Patrick Clancy has revealed that he suffered a severe panic attack and required medical attention while delivering emotionally grueling testimony at his former wife Lindsay Clancy’s trial.
In an interview with 60 Minutes, the father of three discussed the devastating deaths of his children—five-year-old Cora, three-year-old Dawson and eight-month-old Callan—along with the personal toll of testifying in their mother’s case.
Patrick was a central witness in the prosecution, which ended in a mistrial earlier this month. He described Lindsay’s worsening mental health and recounted the moment he returned home to discover that his children had died.
During hours of testimony, Our News Outlet watched the 38-year-old struggle to hold back his emotions. He trembled, took deep breaths and wiped away tears while revisiting the traumatic events of January 2023.
Speaking publicly about the experience for the first time, Patrick told 60 Minutes that he suffered what he called a “massive, traumatic panic attack” during a recess at Plymouth County Superior Court in Massachusetts.
“We did take a break right before they played the 911 call, which I knew was going to be just horrific,” he said.
“And I went to a back room, and I started having this massive, traumatic panic attack. My heart was pounding.”
Patrick said emergency responders placed him in an ambulance and offered him medication. He declined, telling them he wanted to return to court and complete his testimony.
“I said, ‘I don’t want it because I want to go back and I want to finish this so I can be done with this,’” he recalled. “And I went back and I finished the testimony.”
At the courthouse that day, Our News Outlet saw emergency personnel enter a room beside the courtroom during the recess. Dispatch audio indicated that a juror was experiencing a panic attack.
When the proceedings resumed, the jurors returned to the courtroom, but Patrick did not. His testimony was temporarily suspended while two short witnesses testified. He came back several hours later.
In the emotional interview, his first since the mistrial was declared, Patrick spoke about his mental health struggles after the killings. He also discussed his hopes for the future, including building a life and starting a family with his new wife, Dr. Rachel Danis.
Patrick Clancy spoke with 60 Minutes in his first interview since Lindsay Clancy’s case ended in a controversial mistrial
Patrick Clancy pictured with Cora, Dawson and baby Callan before the January 2023 killings
The case drew national attention when Lindsay Clancy went on trial this July, facing three counts of first-degree murder.
The 36-year-old labor and delivery nurse had sent Patrick away from their home in the affluent Massachusetts suburb of Duxbury on the evening of January 24, 2023. He was asked to pick up medication from CVS and collect a takeout order from a nearby restaurant.
While he was out, prosecutors said Lindsay strangled the children with exercise bands in the basement.
She then attempted to take her own life by cutting her wrists and neck before jumping from a second-floor bedroom window.
Cora and Dawson were pronounced dead that night, while Callan was still showing signs of life.
The infant survived for four more days before dying in Patrick’s arms.
‘I’m so grateful for those four days that I had with him. And I’m so grateful he hung on,’ Patrick told 60 Minutes.
Clancy survived but was left paralyzed from the waist down.
The mom-of-three never denied killing her children but pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, saying she was suffering from severe postpartum depression and psychosis at the time.
Her six-week trial in Plymouth, Massachusetts, sparked a national conversation about postpartum mental illness and criminal responsibility – quickly capturing attention all across the globe.
Ultimately, after seven days of deliberations, a mistrial was declared on September 4 after the 12 jurors failed to reach a unanimous verdict.
In an unprecedented move, it emerged during deliberations that a lone male holdout – since identified as Michael P Desronvil – was refusing to join the other 11 in finding her not guilty by reason of insanity.
Several jurors have since spoken out to accuse him of showing reasonable doubt but refusing to apply it to the law. Desronvil has hired an attorney and released a statement pushing back on their claims, saying he believed Clancy ‘knew exactly what she was doing.’
Patrick Clancy suffered a panic attack at the courthouse as he gave testimony in his ex-wife Lindsay Clancy’s trial
Lindsay Clancy stood trial in July in Plymouth, Massachusetts, for the January 2023 killings of her children
READ MORE: LINDSAY CLANCY COVERAGE
Speaking to 60 Minutes, Patrick revealed that he became suicidal in the aftermath of his children’s deaths.
For the father-of-three, who found his children’s bodies in the basement of their suburban home, his life suddenly had ‘no purpose.’
‘There was no family routine, no bedtime stories, no purpose. Everything just came to a screeching halt,’ he said, his eyes welling up with tears.
‘And then there was a day where, really without thinking, I drove by their school, and it was at the exact time that all of their friends were getting dropped off, and I just couldn’t be there anymore.’
