Latest / Murder Files Unsealed / Wellesley Mother Accused of Killing Two Children: Lawyer Says, “This Is Not Lindsay Clancy 2.0”

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Wellesley Mother Accused of Killing Two Children: Lawyer Says, “This Is Not Lindsay Clancy 2.0” · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: If someone walks into a police station and says, I
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: strangled my children to send us all to God, do
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: you have a confession to a murder or like a
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: symptom of a disease? Right.
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: I mean, that is the ultimate question here. Usually the
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: justice system requires a binary answer.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Exactly. You're either a calculated killer who belongs in a
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  Speaker 1: penitentiary or, you know, you're a severely ill patient who
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: belongs in a psychiatric facility.
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the law is literally designed to demand that distinction.
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  Speaker 2: It doesn't do well with gray areas.
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  Speaker 1: It really doesn't. But right now, we're looking at this
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  Speaker 1: highly specific case in Massachusetts that is basically proving that
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  Speaker 1: justice system's diagnostic machinery is just fundamentally broken. Oh, absolutely.
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  Speaker 2: What we're analyzing today is this massive collision between human tragedy,
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  Speaker 2: forensic science, and, quite frankly, the shifting psychology of the
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: American jury.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and we are basing this deep dive— on a
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  Speaker 1: really dense single source. It's a CBS Boston News report
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  Speaker 1: from September 10th, 2026 by a reporter named Neil Riley. Right.
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  Speaker 2: And it's a heavy, incredibly complex subject.
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  Speaker 1: It really is. So the mission of our deep dive
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  Speaker 1: today is to understand how one high profile legal mistrial
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  Speaker 1: is sending shockwaves through the entire justice system.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. Like actively altering the defense strategies and other tragic
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  Speaker 2: high stakes cases in real time.
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  Speaker 1: Exactly. OK, let's unpack this. Who is the central figure
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  Speaker 1: we're talking about today?
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  Speaker 2: So the central figure in this CBS report is Jeanette McCausland.
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  Speaker 2: She's a 49 year old mother from Wellesley, Massachusetts.
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  Speaker 1: OK, Wesley.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. And she is currently facing first degree murder charges
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  Speaker 2: for the deaths of her two children, her six year
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  Speaker 2: old daughter, Ella, and her seven year old son, Kai.
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  Speaker 1: And right here, I just want to pause and make
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  Speaker 1: something crystal clear to everyone listening. You know, our objective
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  Speaker 1: with this deep dive isn't to play armchair detective.
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  Speaker 2: No, not at all.
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  Speaker 1: Right, or to pass any sort of moral or legal judgment.
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  Speaker 1: We are not taking sides here.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. We are just impartially analyzing the factual reporting, the
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: legal maneuvers being presented, and the broader societal questions this raises.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, we're just looking at how this legal defense is evolving.
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  Speaker 1: So let's get into the timeline. When did this actually happen?
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  Speaker 2: The incident itself took place in April at the family's
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  Speaker 2: home on Edgemore Avenue.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, April. But the context for this goes back Much further, right?
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  Speaker 2: Right. The contextual backdrop the article mentions is crucial. McCausland
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  Speaker 2: was embroiled in this really intense custody battle with her husband, Samuel.
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  Speaker 1: And he filed for divorce when?
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  Speaker 2: He filed the previous October. So you have this six-month
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  Speaker 2: window of a highly contentious divorce leading up to April.
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  Speaker 1: Wow. Okay. So a six-month custody dispute. From a prosecutorial standpoint,
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  Speaker 1: that's huge, right?
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  Speaker 2: Oh, it's everything. Because the state has to prove malice
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  Speaker 2: aforethought for first-degree murder. They look at that six month
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  Speaker 2: window and see a textbook motive.
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  Speaker 1: Like retaliation or control.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. But the defense looks at that exact same window
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  Speaker 2: and argues it's a timeline of like acute psychological decompensation.
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  Speaker 1: A complete unraveling.
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  Speaker 2: Right. They'll say the stress of the divorce triggered a
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  Speaker 2: psychotic break. It's the exact same evidence just used for
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  Speaker 2: two totally different narratives.
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  Speaker 1: Which brings us to the immediate aftermath of what happened
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  Speaker 1: on Edgemore Avenue in April. Because the details here are
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  Speaker 1: just incredibly chilling.
