My Final Word on Lindsay Clancy

I am NOT a Lindsay Clancy apologist.

I am not seeking to defend Lindsay Clancy. I am simply seeking to discover the truth.

In fact, after writing three articles on this topic and discussing it with multitudes of people on social media, I do not want to talk about this case anymore.

But before I move on with far more important topics, I want to explain clearly how I got to my position—because I think some people have the impression that I began with sympathy or empathy for Lindsay Clancy and then went looking for philosophical reasons to excuse what she did.

The exact opposite is true!

Let's examine my reasons step by step.

1. I started by thinking Lindsay Clancy was a moral monster.

When I first learned what happened—that she strangled her three beautiful children—my reaction was visceral.

I said publicly that I was glad she was paralyzed. I thought she deserved the death penalty and then deserved to suffer in hell.

So, no, I did not begin this investigation looking for a way to defend Lindsay Clancy.

I began exactly where many of my conservative friends still are.

2. Then I learned more—and hit the pause button.

As I learned more about the case, I encountered evidence of serious deterioration before the killings: repeated attempts to get help, psychiatric treatment, medication changes and reported side effects, emergency care, voluntary hospitalization, and people around her observing that something was terribly wrong.

None of that proves she lacked sufficient rational capacity when she killed her children.

That's important, and I want to state it clearly. But it was enough to make me stop and reconsider my initial intuition.

I tried to do what I'm constantly telling FreeThinkers to do:

Be careful. Reexamine. Follow the evidence—even when it starts pulling you away from your initial intuition or the conclusion you want to reach.

3. I applied a principle I've been discussing for roughly a decade.

I didn't invent a new philosophy of moral responsibility in an attempt to get Lindsay Clancy off the hook.

I've long argued that full moral responsibility requires sufficient rational understanding and control. I've also discussed what philosophers call tracing: even if someone lacks those capacities at the moment of an action, responsibility may nevertheless trace back to an earlier culpable exercise of freedom.

The drunk driver is the obvious example.

Suppose someone freely chooses to become intoxicated and then drives. He may be profoundly impaired and have no control when he crashes, but his responsibility can trace back to his earlier rational and free decision to create that dangerous condition.

So I started asking:

Where is Lindsay's equivalent of freely choosing to get drunk and drive?

What I found instead was evidence—not proof—that she recognized something was going terribly wrong and fought against it.

That really got my attention.

Perhaps she fought imperfectly. But imperfectly fighting to remain rational is not the same thing as culpably choosing to become irrational like the drunk driver. Those are completely different scenarios.

That mattered to me.

4. Then I went back to Scripture.

As a Christian, philosophical coherence isn't enough for me.

If my reasoning conflicts with Scripture, my reasoning needs to change.

So I deliberately asked whether the Bible gives us reason to think that rational impairment, knowledge, and understanding can matter when assessing moral responsibility.

I considered the biblical distinctions surrounding different kinds of killing. I considered Jesus' teaching that knowledge affects degrees of responsibility (Luke 12:47–48). I considered Paul's appeal to ignorance when discussing his own culpability (1 Tim. 1:13).

I also considered biblical examples of people whose rational faculties were profoundly compromised and later restored. Nebuchadnezzar is particularly interesting. After a period of profound impairment, he says, “my reason returned to me” (Dan. 4:34, 36).

Likewise, after Jesus heals the demoniac, the man is specifically described as being in his “right mind” (Mark 5:15; Luke 8:35).

Now, let me be very clear: None of these passages proves that Lindsay Clancy lacked criminal responsibility. They aren't supposed to.

They simply convinced me that Scripture recognizes relevant categories involving knowledge, intention, rational capacity, and degrees of responsibility. I found no biblical reason to abandon the philosophical distinction I was making.

5. That's when Bucky Barnes came to mind.

Some people have misunderstood my thought experiments in my past articles regarding the Clancy case.

Bucky Barnes, the demoniac, the alien, the mad scientist—none of these examples is evidence or proof that Lindsay Clancy lacked rational capacity. They were intended to merely establish a philosophical point:

Planning, intentional action, bodily control, and even committing something objectively horrific do not logically entail full moral culpability.

Bucky's hands killed Tony Stark's parents. He could plan. He could act intentionally. He retained significant agency within the false framework that had been imposed upon him.

But once we know what happened to his rational faculties, our assessment of his culpability changes dramatically.

That establishes a conceptual possibility, but it does not establish what actually happened to Lindsay.

This distinction has become increasingly important to me throughout these discussions:

The philosophy tells us what we should be looking for. The evidence tells us whether Lindsay actually satisfies those conditions.

And that's where I've strived to become even more careful.

6. I do NOT know that Lindsay lacked sufficient rational capacity.

This is probably the most important clarification I can make after all these discussions.

The defense presented evidence suggesting profound impairment. The prosecution presented evidence suggesting that Lindsay retained significant rational capacities.

Experts disagreed.

Planning matters. Her behavior before and after matters. Her interactions with Patrick matter. Her treatment history matters. The testimony concerning her mental state matters. Evidence on both sides matters.

So, please hear me: I am not interested in speaking as though it were an established fact that: “Lindsay lost the fight.”

