Prosecutor Shanan Buckingham rejected the mental illness defense, arguing Clancy acted deliberately and remains fully criminally responsible.
"This was not a woman in the throes of psychosis," Buckingham said.
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He urged the jury to focus strictly on Clancy's individual actions, not broader maternal health care debates.
"This is not a public debate about women's mental health and how the medical system treats women. This case is about this defendant, Lindsay Clancy," Buckingham said.
Legal analyst Elyse Hershon noted the jury's verdict will hinge on their assessment of Clancy's intent and legal capacity.
"Whenever there are deaths of children, it rattles emotions.
Because these actions are incomprehensible and the outcome so horrific, people tend to want to hold someone responsible," Hershon said.
She explained that reactions often split between sympathy for mental health struggles and demand for accountability.
Expert witness Dr. Nicole Cirino, director of reproductive psychiatry at Baylor College of Medicine, explained that mothers committing infanticide while suffering from postpartum psychosis often act under severe delusions.
In their own minds, "they may be saving their children from damnation," Cirino said.
Dr. Catherine Birndorf, CEO of The Motherhood Center in New York City, highlighted legal challenges for mothers with perinatal psychiatric crises.
"Women who kill their children in the throes of this medical illness, postpartum psychosis, are seriously and profoundly mentally ill.
They are not evil," Birndorf said. She expressed concern about how the criminal justice system handles such cases.
"To me it's illness until proven otherwise," she continued. "The fact that we consider it criminal until proven otherwise is problematic."
Clancy faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole if convicted of first-degree murder, or commitment to a state mental facility if found not guilty by reason of insanity.
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The trial is scheduled to continue over several weeks.