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  Speaker 2: They really are. After the incident, McCausland actually fled the jurisdiction.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, she drove north across state lines, right? To her
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  Speaker 1: aunt's house in Vermont.
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  Speaker 2: Yes. And when she arrived, the physical evidence was striking.
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  Speaker 2: The report notes she had dried blood on her neck
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  Speaker 2: from a large cut.
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  Speaker 1: A large cut, which suggests some sort of self-inflicted injury.
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  Speaker 1: But she also allegedly confessed to her aunt as soon
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  Speaker 1: as she got there.
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  Speaker 2: She did. She reportedly told her aunt, and I quote,
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  Speaker 2: I wanted the three of us to go to God together,
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  Speaker 2: but it didn't work.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, that is just, wow. But then there's another confession, right?
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  Speaker 1: To the police.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, according to the police affidavit, her statement to law
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  Speaker 2: enforcement was completely different. She allegedly told them, I strangled
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  Speaker 2: them and then I tried to kill myself.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, see, this is where my head starts spinning. It
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  Speaker 1: feels like we're looking at a shattered mirror here.
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  Speaker 2: That's a good way to put it.
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  Speaker 1: Because the pieces, you know, the divorce, the custody battle,
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  Speaker 1: The explicit confession to police, they don't reflect a rational reality,
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  Speaker 1: but a fundamentally broken one.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, how does law enforcement handle a confession that
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  Speaker 1: is technically so clear, like I strangled them, but thematically
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  Speaker 1: so irrational, like go to God together?
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  Speaker 2: Well, what's fascinating here is the immediate tension between the
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  Speaker 2: factual admission of the act and the mental state required
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  Speaker 2: for legal action.
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  Speaker 1: The intent.
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  Speaker 2: Right. In law, you have the actus reus, the guilty act,
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  Speaker 2: which her police statement covers perfectly. But the mens rea,
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  Speaker 2: the guilty mind, is completely muddled by that statement to
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  Speaker 2: her aunt.
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  Speaker 1: Because wanting to go to God together doesn't sound like malice.
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  Speaker 1: It sounds like a delusion.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. And navigating that delusion in front of a jury
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  Speaker 2: is incredibly risky, which sets up the entire strategy her
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  Speaker 2: defense attorney is using.
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  Speaker 1: Right. The defense attorney, Joseph Krausky Jr., and he is
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  Speaker 1: making headlines because of this specific legal argument he's using.
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  Speaker 1: to urge prosecutors to rethink these first-degree murder charges.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, and this is the pivot point of the whole case.
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  Speaker 2: Krioski is explicitly invoking the recent Lindsay Clancy mistrial.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, for you listening who might not remember, Lindsay Clancy
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  Speaker 1: was another Massachusetts mother accused of killing her children, and
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  Speaker 1: her trial ended in a hung jury, effectively a mistrial. Right.
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  Speaker 2: And the specifics of that hung jury are really important.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. The CBS report notes that jurors revealed a single
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  Speaker 1: male juror refused to find Clancy not guilty by reason
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  Speaker 1: of insanity. That is just one guy.
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  Speaker 2: One single holdout. The defense in that case centered heavily
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  Speaker 2: on severe postpartum psychosis. Eleven jurors accepted the medical explanation.
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  Speaker 2: One held out for a criminal conviction.
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  Speaker 1: And that single holdout completely stalled the system. But the
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  Speaker 1: Clancy case wasn't just a local story. It was massive.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, it was a total national phenomenon. The source text
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  Speaker 2: embeds these wild headlines just to show the scale of it.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, like Clancy's attorney actually asking President Trump for a pardon. Which, again,
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  Speaker 1: we are not getting into the politics of that. We're
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  Speaker 1: just reporting what's in the text to show how high
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  Speaker 1: profile this got.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. And on the flip side, you had Patrick Clancy's lawyer,
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  Speaker 2: the husband's lawyer, threatening to sue conspiracy theorists.
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  Speaker 1: Which just shows the extreme public and political volatility surrounding
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  Speaker 1: these cases. A maternal filicide and mental illness.
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  Speaker 2: It's a complete media circus.
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  Speaker 1: Right. So here's where it gets really interesting. This is
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  Speaker 1: like a high stakes chess match where the board has
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  Speaker 1: suddenly changed overnight.
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  Speaker 2: Oh, totally.
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  Speaker 1: Because Kowalski isn't just defending his client on the facts.
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  Speaker 1: He's like weaponizing the public doubt from the Clancy mistrial
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  Speaker 1: to shield McCausland.
