O.J. Simpson and Lindsay Clancy

On June 12, 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman were murdered. Five days later, O.J. Simpson took the LAPD on a low-speed car chase in a Ford Bronco. At the time, I was almost ten years old. All I remember about the initial crime was that the car chase coincided with the NBA Finals Game. The New York Knicks were playing against the Houston Rockets. I remember asking my parents who O.J. Simpson was. I had never heard of O.J. Simpson the football player, though I knew his character from the classic Naked Gun trilogy. (Don’t even get me started on the sacrilegious remake.)

Yet, over the next year, everyone in America–even kids–became familiar with the trial. I remember hearing about Judge Lance Ito, Johnnie Cochrane, Marcia Clark, and Kato Kaelin. Years later, when I first heard of the Cato Institute, I thought it had something to do with O.J. Conversely, I learned about Kim Kardashian long before I knew who Robert Kardashian was.

The verdict was handed down on October 3, 1995. I remember the moment very clearly. I was in my 6th Grade Social Studies class, and our teacher, Mr. Segalowitz  announced the verdict in class. (I presume he had heard it on the radio.) It seemed obvious to eleven-year old Josh that the jury got it wrong, but I knew nothing about the law to even say why.

Needless to say, views on the O.J. Simpson verdict split sharply across racial lines. I found an old CNN poll with these numbers:

Regardless of the verdict, most whites believe Simpson was guilty of murder; most African-Americans say he was innocent. Two-thirds of all African-Americans think that there was a conspiracy to frame Simpson for the murders; six in 10 whites don’t believe in such a conspiracy.

And both groups suspect that racial issues continue to tint the other group’s view of the case. Sixty percent of all whites believe that blacks who think Simpson is innocent hold that view mostly because of Simpson’s race. Among African-Americans, 58 percent think that whites who maintain Simpson is guilty feel that way mostly based on Simpson’s race.

Another CNN poll asked if the jury did the right thing: 88% of blacks said yes while 59% of whites said no.

Another poll from the Washington Post offered similar numbers:

The survey found that America remains divided sharply along racial lines over the Simpson verdicts. Eight out of 10 blacks interviewed said they agreed with the decision, including 66 percent who expressed strong approval of the verdicts. But 55 percent of all whites interviewed said they disapproved of the jury’s decision, including 40 percent who said they strongly disapproved.

Blacks and whites also differed in their perceptions of whether, regardless of the verdict, Simpson actually killed his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald L. Goldman. Seven in 10 blacks expressed confidence that Simpson did not kill the pair — and an identical proportion of whites said he probably did.

Overall, the survey suggests that in the court of public opinion, the jury is perhaps hopelessly deadlocked: Eight in 10 blacks say justice was done in the Simpson case — and two out of three whites disagree.

Three decades later, I’m not sure the views of the O.J. trial have changed very much. This Family Guy clip sums things up:

This background, of course, brings me to the murder trial of Lindsay Clancy. I’ll admit, I did not pay any attention to this story until a few weeks ago. Yet, it seems that nearly overnight, Clancy has shot to the forefront of the public conscious.

In much the same way that the O.J. verdict split along racial lines, I think the Clancy verdict splits along gender lines. The vast majority of the commentary I’ve seen that is critical of the mistrial has been from men. And the vast majority of the commentary that I’ve seen that supports the verdict has been from women. Women insist that men cannot possibly understand postpartum psychosis and what a woman goes through. Men counter that Clancy brutally murdered her three children and should not be able to escape liability because she is a woman.

I don’t think this issue neatly splits right-left. Indeed, on the Clay Travis & Buck Sexton show, one of the most popular conservative talk radio programs, a long-time female caller said she had never been so angry at the hosts that she had had to turn her radio off. I thought the coverage would quiet down over the long weekend, but it hasn’t.

Moreover, there is a proliferation of social media videos, invariably from women, who blame Lindsey Clancy’s husband for the murder. If you want to go down a dark hole, watch the TikTok videos superimposing Patrick Clancy’s foot over a bloody mark at the murder scene or depicting with Bratz dolls how Patrick pushed Lindsay out the window. The people posting these videos should check with a defamation lawyer before they publicly accuse the husband of murder.

I don’t pretend to be an expert in the nuances of Massachusetts law concerning not guilty by reason of insanity. I also don’t fault most Americans for having strong views on this case. But we should not pretend this verdict can be understood in purely legal terms, any more than the O.J. Simpson verdict was.