginning because the perception was that this was in the legal area and a heinous crime. A bioethicist would state, “We have a different set of questions that we want to raise.”

What was informing the one juror who is believed to be the hold out for seeing this act as a criminal issue? The women appearing outside the courtroom in pink protested that they could see themselves as having strong feelings when they went through postpartum depression, one step ahead of psychosis. They were feeling and saying, “There but for the grace of God, go I.”

To make my point, my son wrote and directed a movie, “Abandoned”, that he wanted it to be a film about postpartum psychosis. The group funding the movie, The Vertical Group, wanted it to be a horror movie. Same film with two different ways to view it. Why? because horror movies sell. It is currently on Netflix and Prime. When I view it, I viewed it as a film about postpartum psychosis, a topic that is never discussed let alone talked about and probably wouldn’t sell as much as marketed as a horror film.

It is impossible for us to identify with what Clancy did. But what about the failure of a mental health system to provide care in situations such as this. That is why my son did the movie he did, to raise awareness of postpartum issues.

We know that her psychiatric care was certainly not coordinated. The whole issue of hallucinations came up as something that people were skeptical about. I have very good friends who are dealing with Parkinson’s Disease. A common characteristic of that disease process is, for those suffering from it, to hallucinate and see things that are not real or there. It is a troubling manifestation of a disease that is a physical illness but not acceptable for consideration as a characteristic of a mental issue such as psychosis. In our culture it is easier to say that you have cancer than that you are struggling with a mental health problem.

In our culture when we can’t understand something, we enter the world of conspiracy theories, and there are many about the Clancy situation. The right wing sees this yet another side of liberal support ending with doing violence against children. Clancy is seen as a representative of women at large. When women stand up for something, they are seen as the violent ones. Betty Friedan who just died created a movement to gain equal rights for women and was treated with disdain by the right. Those on the left had conspiracy theories that the husband was to blame.

In bioethics when we are dealing with an issue like this, we look for something just like it much like lawyers look for case law to make their point. There was a similar situation in Texas, and the mother was seen as guilty. It is a rare issue. There are not a whole lot of examples why a mother who seems to be an ideal mate, mother, nurse, and friend seem to be stellar who commits a heinous crime out of nowhere. In fact, she was seen as the last person on earth who would do such a thing.

A psychiatrist from each side were brought in and said exactly what their attorney wanted them to say except something that people missed.

The reason that my son’s movie, “Abandoned”, could be seen as postpartum psychosis or a horror story is that they both LOOK the same. It is your perception that makes one a psychosis and the other a nightmare.

I have had different experiences with psychotic people that I was counseling and some I just had to deal with on an everyday basis. There is one that I always remember when I watched someone descend into madness right in front of me. It came first in the form of a blank stare. Something was missing. Yes, a director could see that event one way and be shocked. But I also was taught that the psychotic individual can be more afraid of you than the fear you have of them.

Did anyone in the mental health system ever ask her what she was afraid of doing or what she was afraid of seeing? That is the question I want an answer to. It changes the paradigm of the debate but doesn’t change a thing about this being a terrible tragedy.