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Dateline NBC

A mother's mind before killings. Audio recording of missing mom. Plus, rap lyrics as evidence.

2h ago35:437,055 words
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In Massachusetts, young mom Lindsay Clancy is on trial for allegedly murdering her three children. Her psychiatrist testifies about her mental state before killings. In California, Tyler McCain is acc...

Transcript

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We can get going. It's the start of another workday for the date line team. There's a video, you know, false confessions, coarsome interrogation tactics. Our producers are catching up on breaking crime news. It's a family saying it's a murder.

There were no other suspects, there's anything right. Welcome to Date Line True Crime Weekly. I'm Blaine Alexander. It's August 13th and curious what's on our docket. In Northern California, prosecutors prepare to use a recording of a missing mom against the man they say killed her.

You could hear Nicki just describing the brutality of the abuse and just how terrified she was. In Date Line Roundup, former only fan's model, Courtney Kleene, takes a plea for killing her boyfriend. And Luigi Mangione, the man accused of gunning down United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, is back in court, possibly for the last time before his date trial. Both the defense and prosecution have strong takes on how open the trial should be.

Plus, should prosecutors be allowed to use song lyrics or memoirs as evidence. NBC News legal analyst Danny Savallo's isn't convinced.

How do we know what is a nexus between violent lyrics and a crime of violence?

But before all of that, we're off to a Boston suburb where it's week three in the trial of a former labor and delivery nurse accused of murdering her own children. And just a warning that some of what we'll be discussing is quite upsetting and includes mentions of suicide. For weeks, prosecutors have been laying out their case against Lindsey Clancy. The Massachusetts mom, they believe intentionally killed her three young children. Korra, Kalin, and Dawson on January 24th, 2023.

Lindsey doesn't deny killing them, but says she cannot be held criminally responsible. She says she was suffering from undiagnosed postpartum psychosis at the time, as she was overmedicated and not in her right mind. Lindsey's ex-husband Patrick, who was standing by her, has testified about watching Lindsey struggle with her mental health. But this week, jurors got to hear from the doctors who treated her. Chief among them, Dr. Jennifer Tuts, the psychiatrist who saw Lindsey just the day before her children's deaths.

Here and now to tell us what Dr. Tuts had to say, and why he thinks it led to one of the most contentious moments in court so far, is Nate Eaton of East Idaho News and host of the podcast courtroom insider. Nate, thank you so much for being here with us today. Hi, Blaine. Thanks for having me.

You know, I mean, the first thing I have to ask you, Nate, is that this is a case that has clearly grabbed the country's attention.

I mean, we're talking about a trial in Massachusetts. You've been covering it all the way from Idaho.

Just tell me, what do you think it is about this case that has resonated with so many people?

I think that mental illness affects so many people and you have a mother who says she was dealing with postpartum anxiety depression. That is an issue that people relate to. She was a very loving mother by all accounts, according to the testimony. And you see her in the courtroom every day sitting in her wheelchair because she was paralyzed after she threw herself out of that second story window. A lot of people feel sorry for her. A lot of people say she should be held responsible. Most cases you haven't feeling that the defendant may be found guilty or not guilty.

This is a case that I don't know. I don't think anyone knows how this trial is going to end. So let's talk about Dr. Jennifer Tufts. She first met Lindsey Clancy back in September of 2022. This is just a few months before the children were killed in January of 2023. What makes her stand out here as a witness in this case? Well, she is a psychiatrist who met Lindsey 14 times actually leading up until the children's death.

And if there's anyone who could describe kind of a through line for her care over the months leading up to this tragedy, it would be Dr. Tufts.

When the prosecution brought her up, they first asked Dr.

What did she say that Lindsey told her during that first appointment?

Lindsey told her that she was anxious that she was overwhelmed caring for her three children. Lindsey was a labor and delivery nurse herself. And so she went to the doctor saying I need a little bit more time to stay home with my children. The prosecutor read aloud the message that Lindsey sent after two appointments with her. Hi, Dr. Tufts. Well, I'm feeling just better enough to function without medication.

