3.Margaret Hamp — Direct/Cross/Redirect
115 linesBAILIFF: Court, all rise please. Jury's entering.
BAILIFF: Court is back in session. You may be seated.
COURT CLERK: Your Honor, if it please the court, I'd like to return back to the trial of Commonwealth versus Lindsay Marie Clancy. I have the presence of the defendant and the Commonwealth's witnesses.
THE COURT: All right. So members of the jury, as I indicated before, the Commonwealth has rested. All right, so at this time I'm gonna inquire of the defendant if she intends or wishes to call any witnesses at this time. Mr. Reddington.
MR. REDDINGTON: Yes, Your Honor. Thank you. Page Hamp, please. I believe she's right outside.
COURT CLERK: Good afternoon. Please raise your right hand. Do you solemnly swear that the testimony and the evidence you shall give to the court and the jury in the matter now pending between the Commonwealth and [oath administered]
THE COURT: Hey, good afternoon.
MARGARET HAMP: Good afternoon, Your Honor.
THE COURT: I'm gonna ask you if you can keep your voice up and speak into that microphone.
MARGARET HAMP: Okay.
THE COURT: Okay. Thank you. Mr. Reddington.
MR. REDDINGTON: I'm just gonna say the same thing. So make sure that all the jurors way down here even can hear you, okay?
MARGARET HAMP: Okay.
MR. REDDINGTON: Tell us your name.
MARGARET HAMP: It's Margaret Hamp.
MR. REDDINGTON: And what town do you live in?
MARGARET HAMP: Stoneham.
MR. REDDINGTON: And what do you do for work?
MARGARET HAMP: I'm a labor and delivery nurse.
MR. REDDINGTON: Where?
MARGARET HAMP: At Mass General.
MR. REDDINGTON: And how long have you been working as a labor and delivery nurse?
MARGARET HAMP: I started on our labor and delivery unit in 2012.
MR. REDDINGTON: Okay, so about what, 24 years? No.
MARGARET HAMP: I started for the obstetrics department in 2006.
MR. REDDINGTON: Okay. So 20 years you've been working for Mass General between obstetrics and labor and delivery, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MR. REDDINGTON: Do you know Lindsay?
MARGARET HAMP: I do.
MR. REDDINGTON: How do you know her?
MARGARET HAMP: I was working on the labor floor when Lindsay first started with us.
MR. REDDINGTON: So this would be the labor and delivery floor, and she started as a nurse, correct?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MR. REDDINGTON: Who had already been working there?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MR. REDDINGTON: And she was about what, 24 years old?
MARGARET HAMP: Roughly.
MR. REDDINGTON: And came in as a young woman, as a nurse, correct?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MR. REDDINGTON: Can you tell us, to your observation... Well, let me ask you this. How many years did you work with her?
MARGARET HAMP: She started, I believe, in 2015, and I worked until 2022 when she went out with Callan.
MR. REDDINGTON: About seven years or thereabout. Did you know that she had a child, Cora?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: And did you know that she had a child, Dawson?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: And ultimately, that she had a child, a baby that was born very, very recently, Callan?
MARGARET HAMP: Mm-hmm.
MR. REDDINGTON: In the years that you were working with her, were you able to observe... I mean, did she like being a nurse? Did she wanna work or was she a good nurse? What's your opinion?
MARGARET HAMP: Lindsay loved being a nurse. She was really good at being a nurse. She was compassionate, she was kind, she was a patient advocate. She was the type of nurse that you wanted taking care of you or your loved one when you walked onto our unit.
MR. REDDINGTON: Did you observe, for example, that on occasion when she would be involved with the delivery of a baby that she would become emotional?
MARGARET HAMP: Lindsay was often emotional during births of complete strangers. She would cry, and she would just say, “That was so beautiful.” You could just tell that she really loved being in that setting.
MR. REDDINGTON: Over those years, right up until the time of Callan being born, fair to say that you stayed friendly with her?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: And you're still friendly with her?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Can you tell us, did you observe, during the time you worked with her, how she emoted or felt about her children, all three of them?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Tell us anything that you recall.
MARGARET HAMP: So Lindsay and I worked the night shift together. And often on the night shift, you get to have a opportunity to really get to know your coworkers and celebrate things that are happening in their lives or support them with things that are not going so well. Lindsay asked a lot of questions of her coworkers about parenting. Simple things as she would poll the nursing staff about monogrammed lunchboxes, right down to sleeping habits, what questions do you ask a daycare provider to make sure that you're in the right place. She was often asking her coworkers childcare, parenting tips.
