Kevin Reddington, the defense attorney for Lindsay Clancy, said Thursday that Fox News legal analyst Jonathan Turley was wrong to criticize his public comments about the lone holdout juror who blocked a unanimous murder verdict against Clancy, and said he would welcome a debate on the matter.
“I’d like to meet with him sometime and maybe debate a few things,” Reddington told Fox News correspondent Bryan Llenas.
Turley, a George Washington University law professor, had earlier called Reddington’s public criticism of the holdout juror “utterly reprehensible, a breathtaking abandonment of restraint and decency.” Llenas read that assessment back to Reddington: “He effectively put a target on the back of a juror who committed the unpardonable sin of not being convinced by his arguments.”
Reddington did not accept it.
“Well, I guess Jonathan Turley was wrong, wasn’t he? Based on what we now know as far as the reason why this jury did not vote in accordance with the law. Maybe Jonathan Turley should check out the record before he makes his accusations. I kind of think his comments were reprehensible.”
Llenas noted that the public still has not heard directly from the holdout juror. “We don’t know what this one juror actually means or have said,” he said.
Reddington replied that it was “probably a matter of time before he’s getting interviewed somewhere and you can find out.”
Turley Responds
The exchange is the latest turn in a dispute that began after Clancy’s trial ended, when Reddington publicly criticized the juror whose vote prevented a unanimous decision on the murder charges. Turley accused the veteran defense attorney of abandoning the professional restraint lawyers owe jurors after a verdict.
After the Fox News interview was published, Turley responded again on X.
“I was surprised to learn this morning that Kevin Reddington challenged me to a debate in an interview with Fox News reporter Bryan Llenas over my criticism of his attack on the holdout juror in the Clancy trial. I am curious as to what is debatable in his view: the professional duty of lawyers not to fuel the rage against a holdout juror or his apparent self-exemption from that duty.”
Turley has argued lawyers have an ethical duty not to stoke public anger at jurors who exercise independent judgment during deliberations. Reddington maintains the holdout juror did not follow the judge’s instructions and that information since the trial supports his criticism.
Clancy’s trial in Massachusetts ended in a mistrial after jurors deadlocked on whether she was criminally responsible for the deaths of her three young children. Prosecutors have said they intend to retry her on the murder charges.
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