I did reach out to my employer about extending my leave for reasons of postpartum anxiety/depression.

I don't feel mentally well enough to return to taking care of patients with a baby at home that still won't take the bottle.

Gosh, you know, just hearing that I think that that's something that a lot of new mothers would certainly relate to.

The no sleep, the baby won't eat. Dr. Tufts initially diagnosed Lindsey with generalized anxiety disorder and an adjustment disorder with depressed mood, but notably nothing in there mentioned psychosis or hearing voices during that initial meeting, right? No, and Lindsey filled out a form about suicide for that initial meeting.

One of those intake forms and in it, she said that she wasn't contemplating suicide, self harm or hurting other people.

Tufts testified that she asked Lindsey at several of their sessions over the next few months about this, and each time Lindsey said that she was not suicidal or homicidal. Now, their last session, this is notable took place the day before the children were killed. Here's how Dr. Tufts described that visit.

Did you ask her if she had suicidal ideation or homicidal ideation on the 23rd?

Yes, I did. What was her response? No. And did you notice any symptoms or signs of psychosis that day? No.

Let's just so chilling to hear that this took place, this conversation took place literally the day before she killed her children. Now, I have to ask Nate what about medication?

Did Dr. Tufts help explain this kind of cocktail of medication that the defense has been talking about several times?

Dr. Tufts explained that she recommended to Lindsey that she take the lowest dose of zooloft, which is a very common antidepressant. Even though Lindsey was prescribed the medication, when Dr. Tufts met with her two weeks later, she told the doctor she hadn't started it. Now, eventually, Lindsey did start taking that medication zooloft, right? That's according to the doctor's testimony, and she prescribed a different medication to her as well, adivine, which helped her sleep. So, not necessarily a lot of medication, but we should say that Dr. Tufts didn't really have the complete picture, because Lindsey was also seeing other doctors at the same time.

Were they kind of at least cross referencing her prescriptions to see what other medication she was taking, and what how they could possibly interact with each other or have issues? Not really, and the defense made a big deal about that saying, why didn't these doctors request the records from the other providers? Now, the psychiatrist counter that Lindsey told her, Lindsey Clancy told her, well, I've gone here, and I've gone here, and they've prescribed me this, but as far as getting actual documentation, those records were never requested, at least by Dr. Tufts.

That ended the prosecution's questioning of Dr. Tufts, but she was back on the stand for defense cross on Monday. Lindsey's defense attorney Kevin Reddington really pressed Dr. Tufts on her experience, and it sounded like he was really working to kind of discredit her there on the stand. This is a young doctor who had only been practicing independently for a little over a month when she first saw Lindsey Clancy. She said she had become board certified in psychiatry the same day that Lindsey Clancy reached out to her.

I have to ask, Nate, do we know how Lindsey found her, did she just Google her, how did she happen upon this doctor? According to court documents, an internet search. Now on her webpage, Dr. Tufts does say that she is an expert at parian natal issues. Kevin Reddington really pressed her on that issue to be like, what were you saying to the public, maybe you were exaggerating your claims about your resume? What's actually on Dr. Tufts webpage, she has a column titled "Arius of Expertise" and underneath that it lists parian natal psychiatry. Now in her biography, she writes parian natal psychiatry as a particular interest. Let's listen to a little bit of that testimony.

So you understand that if in fact, it's determined that you advertise as an expert in post-target. Then at post-target psychiatry, would you consider that to be a negative or misrepresentation? I do not believe that I have been rich. Do you want to stand on this first occasion? Yes. For the month, I think you've got post-target, you don't want this period to be more an expert than we have to face that.

I just think the wording was that it's an interest of my name, don't believe ...

So during that cross, it was also revealed that Dr. Tufts only met with Lindsay virtually on telehealth.

Right. In fact, Kevin Reddington, the attorney pointed out that the first time Lindsay Clancy and Dr. Tufts saw each other face to face was in the courtroom during this trial.