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  Speaker 2: Yes.
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  Speaker 1: So I have to ask, is it common for lawyers
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  Speaker 1: to use the public sentiment of a completely different case
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  Speaker 1: To influence the pretrial phases of another.
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  Speaker 2: It's an aggressive tactic, for sure. Krawski is basically trying
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  Speaker 2: to force a paradigm shift. He is cautiously optimistic, according
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  Speaker 2: to the report, that prosecutors will take a second look.
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  Speaker 1: Because they don't want another media circus.
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  Speaker 2: Right. Krawski talks about this opening of a national discourse
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  Speaker 2: on whether we, as a society, want to criminalize mental illness.
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  Speaker 2: He is trying to change the entire vocabulary of the
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  Speaker 2: case before a jury is even seated. But.
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  Speaker 1: There is a huge apparent contradiction in this strategy, isn't there?
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  Speaker 2: Huge.
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  Speaker 1: Because Krausky is aggressively leveraging the Clancy mistrial. But at
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  Speaker 1: the exact same time, he is explicitly saying to the press,
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  Speaker 1: this is not Lindsay Clancy 2.0. Jeanette McCausland is her
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  Speaker 1: own woman.
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  Speaker 2: Right. He has to create that strategic separation. And the
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  Speaker 2: reason for that comes down to the medical and circumstantial
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  Speaker 2: differences between the two women.
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  Speaker 1: Which are pretty significant.
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  Speaker 2: Very.
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  Speaker 1: Very.
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  Speaker 2: In the Clancy case, the entire defense was built on
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  Speaker 2: postpartum psychosis. It's a very specific biological trigger following childbirth.
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  Speaker 1: But McCausland's children were older. Ella was six and Kai
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: was seven.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. So Krauske publicly admits this is not a postpartum situation, right? Right.
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  Speaker 1: So he wants the legal leeway that the postpartum defense
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  Speaker 1: created in the public eye, but he doesn't actually have
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  Speaker 1: that diagnosis for his client.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. And he's playing it very close to the vest.
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  Speaker 2: He says, until I get all of the information... I'm
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  Speaker 2: not prepared to say anything about any potential defenses, but
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  Speaker 2: everything is on the table.
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  Speaker 1: Everything is on the table. Isn't this kind of a
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  Speaker 1: having your cake and eating it too strategy?
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  Speaker 2: It's a massive legal tightrope walk.
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  Speaker 1: Right. Because he wants the public sympathy. Yeah. And he
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  Speaker 1: wants the prosecutorial hesitation that the postpartum psychosis defense generated
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  Speaker 1: in the Clancy case.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: But he wants all of that without actually having that
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  Speaker 1: specific medical diagnosis to rely on.
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  Speaker 2: Well, if we connect this to the bigger picture, this
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  Speaker 2: is what defense attorneys have to do when the diagnosis
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  Speaker 2: doesn't perfectly fit a known narrative. They have to anchor
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  Speaker 2: their clients to a broader history of mental illness.
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  Speaker 1: Which Kroski claims McCausland has.
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  Speaker 2: Right. He claims she has a documented history. The defense's
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  Speaker 2: goal here is to broaden the protective umbrella of the
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  Speaker 2: Clancy mistrial to cover older child maternal filicide.
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  Speaker 1: Basically saying psychosis is psychosis, regardless of whether it's postpartum
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  Speaker 1: or not.
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  Speaker 2: Precisely. And that brings us to the current legal status,
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  Speaker 2: which is, frankly, in complete limbo.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Let's talk about where things stand right now in
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  Speaker 1: Dedham District Court, because the proceedings are totally delayed.
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  Speaker 2: They are. The judge actually denied Krowski's requests to either
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  Speaker 2: dismiss the charges entirely or to set bail.
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  Speaker 1: So she's still in custody.
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  Speaker 2: Yes. And the next court date isn't set until October 29.
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  Speaker 1: But the reason for the delay is what really caught
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  Speaker 1: my eye in the CBS report. Despite the fact that
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  Speaker 1: McCausland literally told the police, I strangled them, the medical
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  Speaker 1: examiner has yet to officially determine the cause and manner
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  Speaker 1: of death for Ella and Kai.
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  Speaker 2: Which is such a critical point. It highlights the difference
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  Speaker 2: between an investigative confession and forensic proof.
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  Speaker 1: Because a confession isn't enough on its own.
