The Lindsay Clancy trial

The holdout juror has now spoken publicly for the first time, and his account contradicts his fellow jurors'. Michael P. Desronvil told NewsNation he never had doubts about the prosecution's case: 'I didn't have any doubts. As I tried to explain different possible theories during deliberation, I kept getting cut off as if I had doubts based on the evidence present,' saying the physical evidence and witnesses convinced him Clancy 'knew exactly what she was doing and planned' it. Other jurors had said after the mistrial that he appeared to acknowledge reasonable doubt yet still refused to join them in a not-guilty-by-reason-of-insanity verdict. He has since retained a former Trump lawyer, who has publicly called him an 'American Hero'; Judge Sullivan has ordered jurors' identities and questionnaires sealed, citing safety concerns after the high-profile mistrial. Plymouth County prosecutors are still weighing a retrial before Clancy's September 29 court date. Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley framed their dilemma as whether they could ever get a Massachusetts jury to unanimously reject the insanity defense, against the equally unappealing alternative of walking away from a case with three dead children. Defense attorney Kevin Reddington, who has signalled he will argue the circumstances of the mistrial should bar a second trial, has separately said that if prosecutors reduced the top charge to second-degree murder he would opt for a bench trial in the hope of probation. Judge Judy Sheindlin, asked by TMZ, said there was 'a danger' in not retrying the case - 'there's no question, my dear, that she killed her children. The only question is, is there an excuse for it?' - while calling Rep. Nancy Mace's public call for Clancy to be executed 'ridiculous.' In a new court appearance, Reddington pushed for outright dismissal of the murder case, criticized the police investigation as 'atrocious,' and raised doubts about who actually killed the children, while a public war of words broke out between him and the holdout juror's lawyer, who says his client is now planning a formal legal complaint against Reddington and insists Desronvil had a 'mountain of evidence' for his position. Clancy remains in custody at Tewksbury Hospital.