And those appointments were relatively brief meetings on the computer screen, and Kevin Reddington repeatedly said, "Could you have been doing something off-screen showing signs of anxiety or other conditions that you're not able to see through the screen?" And the doctor said the standard of care these days for a lot of practices is telehealth.

And the way that you're describing all of this name, it sounds like these were some very tense moments of testimony. Any other tense exchanges that you saw during this cross?

Several. Perhaps the most tense moment was when Dr. Tufts was confronted with notes, she took following a session that she had with Lindsay. On those notes, she wrote the phrase, "Not hypercoma," pressured speech. What is pressured speech? What exactly is that describing? Pressured speech could be speaking to fast, you're speaking to slow, you have signs of mania in your speech. But according to Dr. Tufts, that's not what she meant to write. Can you just read this paragraph here for us?

Not hyper pressure speech.

What was that? Not hyper, not hyper, not pressured speech. What I meant? I know it doesn't say not, but that is exactly what I meant.

And did you see this that you noticed that it did not say not? I don't care what it says. I know what I meant. She did not have pressure speech. I wrote that, but you're misinterpreting my note. Am I reading this correctly? And the jury will be able to look at it that you put not hypercoma, pressured speech. Did I read that right?

Yes, but your interpretation is incorrect. You meant to write not pressured speech, but she forgot the not. But that completely changes the meaning of those notes. Or the doctor was not accurate in taking notes.

And so if a juror wonders, if the doctor was wrong on this, what else was she wrong on?

And this was probably the most tense moment we've seen in the trial thus far. Well, Nate, you've been following every twist and turn of this case. What do you expect to happen next in the trial? Of course, the big question is will Lindsey Clancy testify herself? Because that could really sway jurors' opinions one way or another.

If you get up there and you have a mother who confesses to doing all of these things, but then talks about her mental state, that will be very, very compelling testimony. Well, either way it goes. This is just a tragic story all around. We really appreciate you bringing us up to speed on it. Thank you. Thank you, Blaine.

Coming up, a California mother of four has been missing for two years.

Will prosecutors finally be able to take her husband to trial for her murder?

Hey guys, Willie guys to hear reminding you to check out the Sunday Sit Down podcast. On this week's episode, I get together with Jason Sedakis to talk about a career that has taken him from a decade on Saturday Night Live to Ted Lasso, as he returns for a new season, playing that iconic title character. You can get my conversation with Jason now for free,

wherever you download your podcasts. In the summer of 2024, dozens of people reached out to date line about the same missing woman out of Northern California. Her name was Nikki Chang, Saley McCain, a 39 year old mother of four who had seemingly vanished on May 18th, 2024. Her three sisters told our date line missing an American team that they were desperate

to find her and they were adamant that Nikki would never just walk away.

Then, more than a year later, in August of 2025, even though Nikki's body had never been found, the sheriff of Shasta County made an announcement. The detective says determined that Nikki is a victim of homicide. Detectives also further concluded that Nikki's husband, Tyler Scott McCain,

as responsible for Nikki's death. Tyler has pleaded not guilty to charges, including first-degree murder. At a preliminary hearing, prosecutors revealed some of their evidence against Tyler, ranging from forensic analysis of Nikki's truck, to a recording that she made in the weeks before her alleged death.

Tyler's defense team, however, is pushing back on this, arguing that there was another person in Nikki's life who could have harmed her, her alleged lover. Tyler was expected to go on trial in just a few weeks' time,

On Monday, his defense team asked for a delay.

We're joined now by Blake Mayfield. He's a reporter with our affiliate NBC-24 action news now. Blake, thank you so much for being here and bringing us up to speed.

First, let's just talk about Nikki.

I want to give our listeners a sense of who she was.

What have you learned about her through all of this?

Yeah, Nikki was 39 years old. She was from the running area. She was one of four sisters, and all the sisters were really close with each other. The family was a big emphasis for all of them.

Her sisters described her as just being goofy and funny. She was also feisty now going. They described her as the one with the big personality. Well, when you talk about her siblings, I mean, her siblings have been very clear from the beginning.