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  Speaker 2: No, the state has to prove independently through empirical evidence
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  Speaker 2: that the crime occurred the way she said it did.
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  Speaker 2: What if she was delusional and the kids died of
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  Speaker 2: something else entirely? Oh, wow.
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  Speaker 1: I hadn't even thought of that. So the medical examiner
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  Speaker 1: has to rule out everything else.
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  Speaker 2: Everything. Toxicology, environmental factors, everything. The ME's office operates completely
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  Speaker 2: independent of the police narrative.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Which is why the science is taking so long while
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: the legal PR battle is moving at lightning speed.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. And that PR battle is squarely aimed at the
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  Speaker 2: district attorneys.
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  Speaker 1: Right. Krauske is making this direct appeal to the prosecutors.
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  Speaker 1: specifically the outgoing Norfolk County District Attorney Michael Morrissey and
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  Speaker 1: whoever his successor is going to be.
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  Speaker 2: He's putting immense pressure on them.
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  Speaker 1: He really is. Let me read this quote from Krauske
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  Speaker 1: because it's powerful. He says, Notice the language there.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: Involved or associated with a horrific tragedy. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: He completely strips away the language of murder or intent.
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  Speaker 2: He frames it entirely as a medical tragedy, not a
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  Speaker 2: criminal act.
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  Speaker 1: But so what does this all actually mean in practice?
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  Speaker 1: Because the justice system is essentially this massive machine programmed
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: to process crimes with charges and sentences.
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  Speaker 2: Right. It's a punitive machine.
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  Speaker 1: It's not designed to process psychiatric crises. So how can
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  Speaker 1: a district attorney whose literal job is to advocate for
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: the victims in this case two young children, how can
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  Speaker 1: they lawfully just step back from that default position of
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: seeking maximum prosecution?
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: While this raises an important question about prosecutorial discretion, district
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  Speaker 2: attorneys have massive power to decide what charges to bring.
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  Speaker 1: So they don't have to charge first-degree murder? No, they don't.
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  Speaker 2: But historically, the safest political move was to charge maximally
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  Speaker 2: and let the jury figure it out.
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  Speaker 1: But Krosky is warning them that the public is changing.
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  Speaker 1: He actually says district attorneys nationwide have to start taking
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  Speaker 1: note because the public is taking note.
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  Speaker 2: And that is the crux of it. The public makes
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  Speaker 2: up the jury pools. The Clancy mistrial proved that juries
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: are no longer a guaranteed conviction in these severe mental
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: illness cases.
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  Speaker 1: The jury pools ultimately dictate the prosecutorial power.
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  Speaker 2: Exactly. If a DA knows a jury might hang, they
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: have to calculate the political and financial cost of a
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: mistrial before they even bring the charges.
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  Speaker 1: Man, the complexity of this situation is just incredible. We
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: have this utterly tragic loss of two young children.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's devastating.
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  Speaker 1: We have a clear verbal confession to the act. And
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  Speaker 1: yet we have a legal system that is being forced
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: to evolve in real time simply because the shifting sands
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: of public opinion on mental health are completely destabilizing the
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  Speaker 1: old rules.
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  Speaker 2: It's a real-time stress test of the American legal framework.
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  Speaker 1: It really is. And for you listening, this is the
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: biggest takeaway. When these attorneys talk about the public taking note,
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: They are literally talking about you. Absolutely. You are the
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: potential jury pool. You are the voters who elect these
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: district attorneys. It is society that ultimately decides where the
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: line between criminality and mental illness is actually drawn. The
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: laws are just ink on paper until a jury interprets them.
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  Speaker 2: Which leaves us with a pretty wild thought to look
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  Speaker 2: forward to. Think about this. If high profile mistrials like
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: the Clancy case are proving that modern juries are deeply
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: hesitant to convict in cases involving severe mental illness.
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: How is this going to shift the way prosecutors silently
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: filter and charge all L crimes before they ever even
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: see the inside of a courtroom?
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: Oh, wow. Because they'll be terrified of a mistrial.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Exactly. If the threat of a hung jury becomes
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: the new normal, does the definition of criminal responsibility effectively
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: change in this country without a single law ever actually
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: being rewritten?
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: That is, I mean, that's a massive shift in how
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: justice operates. It's happening completely under the radar.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: Completely. And October 29th in Dedham District Court is going
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: to be the next big indicator of just how far
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: that shift has gone.