Three children are dead and their mother is walking toward a deal that could mean probation.
Judge Judy Sheindlin watched the Lindsay Clancy mistrial and had one reaction.
And Judge Judy just issued a surprising warning to Plymouth County DA Tim Cruz about the Lindsay Clancy case.
What Judge Judy Actually Said
Sheindlin didn't mince words when TMZ caught her Thursday.
Asked whether prosecutors should retry Clancy, the 83-year-old gave the clearest answer anyone in the legal world has offered since the September 4th mistrial: "I think there's a danger in that, in not retrying."
She was also asked whether Clancy was guilty.
"There's no question, my dear, that she killed her children," Sheindlin said. "The only question is, is there an excuse for it?"
That question is the entire case.
Nobody disputes that Lindsay Clancy – a former labor and delivery nurse – strangled her three children with exercise bands in the basement of her Duxbury, Massachusetts, home in January 2023.
Cora was five. Dawson was three. Callan was eight months old.
Clancy's defense claims she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and heard voices commanding her to kill them.
The jury deadlocked 11-1 in favor of finding her not criminally responsible.
One juror held the line.
The Andrea Yates Blueprint
Here's what prosecutors in Plymouth County need to understand before they make their next decision.
They've been here before – and they lost.
In 2001, Andrea Yates drowned all five of her children in a bathtub in Houston and admitted it immediately.
She pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.
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A jury convicted her in 2002 and sentenced her to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 40 years.
Prosecutors celebrated.
Then an appeals court threw out the conviction, Yates got a retrial in 2006, and a new jury found her not guilty by reason of insanity.
She's been in a psychiatric facility ever since – no prison time.
That's the roadmap Clancy's defense attorney Kevin Reddington is following right now.
Reddington's first move is arguing that a retrial violates Clancy's double jeopardy protections – because the mistrial was declared over the defense's objection.
Legal experts say it's a long shot.
But Reddington doesn't need to win that motion.
He needs to run out the clock and wear down prosecutors until they blink.
The Plea Deal Nobody Wants to Talk About
Reddington has already told Fox News exactly what his fallback position looks like.
If DA Tim Cruz reduces the top charge to second-degree murder, Reddington would push for a bench trial – with the goal of Clancy receiving probation instead of prison time.
Not prison. Probation.
For strangling three children.
The court date is September 29, and Cruz's silence on retrying the case is its own answer.
Eleven jurors already voted to let her walk after six weeks of testimony and more than 80 witnesses.
The media has spent two years turning Lindsay Clancy into a victim of the healthcare system.
Reddington knows that, and he's not trying to win a legal motion – he's trying to make Cruz flinch.
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And if Cruz blinks, three murdered children get a plea deal while their father watches from the gallery.
Sheindlin called it a danger.
She's being polite.
If Cruz walks away from this case, he's not protecting a struggling system – he's telling every defense attorney in Massachusetts that the right diagnosis and a single sympathetic juror is all it takes to beat a murder charge.
Cora was five.
Dawson was three.
Callan was eight months old.
Someone in Plymouth County needs to remember that on September 29.
Sources:
- Michael Sinkewicz, "Judge Judy warns of 'danger' if prosecutors don't retry Lindsay Clancy after murder trial ends in mistrial," Fox News, September 18, 2026.
- Bryan Llenas and Brittany Miller, "Lindsay Clancy's lawyer reveals post-mistrial strategy as retrial looms," Fox News, September 10, 2026.
- "Jury Finds Andrea Yates Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity," Associated Press, July 26, 2006.