After Mistrial For Mom Who Killed Her 3 Kids, Strikingly Similar LA Case Returns To Court

LOS ANGELES, CA — As a Massachusetts jury struggled for seven days with whether Lindsay Clancy should be held criminally responsible for killing her three young children while suffering from what her attorney said was postpartum psychosis, a similar case in Los Angeles is back in court.

A judge in the Clancy murder case declared a mistrial on Sept. 4 after jurors failed to reach a verdict as a captivated nation watched. Clancy, a 36-year-old former labor and delivery nurse, strangled her three children — ages 5, 3 and 8 months — before trying to take her own life in 2023.

The case sparked national debate over maternal mental health around childbirth and draws parallels to the case of Liliana Carrillo, a Reseda mother who drowned her three young children in 2021 while suffering from severe mental illness.

Carrillo was found not guilty by reason of insanity in October 2024, after a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge reviewed reports from several doctors who evaluated her.

One psychologist found that Carrillo suffered from bipolar disorder with peripartum onset and post-traumatic stress disorder and concluded that the bipolar disorder left her unable to understand that killing her children was morally wrong, according to court papers.

Carrillo, now 36, is being treated at a state mental hospital. Her case is back before a judge because Erik Denton, the children's father, is seeking psychological records from Carrillo's criminal case as part of a civil lawsuit against the city and county of Los Angeles. His suit alleges his children died because county officials did not take his concerns about Carillo's mental health seriously. A hearing on the records dispute is scheduled for Monday.

'I Drowned Them'

The criminal case stemmed from the April 10, 2021, deaths of Carrillo's three children — 3-year-old Joanna, 2-year-old Terry and infant daughter Sierra — at a Reseda apartment. All three children were drowned, and Sierra also suffered a stab wound to the chest, according to testimony from a deputy medical examiner.

In a jailhouse interview following her arrest, Carrillo admitted to drowning the children, and said she believed they were being abused and sexually assaulted and feared they would continue to be harmed.

"I drowned them," Carrillo told KGET at the time. "I wasn't about to hand my children off to be further abused."

Carrillo also said she tried to kill herself after killing her children.

• See also: Mother Who Drowned Her 3 Children Ruled Insane By Judge

Clancy's Deteriorating Mental Health

While Carrillo and Clancy were not given the same diagnoses, both cases centered on whether severe mental illness associated with the period surrounding childbirth left the women criminally responsible for killing their children.

In Clancy's case, jurors heard 21 days of testimony about her deteriorating mental health after the birth of her youngest child.

Clancy experienced severe anxiety, difficulty sleeping and what she described as brain fog. She sought treatment from specialists in postpartum mood disorders, was prescribed multiple psychiatric medications and checked herself into a psychiatric hospital in early 2023. She killed her children 19 days after she was discharged, according to the testimony.

Her defense argued that she was suffering from postpartum psychosis, a rare mental illness that can occur after childbirth, and should therefore not be held criminally responsible.

Clancy has not disputed killing her children.

Prosecutors acknowledged that Clancy had severe mental illness but argued that she understood what she was doing and could control her actions. They pointed to evidence that she sent her husband out of the house to pick up medicine and dinner before strangling 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson and 8-month-old Callan with exercise bands.

Clancy later jumped from a second-story window and remains paralyzed from the waist down.

Jurors told the judge three times that they could not reach a unanimous decision before the mistrial was declared on the seventh day of deliberations. Clancy remains charged with murder and is expected to stay at a psychiatric hospital while prosecutors decide whether to try the case again.

• See also: Mistrial Stands In MA Mom Lindsay Clancy's Triple Murder Case

Carrillo's criminal case, by contrast, ended without a jury deciding the question. She withdrew her not-guilty plea and waived her right to a jury trial before a judge found her not guilty by reason of insanity based on the doctors' evaluations.

The circumstances leading up to the killings remain the subject of Denton's civil lawsuit. He claims Los Angeles police failed to take seriously signs that Carrillo's mental health was deteriorating and failed to share information with county social workers.

Material from City News Service and the Associated Press was used in this report.