PLYMOUTH, Mass. — The jury in Lindsay Clancy’s murder trial told a Massachusetts judge Tuesday that it was unable to reach a unanimous verdict as deliberations entered a fourth day, prompting the judge to order the panel back into the jury room to continue weighing the case.

Jurors informed Judge William Sullivan of the impasse at the start of Tuesday’s session, according to multiple outlets covering the trial, including NBC News and the Boston Globe. Sullivan responded by instructing the 12-person jury to resume deliberating rather than declaring a mistrial. “I know that this was a long trial,” Sullivan told jurors, according to NBC News. “I know there were over 80 witnesses, over 300 exhibits. But because of that, I’m going to ask you to go back out, keeping in mind all the instructions that I gave you.” He added, “Maybe today’s the day; we’ll see. I don’t know.”

Clancy, 36, a former labor and delivery nurse, has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder in the deaths of her children, Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months, who were killed at the family’s home in Duxbury on Jan. 24, 2023. Both the prosecution and the defense agree Clancy strangled her children with exercise resistance bands and then attempted suicide, and the central question for jurors is whether she was criminally responsible for her actions at the time, a legal standard requiring that she understood the wrongfulness of what she was doing and could control her behavior accordingly. Jurors are weighing four possible outcomes for each of the three victims: first-degree murder, second-degree murder, manslaughter, or not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility.

As of Tuesday, the jury had deliberated for roughly 17 to 18 hours across four days since receiving the case Thursday afternoon, according to ABC News. The panel has submitted only one formal question to the court so far, asking Friday to review physical evidence including prescription pill bottles found in Clancy’s bedroom and a kitchen knife she used during her suicide attempt.

Clancy’s lead defense attorney, Kevin Reddington, expressed continued confidence in the jury’s process despite the reported deadlock, according to comments captured by Boston 25 News. “Maybe today’s the day; we’ll see. I don’t know,” Reddington said, echoing the judge’s own uncertainty about when a resolution might come. Asked by a reporter what a hung jury would mean for the case, Reddington offered a blunt, two-word response: “Try it again.” When a second reporter asked whether he would want to try the case again if jurors remained deadlocked, Reddington similarly declined to speculate further on the outcome, telling reporters he could not predict how long deliberations might ultimately continue. “I have had them out for a week; I have had them out for an hour. I do not know,” he said.

Legal experts have said a jury announcing a deadlock does not necessarily mean deliberations are finished. Retired Massachusetts Superior Court Judge John T. Lu told the Boston Globe that a judge presiding over a case like Clancy’s must weigh the length and complexity of the trial against how much time jurors have spent deliberating before deciding whether to accept a hung jury declaration. “Sometimes the judge evaluates whether there has been due and careful deliberation comparing the length of the trial to the length of the deliberations,” Lu wrote in an email to the Globe. He added that hung juries, while not common, are “unusual but not rare” in cases of this complexity.

If jurors ultimately convict Clancy of murder, she faces a sentence of life in prison. If the jury finds her not guilty by reason of lack of criminal responsibility, prosecutors have indicated they may seek to have her committed to a psychiatric facility rather than released outright. Clancy remains partially paralyzed as a result of her 2023 suicide attempt and has been held at a state hospital in Tewksbury since that time.

As deliberations resumed Tuesday afternoon, no timeline had been established for when jurors might reach a final decision, and both prosecutors and Clancy’s defense team continued to await word from the jury room as the trial’s outcome remained unresolved for a fourth consecutive day.