She would not get up and leave. It was completely out of character. What was the first sign for Nikki's siblings that something was wrong? She stopped responding to their text messages. And then she said, "I'm so happy to be here.

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I'm so happy to be here. I'm so happy to be here. I'm so happy to be here. Welcome back to Date Line Roundup. Today, I am joined by Date Line Field Producer Brittany Morris.

Brittany, thanks so much for joining me today. Hey there, Blaine. Thanks for having me.

Well, first off, we are headed down to Miami for what looks like it might be the final chapter.

In the case of 30-year-old former only fans model Courtney Clinton. Courtney was accused of fatally stabbing her boyfriend, Christian Obamcelli, back in 2022 in a fit of rage. A prosecutor said that it wasn't the first time she had been violent with Christian. Her defense team, however, said she has been the longstanding victim of his abuse.

And the Courtney threw a knife at Christian from across the room out of fear when he charged at her. So Brittany just brings us up to speed. On Monday, Courtney was back in court.

And this was a pretty big moment in this case, right?

It was Blaine. So she was there to enter a guilty plea. Judge Andrew and Ricker Wolfson walked Courtney through what we usually see. And these types of situations, a plea colloquy. So in other words, the judge makes sure Courtney has spoken to her lawyer about the plea deal

and understands the ramifications of taking a guilty plea. And you reveal every line, every word, every page of this plea with your attorney. So I want to take a look at this deal itself and just what exactly it entails. Courtney was originally charged with second degree murder under Florida sentence in guidelines. She was looking at at least 21 years in prison if she was convicted.

So with this plea deal, what is she facing now? So Courtney pled guilty not to the second degree murder, but to a lesser charge of manslaughter. And so that meant she received a sentence of six years in prison and five years probation after that. So 15 years reduction in prison time. That's pretty major. And the deal factors in time that's already been served.

And Courtney has already been behind bars for quite some time now. So how early could she potentially be released? She was arrested in 2022. And according to her lawyers, she could be released as early as 2028. So Christian's family was also there in the courtroom on Monday.

Did they speak at all? Yeah, they did. Several members of his family were present, including his cousin Karen, his mom and dad were there too. They all wore purple bows on their shirts.

Karen, the cousin, she was the first to speak.

She read a statement on behalf of Christian's mom. It vividly captured a mother's grief. There is simply too much pain to put on paper. Since April 2022, I have lived with fear and anxiety, sleepless nights, heartache, and more tears than I could ever count.

Oh, it's just hard to listen to them just speaking about them.

I mean, you can imagine their pain throughout this entire ordeal.

And Courtney was also of course in the courtroom. She sat there and orange jumpsuit. At times she looked like she was about to cry. As Christian's family was speaking, did she make any sort of statement or did she address the family at all? So Courtney did not make any statements herself.

But her attorneys, they held a press conference after the sentencing. Her lawyer Frank Prito doubled down on this idea that they'd been ready to go to trial. But the plea deal was too good to pass up. And we also heard from Courtney's father, Kim Kelly, right? Yeah, so Kim Kelly, he read a pre-written statement to the press.

And in it, he acknowledged that a young man lost his life. And that is a great tragedy. Nothing I could say today. The diminishes that tragedy with a profound and permanent loss at some they feel.

What matters to me now is that for the first time and more than four years, there was an end inside.

Courtney has the future ahead of her. I'm looking forward to the day I consider cross from her face to face and hover until her and the child left her. There have been so many chapters to this case, Brittany. I mean, it's just stunning to see it all come to an end. Absolutely.

Well, up next, we are headed up to Manhattan, where we have an update in the case of Luigi Mangeoni. That's the man who has been accused of gunning down United Healthcare CEO Ryan Thompson back in 2024. A pre-trial hearing was held on Tuesday ahead of Mangeoni's upcoming trial and state court. Now, this is expected to be the last hearing before the trial. Can you tell us what was on the agenda here, Brittany?

