Lindsay Clancy, the Massachusetts mother accused of strangling her three young children, has brought in the attorney who fought Karen Read's double jeopardy battle, setting up a high-stakes bid to block prosecutors from ever retrying her.

Veteran Boston attorney Martin Weinberg filed a limited appearance at Plymouth Superior Court this week, entering the case for a single purpose: to argue that the Constitution bars the state from putting Clancy in front of a jury a second time. A court filing obtained by Fox News Digital states Weinberg will represent Clancy in connection with the forthcoming dismissal motion and "related matters." The filing does not say when he will submit the motion.

The move comes less than a month after Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial on Sept. 4. Jurors had spent seven days behind closed doors and could not reach a unanimous verdict. Several jurors later revealed publicly that the panel split 11-1 in favor of finding Clancy not criminally responsible, with a single holdout voting to convict.

Clancy's case is scheduled to return to court Sept. 29. Prosecutors have not publicly announced whether they intend to retry her. But her defense team is not waiting to find out.

Eleven jurors sided with the defense, one refused

Clancy, a former nurse, does not deny killing her three children, Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, just 8 months old, inside the family's Duxbury, Massachusetts, home in January 2023. She pleaded not guilty on the grounds that she was not criminally responsible at the time. Her defense argued she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and was heavily medicated when the children died.

Prosecutors told the jury a different story. They contended Clancy carefully planned the killings, sending her husband Patrick out of the house before attacking the children with exercise bands. After the strangulations, Clancy jumped from a second-story window in an apparent suicide attempt. She survived but was left paralyzed and remains in custody at Tewksbury Hospital.

The jury deadlock exposed a sharp divide. According to jurors who spoke afterward, 11 of the 12 panelists believed Clancy met the legal standard for lack of criminal responsibility. One did not.

During deliberations, defense attorney Kevin Reddington tried to get the holdout juror removed, arguing the juror refused to follow the judge's instructions. Judge Sullivan declined, telling the courtroom he did not feel it was proper to side with one party in deliberations.

"I don't feel it is proper for me to side with one side or the other of the deliberations. I don't feel it's appropriate for me to say, I agree with one juror or the 11."

That was Sullivan's answer. In a notable first for the trial, the paralyzed Clancy, confined to a wheelchair, was brought to join a sidebar conference with the judge. Reddington told reporters afterward that his client had a right to know what was happening in her own case.

When the jury finally reported it could not agree, Sullivan declared a mistrial. Reddington signaled immediately that he would fight any attempt to retry Clancy.

Reddington already argues no rational jury could convict

Before Weinberg even entered the picture, Reddington filed a separate post-mistrial motion asking the judge to rule Clancy not guilty by reason of insanity outright. His argument: the prosecution's own evidence was legally insufficient to prove Clancy knew her actions were wrong.

Reddington pointed to a fact the defense hammered throughout the trial, every forensic expert who testified, including those called by the prosecution, acknowledged Clancy suffered from a serious mental illness on the day of the killings. As the New York Post reported, Reddington wrote in his filing:

"No rational jury could find beyond a reasonable doubt that she had no mental disease or defect when the Commonwealth's own proof established that she did."

Reddington also argued that the prosecution's strongest evidence, showing Clancy could perform familiar tasks and act in sequence, did not meet the legal bar. He wrote that such evidence "does not show that she could appreciate wrongfulness or conform her conduct to the law."

That motion addressed the sufficiency of the evidence. Weinberg's forthcoming motion will address a different constitutional question: whether the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment prevents the state from trying Clancy again after a jury that split 11-1 in her favor failed to deliver a formal verdict.

Weinberg tried the same play for Karen Read, and lost

Weinberg is no stranger to this argument. He mounted a nearly identical double jeopardy challenge on behalf of Karen Read after her 2024 trial ended without a verdict. In that case, a judge rejected Weinberg's motion, finding the jury never formally returned not-guilty verdicts and that Read's own attorneys had agreed to the mistrial.

The double jeopardy fight in Read's case continued through state and federal court before she was ultimately retried in 2025. Read was acquitted of second-degree murder, manslaughter, and leaving the scene of a deadly crash, but convicted of misdemeanor operating under the influence.

The Clancy case may present Weinberg with different facts to work with. Reddington has already raised the possibility that jurors' public statements about the 11-1 split could constitute what he called an "unannounced verdict", a finding that, if recognized by the court, could bar retrial entirely. Whether Sullivan or a higher court will accept that theory remains an open question.

The Clancy trial was contentious from the start, with the defense challenging proceedings at multiple points. Adding Weinberg, an attorney who has already tested the boundaries of double jeopardy law in a Massachusetts courtroom, signals the defense is prepared for a prolonged constitutional fight.

Sullivan moves to shield jurors from public exposure

While the legal maneuvering over retrial plays out, Sullivan has taken steps to protect the people who served on the jury. In a written order obtained by Fox News, the judge directed that the identities of all 12 jurors and six alternates remain private indefinitely.

Sullivan wrote that jurors had been identified without their permission and that at least one juror specifically asked for the protection to be extended with no end date. The judge cited the intense public attention the case has drawn, attention that has reached the highest levels of national politics.

"Based on the circumstances of this trial and the fact that the case continues to receive daily, divisive attention in Massachusetts and beyond, the Court concludes that there is a real and present 'risk of [personal] harm to the jurors [and] to the integrity of their service.'"

Sullivan also found "a risk of immediate and irreparable injury" if the juror list were made public. The order does not prevent jurors from identifying themselves or speaking with the media voluntarily, it simply bars the court from releasing their names.

In a separate order, Sullivan temporarily extended protection covering the names of the larger jury pool summoned from July 20 through July 24, keeping those names sealed for an additional 10 days due to the same safety concerns.

The unauthorized disclosure of juror information that prompted the order has not been explained in detail. But the judge's language makes clear he views the threat to jurors as real and ongoing, a sign of how deeply this case has divided the public. The broader cultural fallout has extended well beyond Massachusetts, with at least one unrelated criminal case drawing a direct connection to the Clancy proceedings.

Prosecutors stay silent as the defense builds its case

The prosecution has said nothing publicly about whether it will seek a second trial. That silence leaves Clancy's legal team to shape the narrative heading into the Sept. 29 hearing. With Reddington arguing the evidence was never sufficient to convict and Weinberg preparing to argue the Constitution forbids a do-over, the defense is pressing on two fronts simultaneously.

Three children are dead. The woman who killed them does not dispute that she did it. The only question left is whether the law holds her criminally responsible, and whether the state gets a second chance to make that case.

When 11 of 12 jurors already said no, the answer should not require a constitutional scholar to figure out. But in a system that increasingly struggles to deliver clear outcomes, that is exactly where this case has landed.