Maybe she did . . . but perhaps the prosecution's interpretation is ultimately correct. I don't know. And some of the people who have pushed back against me have helped me state that more carefully.

All I am willing to say at this point is that there is significant evidence (not proof) suggesting that Lindsay was suffering from profound psychosis, evidence that she recognized something was terribly wrong and fought against it, and reason to believe that her rational capacities may ultimately have been overwhelmed.

But that remains a rational inference from disputed evidence—not an established fact.

I do not know with certainty.

7. But then I have to apply the actual legal standard.

This is where my conclusion has ultimately landed.

The question in Massachusetts isn't whether Lindsay can prove beyond reasonable doubt that she lacked criminal responsibility.

Once lack of criminal responsibility is properly raised, like it or not, in Massachusetts the Commonwealth bears the burden of establishing criminal responsibility beyond reasonable doubt. And after examining the evidence I've seen: I am not convinced they did that.

That's a more modest conclusion than saying, “I know Lindsay was incapable of rational responsibility.”

I don't know that. What I'm saying is this:

Given the evidence, I cannot honestly and justifiably say that the Commonwealth established beyond reasonable doubt that Lindsay Clancy was criminally responsible—and the horror of what she did cannot fill that evidential gap.

That's where I currently stand.

I’m simply trying extremely hard to be honest, careful, and logical. Indeed, I am trying to bracket my emotions in both directions—my outrage over what Lindsay did to those three beautiful children and whatever sympathy I might naturally feel when I see a woman confined to a wheelchair.

Neither emotion tells me what is true.

I keep reminding myself of a simple principle: Facts don’t care about our feelings.

Neither outrage nor sympathy gets to determine a careful thinker's conclusion. Whatever emotions we experience, rational people must be willing to bracket them when evaluating the evidence and following an argument wherever it leads.

With that principle in place, if I had been sitting on the jury, examining the evidence presented and applying Massachusetts law as instructed, I would have voted not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility.

Not because I know with certainty that Lindsay lacked sufficient rational capacity. I don’t. I would have voted that way because I am not convinced the Commonwealth established her criminal responsibility beyond reasonable doubt.

That’s the law.

8. That does NOT mean “Free Lindsay!”

If Lindsay is not criminally responsible because of profound rational impairment, I am certainly not suggesting she should simply roll out of the courthouse and go home.

Indeed, there is an important distinction between retributive punishment and incapacitation for the protection of others. Someone who lacks sufficient culpability to deserve retributive punishment may nevertheless be extremely dangerous and require secure confinement.

So my position is not:

“Free Lindsay Clancy!”

It's closer to this:

If the Commonwealth cannot establish criminal responsibility beyond reasonable doubt, she belongs in secure psychiatric confinement rather than being punished in a state prison as though full criminal responsibility had been established.

9. And yes, evidence could change my mind.

This matters tremendously to me.

If compelling new evidence establishes that Lindsay sufficiently apprehended reality, understood that her children were innocent, appreciated the moral significance of killing them, possessed sufficient rational control, and nevertheless deliberately murdered them, then:

My conclusion changes.

Throw the freaking book at her!

That's what following the evidence requires.

10. Conclusion.

So here's where I'm leaving this . . .

Do I know that Lindsay Clancy lacked sufficient rational capacity when she killed her children?

No.

Do I believe the Commonwealth eliminated reasonable doubt about her criminal responsibility?

No.

Those are different claims that ought not be confused or conflated. And the objective horror of what she did cannot fill that evidential gap.

Given the limited information I had at the time, I believe my initial intuition was a rational and justified conclusion. Then I encountered evidence and then more evidence that I had not yet considered. Then I did exactly what I teach my students to do.

I hit the pause button.

I examined the case.

I applied philosophical principles I've defended for years.

I searched Scripture to see whether those principles survived biblical scrutiny.

I considered objections and defeaters.

I reexamined the case.

I argued with many whom I respect and allowed them to stress-test my reasoning.

And some of my iron-sharpening critics forced me to sharpen my claims and become more epistemically modest about what the evidence actually establishes (Prov. 27:17).

That's exactly what should happen. That's part of what it means to “reason together” (Isa. 1:18).

If careful reasoning never has the power to make us reconsider our initial reactions, then I'm not sure we're reasoning at all. We're just rationalizing our intuitions.

I'm not interested in arriving at the liberal answer. I'm not interested in arriving at the conservative answer. I'm only interested in arriving at the justified answer.

Ultimately, I want my beliefs to be true. But I don't always have infallible access to truth. What I can do is reason carefully, examine the evidence, consider potential defeaters, and seek the most justified belief available to me.

And sometimes the most justified answer is simply:

“I don't know—but I don't think you've established that beyond reasonable doubt.”

That's not being a Lindsay Clancy apologist; that's simply being a FreeThinker.

And with that, unless something extraordinary happens, I'm officially retiring from Lindsay Clancy commentary.

I've written far more about this case than I ever intended. I've learned some things. I've refined some arguments. And I've even changed how carefully I state my own conclusion.

Thank you to everyone who challenged me thoughtfully—especially those who caused me to sharpen or modify my position. But I am officially done discussing the Lindsay Clancy case.

Stay reasonable (James 3:17),

Dr. Tim Stratton