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I realize this isn’t a top quality post, so I accept the judgement of the mods, but a mistrial has been declared in the case of Lindsay Clancy. Shes the woman in Massachusetts who admitted to killing her kids, but claims she was suffering from postpartum psychosis.
The jury deliberated for seven days. Apparently, it came down to one male juror holding out against the other (nine female, two male) jurors. The belief is that he wanted to vote guilty. The jury reported to the judge that the holdout refused to follow the law regarding reasonable doubt, and the defense tried to have him removed. The judge refused. This morning, the judge declared a mistrial but gave defense one hour to get a stay from the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.
Predictably, the online discourse is off the walls. X lifts the holdout up as a hero, while Reddit believes he (we know it’s a male because the defense said so) is an MRA/red piller and needs to have his phone searched.
Personally, I think she’s guilty of premeditated, cold blooded murder. That said, I get the postpartum argument, but am horrified by the defense of her and holding her up as some kind of hero.
Here is another example of what happens with troubled postpartum mothers.
Context: this woman was posting on a facebook group for mothers of babies born on a certain month, meant to connect over pregnancy and early childhood issues day-after-day
Her partner was murdered by their roommate while attempting to evict him, shortly after birth.
From their living situation, it doesn't seem that they had much family help.
From these horrible circumstances, she felt unwell, and she did what she thought she was supposed to do in these circumstances, and went to a hospital.
Upon learning of the mental condition of that woman, the healthcare workers decided that she was to be kept in a room for 24h under the watch of a minder. To prevent any harm to herself and to the hospital's insurance policy.
Meanwhile, the struggling infant was taken care of by other healthcare workers, fed formula instead of breastmilk, as best as they could do probably.
In my opinion, that whole hospital experience did not really help her mental state or actual circumstances. It probably deterred her from seeking further help through that venue.
I don't know if there is any reasonable way for government workers to help parents in such circumstances. The problem is that our entire society is structured around 'trusting' only credentialed people with certain basic care tasks, and having enormous liability like the sword of Damocles hanging over their head.
I mean if they'd let her have her baby during the observation period it might have been better, no? Like at least she wouldn't be worrying about the nurses being incapable.
If the hospital deemed her at risk of hurting herself or others, the logic was to also prevent her from hurting the baby. If there is a genuine belief that a person could get a sudden bout of insanity that drives them to random violence, it'd be negligent to let them in the same room as an infant, as they would necessarily want to hold/feed them.
It's a complicated situation, best solved by having trusted, caring and competent family members around that allow the mother to rest if needed.
The protocols that healthcare professionals have to follow to limit risk/liability are at odds with what postpartum mothers need, and there really is no way around that.
Especially when criminal mothers are prone to drag said professionals to court for failing to rescue their children from them. The outcome of this show trial is definitely not for healthcare systems to relax their policies around postpartum care.
I would wager that there is a connection between the learned callousness of healthcare workers and female murderers. Lindsay was one, and there is a number of other famous example of killing nurses. Perhaps because in the course of their training they learn how fragile human life actually is, and perhaps because routinely encountering death desensitizes them to its solemnity.
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