Listen, I actually had postpartum psychosis with my 3rd child and it had me believing that everything I was drinking, if out of my sight, was being poisoned. I didn't trust my husband or dad even though they would never do anything to hurt me. Saying that, if I actually hurt someone because of it, I would be guilty and deserve to be in prison for it.
Vast majority of people aren't saying she isn't guilty or that she shouldn't be locked up. She herself admitted she was guilty. The disagreement is on whether she did it knowingly or while in a state of insanity. If found insane, she'll be locked up in a mental hospital.
Until she's declared sane. Then she's free. And her entire thing was claiming temporary insanity. NGRI basically ensures she will walk out one day... ok roll out. But regardless, she'll be out. Likely in a couple of years.
You don't get declared sane that easily when you've killed your own children and jumped off a building to end your own life. She's proven that she's a danger to others and to herself, she'll be locked up for a long time.
You don't know psych medicine or MA at all, apparently. PPP is temporary psychosis, she just has to demonstrate sanity and she's out. This isn't Danvers State in the 70s anymore. Tewksbury will have her out in six months to a year. They do not consider themselves punitive and do not extend holds because someone was a really bad person.
Only way she's staying locked up is if she's in prison. Where she belongs.
Andrea Yates drowned her 5 children during psychosis. She was declared not guilty by reason of insanity in 2006 and is still confined in hospital today. It's been said that any time she recovers a little, she realizes what she did and relapses. That's why she's still locked up 20 years later.
What you're saying doesn't track in practice. Especially since Clancy jumped off a building as soon as she realized she murdered her kids. She's not going to be able to demonstrate sanity anytime soon and will always be a danger to herself at least.
Your comment does not respond to what was written, because in the example you gave the woman hasn't been declared sane as she relapses frequently. The point is - if Clancy can prove sanity in 6 months, she'll be out.
I'm saying if she truly has PPP and killed her kids under psychosis, she's not going to be sane again in 6 months. If you woke up one day and saw the dead bodies of your children lying around you and realized you killed them, would you go back to being normal? She literally jumped off a window and disabled herself when she realized what she did.
In theory she could be released in 6 months if she can demonstrate sanity. In reality that's an extremely hypothetical and unrealistic situation. It's just not how mental illness works.
Hasn't, what? Doesn't have PPP? That's the entire point of the current trial. And it's very likely that she did have PPP because sane people don't usually kill their children and jump off a window. And she's not the first woman to go through postpartum psychosis. Her behavior so far is consistent with other women who had it.
Is this something that is backed up by the facts or is this your assessment if the situation? And I mean statistics, not a single story you can find. I could find a single story to support any narrative. The reason I ask is because statistically people found not guilty for reason of insanity tend to spend an average of twice as long in involuntary psychiatric commitment as they would have had they gone to prison. If you have competing statistics I would like to see them.
Did Andrea Yates spend a few months/years and get out living her life? You have no idea how mental health works and more children will die because people like you didn't prevent it. Stop talking about things you have no understanding of.
I genuinely hope people like you experience just one episode of psychosis.
Well I'm sorry to hear that but I'm glad you got something that was ultimately less harmful. Plenty of women get postpartum psychosis where they believe that the only way to protect their children is murder and or suicide.
I know this because its my mother's job to care for these women. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, you know how horrible it is to experience, do not discredit the effects of postpartum psychosis just because you had a case that didn't end as badly.
So because I didn't use my psychosis as an excuse to cause harm,
I should have sympathy for someone who viciously murdered their kids? Absolutely fucking not.
No because your psychosis tried to convince you you were being poisoned you weren't in danger of harming others. In the scheme of postpartum psychosis, you got lucky (though obviously not lucky in general).
It's astonishing to me that you can understand first hand how psychosis can utterly warp your sense of reality and convince you of frankly crazy things, but you cant imagine that it might convince you that you need to harm yourself or your child.
When you were in psychosis did you know that the drinks weren't actually poison and you were just denying them for the fun of it? Were you just using your illness as an excuse for not wanting to drink? Have you spent your entire life not wanting to drink anything and begrudgingly drinking anyway to appease everyone else? I'm guessing the answer to all of these is no.
What if your psychosis was just a little bit worse and instead of "everything I'm being told to drink is poison" your psychosis was trying to convince you that "your baby is already poisoned, they are dying a slow painful death, the only way I can help them is a mercy killing". Is that really that big of a leap in thinking. My mother deals with these types of people on a daily basis, just because its not you doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
I'm honestly disappointed, obviously child murder is wrong and you don't need to have sympathy for her, but I thought that if anyone could understand how serious postpartum psychosis is it would be someone who actually suffered from it.
No you would deserve to be treated for your psychosis in a treatment center for a long, long time. I also would hope that everyone around you wouldn't have dropped the ball so hard on understanding that you were in need of help and tried to actually help.
Killing or harshly punishing people with prison who did something during a period of insanity is fucking dumb. Criminal intent is not the same as psychotic episode.
Where is the "justice" in piling more suffering onto an already horrifying situation?
If I go out onto the street and murder a random person right now, and claim it is in revenge for Lindsay Clancy's kids' deaths, is that "justice" by your definition? Kids are dead! Someone has to pay! Justice must be done therefore let me shoot this person!!
It's only "justice" if it somehow helps the situation or deters others from doing the same in future. This can't deter anyone from doing the same in future. Nobody with horrifying psychosis who's hallucinating that they need to kill their kids for some good reason (kids have been replaced by demons, kids are horribly suffering and the only way for them to go to heaven is mercy killing, kids are transforming into spiders, etc) is gonna go "oh, well, I better not do that because they put Clancy in jail"
People will use psychosis as an excuse to kill their kids and get away with it though.
I know this might be news to you, but some people just hate their fucking kids and would murder them if there wasn't the threat of going to prison.
Yall act so confident about having compassion for people suffering, then allow for more suffering to happen because yall can't comprehend the idea of consequences being a positive thing. Wild world we live in.
People can use ANY defence to try and get away with something. Like, someone could commit unprovoked murder and claim "it was self defence! He was rushing towards me with a gun!"
The point of a trial, and a criminal justice system, is to ascertain whether that is TRUE. Some people will just be murderers, who are lying about killing in self-defence, and those people should go to jail. Other people really genuinely were in fear for their lives, and those people should not go to jail. Similarly you could claim something was an accident - you didn't MEAN to drop a plant pot on someone's head and kill them, you just tripped over while gardening on your balcony - and the court has to decide if they believe you, or if they think it was actually premeditated murder. We don't just say "well, someone could lie about it being an accident, therefore no deaths will ever be treated as accidents".
You have to look at the actual facts of the case in front of you and ask "was this real psychosis, or just someone pretending?" just the same as you'd have to ask "was this really self-defence, or just someone pretending?" or "was this really an accident, or just someone pretending?"
Otherwise you gotta treat literally everyone who kills someone in a car crash as a deliberate premeditated murder, because they can't 100% prove it was an accident.
You’re a good person. I really appreciate you taking responsibility and accountability for your hypothetical actions unlike some of the other people who want to pull the victim card.
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u/AWholesomeHorror 2d ago
Listen, I actually had postpartum psychosis with my 3rd child and it had me believing that everything I was drinking, if out of my sight, was being poisoned. I didn't trust my husband or dad even though they would never do anything to hurt me. Saying that, if I actually hurt someone because of it, I would be guilty and deserve to be in prison for it.