As Lindsay Clancy Jury Deliberates, Another Killer Mom Walks Free On Insanity Plea

While jurors consider the case of Massachusetts mother Lindsay Clancy, a New York City judge has found another mother — who also killed her children — not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.

Dimone Fleming, now 26, had repeatedly stabbed her sons — Octavius Canada, 11 months, and Daishawn Fleming, 3 — before submerging them in a bathtub, The New York Times reported. Police found her on November 26, 2022, at a family shelter. She was naked from the waist up and was pretending to read a children’s book that was upside down at the time.

Fleming’s case, like the high-profile Clancy case, has drawn attention to maternal health issues — particularly postpartum depression and psychosis — but hasn’t made the same kind of headlines.

According to court documents, Fleming had been seen at the Floating Hospital in Queens for some time prior to the murders — and after being diagnosed with a major depressive disorder, she’d been prescribed medication to manage the symptoms. Instead of taking the medication, however, Fleming had used marijuana on a daily basis — and her condition worsened considerably.

Dr. Eric Goldsmith, who examined Fleming on behalf of the prosecution, determined that she was “grossly psychotic and out of touch with reality” the night that she killed her children. He also said in his report that Fleming had been hallucinating, believing that she was inhabited by another spirit and that the world was ending.

Defense psychiatrists wrote that Fleming believed her actions were necessary to “cleanse” her children.

Lindsay Clancy claims to have heard a male voice telling her that she had to kill her children and then herself. She had spent months in and out of different doctors’ offices, and had been prescribed a cocktail of different psychiatric drugs — but several reports indicated that she had not been taking them reliably.

In Clancy’s case, the defense has also cited postpartum depression and psychosis — and a lengthy list of medications — when arguing that she should not be held criminally responsible for strangling her three young children. The prosecution has argued that Clancy’s actions show deliberate and willful planning and a clear awareness that she understood the difference between right and wrong.

The jury in Clancy’s case deliberated for several hours on Thursday and nearly a full day on Friday. They are expected to return to deliberations on Monday.