MR. REDDINGTON: When she had Callan, after Callan was born in the spring, late spring of '22, did you see her after the birth of Callan?
MARGARET HAMP: I did not see her after the birth of Callan.
MR. REDDINGTON: Were you aware that she had taken a leave of absence from Mass General?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Did you stay in touch with her by phone or text?
MARGARET HAMP: I briefly kept in touch through text. After Callan was born, I reached out to her, and I asked her for her address and how she was doing so I could send her a gift. And then a few months later, she circled back to me to thank me for the gift that I had sent her.
MR. REDDINGTON: Do you recall an incident, on one occasion where she was looking or monitoring one of the children and the child was crying, and you observed what happened after that?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Tell us about that.
MARGARET HAMP: Lindsay often checked in on her kids while they were sleeping at night. Again, we worked the night shift, and she had the ability to look at her phone and see what Cora or Callan were doing in their cribs. And she shared that with a lot of us. There was one particular night that Cora was crying. She was probably about six months old, and L- Lindsay never let Cora cry. She wasn't at that point in parenting, and she was very communicative about that. And Cora was crying on the monitor. It was the middle of the night, and I... Maybe after 10 minutes, she started to call Pat, and he wasn't answering. And she got really worried that, one, Cora was crying, but now Pat wasn't answering his phone.
MARGARET HAMP: So in the middle of the night, she called the police to do a wellness check on her family.
MR. REDDINGTON: Okay. And while you were working the night shift, is that pretty much what you both worked together all those years?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Would that be through the pandemic as well?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MR. REDDINGTON: Would you say that that was quite a bonding experience, being in labor delivery up close and personal with patients during the pandemic at night?
MARGARET HAMP: Of course. It was a very challenging time as a healthcare provider.
MR. REDDINGTON: Thank you very much.
MR. REDDINGTON: You can inquire.
THE COURT: Alright. Commonwealth.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: Good morning.
MARGARET HAMP: Good morning.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: So the incident that you just told us about where Miss Clancy was watching the monitor overnight, you are aware that the police responded and everything was fine, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And you worked with her through 2022 when she went out with leave on Callan?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And you never visited their house after Callan was born, did you?
MARGARET HAMP: No.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: You don't know what was going on in her life, did you?
MARGARET HAMP: No.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And she didn't share any of her struggles with you via text or in any other capacity, did she?
MARGARET HAMP: No.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And as a labor and delivery nurse, and having been trained in labor and delivery, and you said you worked obstetrics before, correct?
MARGARET HAMP: Correct.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: Is it fair to say that you often have patients that come to you in both those areas that have some mental illness or are on psychiatric medications, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Sometimes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And working labor and delivery, you have some training on how to handle patients that are on certain types of medications, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Limited training, yes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: Well, it affects how you're going to birth... go through a birth plan or do a delivery if a person is on some sort of long-term medication, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Right.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And so you're aware that Zoloft is something that's deemed safe for pregnant moms and breastfeeding moms?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And you've had patients that have dealt with bipolar issues before?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: And that they have to remain medication compliant in order to manage those things, right?
MARGARET HAMP: Yes.
MS. BUCKINGHAM: Thank you. Nothing further.
THE COURT: All right. Mr. Reddington.
MR. REDDINGTON: So your experience dealing with patients that have birthed a child, as the district attorney asked, and are on Zoloft and expressing issues of being a parent, were you aware of any incidents where Lindsay was with you and a woman did in fact express concern that she wanted to hurt herself or her child?
MARGARET HAMP: There was a particular patient that Lindsay was on staff when this patient arrived. It was a patient that arrived to the unit that had plans to harm herself while she was pregnant. And we had a conversation. Lindsay was brand new. It was the summer that she had just started. And we had a conversation about mental health in pregnancy and postpartum. And I asked her if she had ever heard of the Andrea Yates case, and she hadn't. And I explained that to her, and she cried, and she said, “How could a mother hurt her children?”
MR. REDDINGTON: Thank you. All set.
MARGARET HAMP: Thank you.
THE COURT: Commonwealth?
THE COURT: All right. You may sit down. Thank you.
THE COURT: Counsel.