So this case has captured the nation's attention. No doubt. And that undeniably reads questions about whether the spectacle of the trial could overshadow the trial itself. So both the defense and prosecution have strong takes on how open the trial should be. And a lot of what they talked about on Tuesday involved media access to the trial.

You know, this came up a few weeks ago when the New York State Office of Court Administration issued guidelines on how many reporters could actually be inside the courtroom during this trial. And that events complained that these were far too restrictive. Can you walk us through some of those guidelines? Sure. So that office said that it had selected 68 journalists to cover the trial from inside the courtroom.

And of those 68 only six could be present for jury selection. Wow. And the court administration didn't want to have an overflow room for additional spectators. I could see how that could ruffle a lot of feathers, certainly. Well, Mangeoni's defense team filed a motion demanding changes to the guidelines and information about how those 68 journalists were.

We're chosen. How did that shake out?

So it was very quick hearing where the judge reiterated that there has never been a decision to exclude press from access to the trial.

The judge did not comment on how those 68 journalists were selected. But said he will now allow an overflow room for the press. And additionally, he said that for jury selection and in regard to the jury, specifically, it will be an anonymous jury.

Oh, interesting. What exactly is an anonymous jury?

So this is the first time I have ever heard of one. In normal cases, we don't know all that much about identifying information in regards to the jurors. We might know their age, their job or where they're from. So for an anonymous jury, that identifying information can be with help from the public. The parties involved or both for varying lengths of time.

Interesting. You know, another thing that we've been watching very closely in all of this Brittany is whether or not the proceedings can be broadcast live. It's something that the defense had requested. Has the judge made a decision on that yet? He has not.

We will have to wait for that ruling. Well, a lot of eyes are going to be on this trial. Of course, we will be watching closely as we approach the start of that trial that set for September 8th. Brittany, thank you so much for joining us and breaking all of this down. We appreciate you.

You're so welcome. Thank you. This week in a Las Vegas courtroom, Duane, KVD Davis, a former gang leader, went on trial for the 1996 murder of Rap Legend to Pockshire Corps. Davis has pleaded not guilty, but, as we told you last week, Central to the prosecution's case are Davis's very own words, including a passage in his memoir,

describing his alleged role in to Pockshooting. Prosecutors say that it amounts to a confession. Now, this is not the first time that we've heard of a case where prosecutors have ripped a defendant's own words from a book or song lyrics to try and prove guilt in front of a jury. And so we ask NBC News, legal analyst, and defense attorney Danny Sawallos,

Join us and tell us more about this Danny. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for having me glad to be back. Let's talk about the importance of a defendant's own words.

Those are something that, of course, can be very powerful tools for prosecutors, right?

Absolutely.

We always find it reliable when somebody is willing to admit that they did something.

We trust when the defendant himself says, "I did it.

So let's dive into this key VD case a little bit more.

It first, this all kind of goes back to a memoir that he wrote,

just kind of remind our listeners what was said in that memoir they're pointing to. The defendant here is essentially said that he may not have been the person who pulled the trigger, but he was in the car and present at the scene of the crime, and at least according to prosecutors, his words evidence his intent to be involved in this specific crime which resulted in the death of Tupac.

The defense has said that this memoir was fiction, just basically a way to sell books, to look tough in front of people. I've got to ask were you surprised that the judge allowed this in his evidence? Well, yes and no. His phrase is another fascinating issue.

The corpus-delective rule. And that is just a fancy Latin word.

For the idea that you have to have more than just a defendant's words

to corroborate a crime. I'll give you an example. If I came to you and said a month ago, I had an illegal firearm and I had a lot of cocaine in my car. Well, I mean, that's certainly helpful to the government,

but the government couldn't charge me for that crime with no other evidence other than my words. So, for example, in this case, it's a little different, right? You do have further evidence of the crime. You have a dead Tupac Shakur. So, there is in a sense corroboration.