The grief-stricken father, 38, revealed that he began to suffer from suicidal thoughts and didn’t care if he didn’t make it to his next birthday.
‘There was a time where I didn’t think I would live to see my 35th birthday, and I was completely fine with it,’ he said.
Patrick testified how Clancy had asked him to go to collect a takeout order and medicine that evening.
He returned home to find the house ‘really quiet’ before discovering his wife lying injured in the back yard.
In one of the most harrowing moments of the trial, jurors heard Patrick’s gut-wrenching 911 call capturing the moment that he found the bodies of his children in the basement.
Cora, five, Dawson, three, and eight-month-old Callan were strangled at the family home in January 2023
Patrick Clancy told 60 Minutes that he felt suicidal after his children’s deaths in January 2023
Patrick’s primal, unearthly screams could be heard in the call before he cried out: ‘She killed the kids!’
The call has not been publicly released with only the jurors and a small handful of members of the public and reporters inside the courtroom that day, including Our News Outlet, hearing it.
In the absence of its release – and claims that Patrick appeared stoic on the stand when viewed through the livestream – the grieving father faced a slew of vile conspiracies and rumors online.
His testimony was picked apart by internet sleuths with some going as far as to accuse him of possible involvement in his children’s deaths.
Patrick told 60 Minutes correspondent Ross Douthat that the rampant conspiracies are ‘painful’ and a ‘huge distraction’ from the issues at the heart of the tragedy.
‘It’s deeply harmful to the legacy of my children. It is a huge distraction from what really matters here, which is perinatal mental health. And it’s done real harm to real people, myself included but also others,’ he said.
‘It’s painful to see. And it makes it difficult to be in public and it’s possible that some of those people after seeing lie after lie after lie, they start to believe it and that’s what we’re left with.’
The 38-year-old’s attorney has since issued a legal warning to conspiracy theorists that ‘this spread of blatant and baseless falsehoods must stop’ or ‘there will be consequences.’
Patrick told 60 Minutes that he had spoken with postpartum mental illness experts and psychiatrists since the tragedy to learn what had taken place.
At the time of Clancy’s spiraling mental health, Patrick said he didn’t know anything about postpartum mental illness.
Patrick Clancy and his new wife, Dr Rachel Danis, met while running in Central Park, she has revealed to 60 Minutes
He recalled noticing a big change in Clancy’s mental health around fall 2022.
‘She went a few nights without sleeping,’ he said. ‘She came downstairs one morning and she said, “I didn’t sleep at all last night.”‘
Her mental health deteriorated further in December before she entered a psychiatric hospital for five days from New Year’s Day 2023. Just 17 days after she was discharged, Clancy killed the children.
Patrick said he now realizes there are ‘things that I didn’t see.’
When asked if he was angry with himself or felt like he had failed in some way, Patrick told correspondent Ross Douthat: ‘I think I did the best I could with what I had at the time, and I live with the outcome. I live with it every day, but I think I did the best I could.’
For Patrick, a move away from Duxbury to New York City in April 2023 – three months after the killings – was the start of him rebuilding his life, he told 60 Minutes.
Five weeks later, on May 26, it was what should have been Callan’s first birthday.
‘How do you celebrate your son’s first birthday months after he’s passed away?’ he said, choking up with emotion.
‘And so I go to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. I light a candle, and I say, “I love you, buddy.” And I walk out on Fifth Avenue and I start crying my eyes out. And nobody cared.’
The following January, he met Dr Rachel Danis at a run club in Manhattan’s Central Park.
Our News Outlet exclusively revealed in July that the couple wed this April in an intimate ceremony at the historic Ladies Pavilion overlooking Central Park’s lake before celebrating with family and friends at Sarabeth’s restaurant.
Patrick with Cora. He returned home to find his wife lying injured in the back yard and his children dead
Joining Patrick in the 60 Minutes interview, Rachel said that she tries to ‘take some of the weight’ from her husband’s grief.
The couple also revealed that they are starting a family together and ‘can’t wait to tell [their children’ about their brothers and sister.’
While Patrick tries to rebuild his life, Clancy’s criminal case now hangs in the balance after the mistrial was declared earlier this month.
Plymouth County District Attorney Tim Cruz is yet to reveal whether or not his office plans to try her a second time – and whether on the same or lesser charges.
Clancy’s defense attorney Kevin Reddington has filed a motion asking the court to acquit her on all charges, arguing that the state did not present enough evidence in its case and so should not be able to retry it.
The motion will be argued when the two sides return to Plymouth County Superior Court for a hearing on September 29.
