Fox News Panel Gobsmacked by Lindsay Clancy Case Drama: ‘Perfectly Bonkers’

A Fox News panel reacted with shock to the breaking news Friday that the judge in the Lindsay Clancy trial had ordered a mistrial before pausing his ruling and giving the defense an hour to appeal his decision — calling it a “perfectly bonkers” conclusion to an already sensationalized case.

Clancy, 36, had previously admitted in a civil case to strangling to death her three children (Cora, 5, Dawson, 3, and Callan, 8 months) in January 2023 before attempting to commit suicide. She was charged with three counts of murder. Her defense team, lead by Kevin Reddington, argued she was suffering from postpartum psychosis and bipolar disorder and was therefore not criminally responsible for the children’s deaths due to reason of insanity.

The case has garnered international media attention and fervent online debates about mental health, maternal and postpartum care, and related issues.

On Friday, after more than six days of deliberations, the jury sent the latest of a series of notes to the judge expressing their “deepest regrets” at being unable to reach a verdict, Judge William Sullivan said he intended to declare a mistrial but, in response to a motion from Reddington, granted a stay for one hour to allow the defense to appeal.

Fox News carried the judge’s mistrial and stay live and then came back to the studio for the panel’s reactions, which were universally stunned.

Donna Rotunno, a criminal defense attorney reporting from the Massachusetts courthouse, called the mistrial and stay “an unprecedented move.”

“We have not seen anything like this, and this is really very, very interesting,” said Rotunno.

“Wow,” responded anchor Julie Banderas. “My jaw was dropping the entire time.”

“No, we did not expect any of this,” Rotunno agreed. “Julie, in all of our conversations about this, this we did not expect. We thought it was going one way, and then Kevin Reddington said ‘I think I would like to appeal this ruling, I need a stay,’ but the practical side of that becomes very difficult, because what happens? You just leave this jury out wondering, what’s going on? So if the judge decides that the appellate court is going to give him that stay, then the judge has no other option — the trial judge has no other option, because if the appellate court says yes, we’re going to hear this, then the judge’s hands here are tied, and he has to wait to see what the appellate court is going to do, and then how do you even advise this jury, you just say “Come back on Tuesday”? and then how do they not hear all of this going on, and they know that this is a subject now of a direct appeal.”

“Jillian, this is something,” Rotunno said before quickly correcting herself and attributing the name flub to her shock at the courtroom events. “I apologize, Julie, I apologize, I keep saying Jillian — Julie, I’m out of my mind here today — Julie.”

“We’re all a little bit out of our minds,” Banderas replied.

Banderas commented that Reddington had “pulled a magic hat out of his back” and “nobody saw this coming,” repeating Rotunno’s comment that this was “unprecedented.”

She asked Josh Ritter, another criminal defense attorney reporting live on the scene with Rotunno, if he thought there was any chance Reddington could convince the appellate court to let him select an alternate juror to replace the lone holdout.

Ritter was skeptical that could happen, calling Reddington “obviously desperate and understandably so,” because he was “watching an 11-to-1, what he believes in his favor, jury walk out the door.”

“I don’t begrudge him that, but this is desperate,” Ritter added. “I think it’s a stall tactic, and some last Hail Mary attempt to do anything but declare a mistrial here.”

However, Ritter continued, the appellate court was likely to simply view this as a mistrial and that would lead to a new trial, so “from Kevin Reddington’s perspective, he’s walking away from what he thought was near victory,” but he doubted the defense would prevail in this motion.

Fox News contributor and constitutional law attorney Jonathan Turley weighed in, declaring, “Well, first of all, this is perfectly bonkers.”

“Ha, yeah, good word,” Banderas laughed.

Turley was similarly skeptical as the previous attorneys that the court would grant the defense the requested relief, although he understood the “frustration,” “if you’re one number off from the Powerball lottery ticket, you still don’t have a winning ticket, it may be 11-1, but that is still a mistrial.”

Even a jury that was 11-1 in his favor, “means that this case, is dead as Dillinger, and that’s going to be the result, and there’s no appellate court that I know of that will say any different.”

“The reference to the Disability Act was absolutely bizarre,” Turley added. “I can’t imagine how you’re even going to articulate a theory like that, and you have to be real darn careful, because that’s bordering in my view on the frivolous, so I don’t know what the heck he’s going to file in front of that appellate judge, but I expect it’s going to have a half-life measured in seconds.”

Fox News chief legal correspondent  Shannon Bream concurred with her colleagues, agreeing with Banderas’ comment that this was a “desperate attempt” that would not succeed with the appellate court.

The motion was a “Hail Mary,” said Bream, and “sounds like a long shot,” especially with the very short one-hour time frame the trial judge granted.

Watch the clip above via Fox News.

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