But believe me, as a defense attorney, I see it the defense's way, which is that look, all you have are these words, and really nothing else other than a death 30 years ago. It all of this, Danny, makes me think of a case out of Georgia right here. It's actually a case that I covered in part.

But it was basically a reco case against a well-known rap artist,

the young thug, as real name as Jeffrey Williams, and a portion of that prosecution had to do with rap lyrics. Prosecutors introduced 17 sets of Williams lyrics to try and prove that YSL, which were the same initials as his record label, young stoner life, was actually a street gang with Williams at the very top of it. They argued that the lyrics weren't necessarily admissions of specific crimes,

but rather promoting the gang and their activities. Young thug, or Jeffrey Williams, ultimately pleaded no contest to that reco charge. Yes, that was a case where the prosecution sought to introduce evidence of rap lyrics to show guilt in the sort of the association with people and the conspiracy, and all of these other elements.

As a defense attorney, obviously I'm biased, but I see a real problem with introducing artists' work as evidence against them, imagine you're an artist, and you create something, and then years later, it just happens that a crime occurs that is close to those lyrics. If the prosecution can show a connection between the lyrics and the crime itself, then it may come in.

But how do we know what is a nexus between violent lyrics and a crime of violence?

And I would just add, as an asterisk, that you see a lot of rap lyrics, but I can show you several songs in rock and some of the other genres that talk openly about crime. There's I shot the sheriff. I shot the sheriff.

There's some of these other country music songs are about shooting people and watching them die.

This is always been around.

Well, I mean, you make a great point, echoed by the ACLU, the American Civil Liberties Union, that it is more likely that rap lyrics are going to be targeted. They say that it exposes a sort of bias in the system there. Sure. There's also a technical reason.

I mean, you could argue that rap lyrics are usually at a faster rhythm, a faster beat, and they contain more words than your typical rock ballad, which has a two-minute guitar solo, and a two-minute introduction that's all instrumental, whereas rap crams in a lot more content into one song. One last thing I want to get you to touch on, Danny.

One case that we've been covering very extensively here on the podcast is the case of David, the artist who's been charged with the murder and sexual abuse of a teenager who was found dead in his car back in September of last year. He has pleaded not guilty to these charges, but there is a lot of online conversation about whether some of his music could possibly play a role in the criminal proceedings.

One of David's songs was a track titled Romantic Homicide. It released prior to Celeste Rivas Hernandez's murder, and you have words like, "In the back of my mind, you died, and I didn't even cry."

You know, if I step back and just take those words, should we take them in context?

Do we just take them in isolation? How do you even analyze how words may have a connection to the crime itself?

So, again, my concern is that we're living on a slippery slope,

because if it begins with rap lyrics, where does it end?

And should prosecutors be able to bolster a case that might otherwise be a close call

by going to an artist's inventory? It's just a fascinating concept all around. Danny Savalo's, thank you so much, friend. We appreciate you. Thank you. And that's it for this episode of "Dateline True Crime Weekly."

But don't forget to check out the latest season of the Webby Award-winning podcast "Dateline,"

missing in America. Josh Mankowitz looks into six new cases.

The first three episodes are out now, and to get early access to new episodes,

and listen at free, just subscribe to "Dateline Premium." Coming up this Friday on "Dateline," we've got one of Andrea's most moving episodes.

It's about the murder of a Tennessee high school cheerleader, her family's quest for answers,

and the teenage boys that helped lead police to her killer.

You're going to have two boys in a car with a guy that's believed to have already killed one person with a marker weapon, and this is a huge danger of staying. Watch "Dateline on NBC." Thanks so much for listening. "Dateline True Crime Weekly" is produced by Carson Cummins, Caroline Casey and Keanu Reed.

Our associate producers are Ellery Gladstone, growth, and Arya Young. Our senior producer is Liz Brown, Coral Off, production and fact-checking help by Yana Johnson. Veronica Mosaicka is our digital producer. Rick Gwan is our sound designer, original music by Jesse McGente. Paul Ryan is executive producer, and Liz Cole is senior executive producer

of "Dateline." Bye, everybody.

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