Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis accused NBC10 Boston of running a smear campaign against the lone holdout juror in the Lindsay Clancy murder trial, and offered the man refuge in Florida if he faces harassment.
DeSantis fired back on X Friday after the NBC affiliate published an investigation into the personal history of the unnamed juror, a Black man who stood alone against eleven other panelists during seven days of deliberations over whether Clancy was criminally responsible for strangling her three young children with exercise bands at the family's Duxbury, Massachusetts, home in 2023. Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial after the jury deadlocked 11-1.
The governor framed the network's decision to investigate the juror's background as an attack on a private citizen who simply refused to go along with the majority. His posts drew a sharp line: the media, he argued, was punishing a juror for exercising his right to vote his conscience.
In his first post on X, DeSantis did not hold back. Breitbart News reported the governor wrote:
"A man objected to allowing a woman to kill her three young kids and get away with it, so NBC is trying to smear that juror, whose identity should be protected. Another low for legacy media."
He followed up with a direct offer:
"If the juror is being harassed, Florida will provide asylum, I'm sure he'd be welcomed and appreciated."
DeSantis included a link to the NBC10 Boston report in his post. He did not indicate whether his office had been in contact with the juror or planned any formal action beyond the public statements.
The NBC10 Boston report, published Friday, drew on police reports and court records to build a profile of the holdout juror. The affiliate reported that the man faced a criminal charge in 2021 for allegedly assaulting his then-wife. A police report cited by the station stated the juror's 13-year-old nephew told officers he witnessed the man grab his then-wife by the throat and throw her into a dresser.
That charge was later dismissed. The couple divorced.
But the station's report did not stop there. NBC10 Boston reported that the same nephew subsequently took out a restraining order against the juror after alleging the man pushed him to the ground and repeatedly punched him in the face. That restraining order was apparently still active when the man was selected to serve on the Clancy jury, though S1's own language used "apparently," leaving the point unconfirmed.
The station also reported the juror was facing eviction for failing to pay rent since March, and that his landlord had secured a $12,000 judgment for unpaid rent while the man was actively deliberating on the case.
The investigation raised questions about how the juror cleared the selection process. Massachusetts' standard juror questionnaire asks prospective jurors whether they have been arrested, charged with a crime, or served with a court order. NBC10 Boston reported that each of those questions would have applied to the holdout juror, based on the records the station uncovered.
His questionnaire, however, is not public. How he answered those questions remains unknown.
NBC10 Boston's chief legal analyst, Michael Coyne, offered a blunt assessment on air:
"I don't see how they would've allowed him to be a member of this jury."
That comment captures the media's framing: the juror should never have been seated, and the mistrial is therefore tainted. DeSantis's framing runs the opposite direction, that the juror's vote was legitimate, and the real problem is a news organization digging into a private citizen's past to discredit a verdict the press didn't like.
Lindsay Clancy is charged with killing her three children, Cora, 5; Dawson, 3; and Callan, 8 months, by strangling them with exercise bands before attempting suicide at the family home in Duxbury, Massachusetts, in 2023. Her defense argued she was experiencing postpartum psychosis and was on psychotropic prescription drugs ordered by doctors, and that she was not criminally responsible at the time of the killings.
The jury split on whether to find Clancy not criminally responsible by reason of insanity or to convict her on one of several homicide charges. Eleven jurors went one way. One went the other. After seven days, Judge Sullivan declared a mistrial.
Which side the holdout juror took, whether he voted for conviction while eleven others favored the insanity finding, or the reverse, is not specified in available reporting. DeSantis's post strongly implies the holdout voted against acquittal, describing the juror as a man who "objected to allowing a woman to kill her three young kids and get away with it."
The juror's race became part of the story when it was revealed on air that the holdout was a Black man. Gayle King, identified in the report as an NBC morning host, reacted with visible surprise. Breitbart previously reported her response:
"Whoa. I'll have to sit with that for a second."
The reaction drew criticism from conservative commentators who saw it as an implicit suggestion that the juror's race was relevant to his vote, a framing that would be considered inappropriate in virtually any other context. King's network affiliation is itself unclear; the article body identifies her as an NBC host, while an internal link references her as a CBS host. Regardless of which network employs her, the moment underscored the media's apparent discomfort with a juror who refused to fall in line.
Several key facts remain unknown. The juror has not been named publicly, and whether NBC10 Boston contacted him for comment is not reported. Whether the court questioned him about his questionnaire answers is also unclear. DeSantis's office has not announced any formal steps beyond the governor's posts on X.
The broader question is whether a news organization should be investigating a juror's personal life because the jury failed to reach the verdict the coverage seemed to expect. Dismissed charges, a contested restraining order, and an eviction proceeding are all matters of record. But publishing them in the immediate aftermath of a mistrial, when the juror's identity is supposed to be protected, sends a message to every future juror in every high-profile case: vote the wrong way, and your life becomes an open file.
DeSantis is right about one thing. Jurors are not public officials. They do not sign up to have their pasts excavated on cable television. When the press treats a holdout vote as a scandal to be explained rather than a right to be respected, it is the jury system itself that takes the hit.
