Patrick Clancy held out hope for 8-month-old son after Lindsay Clancy strangled him, siblings — but 'he died in my arms'

Patrick Clancy held out hope for his 8-month-old son Callan after Lindsay Clancy strangled him and his siblings — 5-year-old Cora and 3-year-old Dawson — in January 2023, according to a "60 Minutes" interview that aired Sunday.

He said he returned to his Duxbury, Massachusetts, home from an errand to find Lindsay lying in the back yard; her throat and wrists were cut — and she was paralyzed after jumping from an upstairs window, CBS News reported.

'There was a time where I didn't think I would live to see my 35th birthday. And I was completely fine with it.'

Patrick, 36, said he found his children strangled in the basement; Cora and Dawson were dead — but Callan was hanging on and was airlifted to Boston Children's Hospital, the news network noted.

"I really thought there was a chance that Callan would live," Patrick said in the interview. "I remember just thinking, 'Just give me one. Just give me one kid, and I would raise him as best I could, and I would give him the best life I possibly could. I'd tell him about his brother and sister.' And I was holding out hope for that."

Callan's heart continued to beat for four days, according to "60 Minutes."

"I got to hold him. I got to lay down next to him," Patrick revealed. "And he died in my arms."

In the following days, CBS News said Patrick wrote tributes to each of his three children — and decided to publicly forgive Lindsay, who's now his ex-wife.

"I saw headlines that said, you know, 'Killer Mom,' and 'Baby Murderer,' 'Monster.' And none of them were accurate," Patrick noted in the interview. "I believe that it was her mental illness that caused that. So I shared those words."

The news network said Lindsay never asked Patrick for forgiveness, but Patrick gave it to her anyway.

CBS News said Patrick and Lindsay both brought medical malpractice lawsuits against health care providers who treated Lindsay — and while some have denied wrongdoing, others haven't yet responded to the claims.

Patrick noted to "60 Minutes" that he believes he "did the best I could with what I had at the time. And I live with the outcome. I live with it every day."

He also shared that shortly after his children's deaths "there was a day where I, really without thinking, I drove by their school, and it was at the exact time that all of their friends were getting dropped off, and I ... just couldn't be there anymore."

RELATED: Lindsay Clancy murder trial hits huge speed bump (UPDATE)

JOSEPH PREZIOSO/AFP/Getty Images

Patrick was asked in the interview if he had suicidal thoughts. His reply? "There was a time where I didn't think I would live to see my 35th birthday. And I was completely fine with it."

He added that he no longer could stay in Duxbury, and in April 2023, he moved to New York City where he sought anonymity, CBS News reported.

"Five weeks after I moved to New York, on May 26, I had to figure out how I'm going to celebrate Callan's first birthday," Patrick shared in the interview, his eyes welling up. "And how do you celebrate your son's first birthday months after he's passed away? And so I go to St. Patrick's Cathedral, I light a candle, and I said, 'I love you buddy.' And I walk out on 5th Avenue, and I stared crying my eyes out. And nobody cared ... and I thought, 'This is where I need to be. I can grieve.'"

Patrick added that before moving from the family house in Duxbury, he kept a number of items that reminded him of his children: Interviewer Ross Douthat mentioned a stuffed "baby sloth that Cora carried everywhere; a photo of Callan wearing a bow tie almost bigger than him; [and] Dawson's battered and beloved helicopter."

You can view the entire "60 Minutes" interview here; the below clip is a summary of its content:

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By this April, Patrick was remarried to Rachel Danis, a New York City fertility doctor, CBS News said.

Danis told the news network that she met Patrick in January 2024 in a New York City run club and got to know each other over coffee.

"Pat pulled out his phone to pay, and I noticed this adorable photo of children as the wallpaper," Danis shared with CBS News. "And I just asked, 'Who are those cuties?' And Pat said, 'Those are my kids.' And then I think I asked if they live in Massachusetts, and Pat said, 'They died.' And this is just at the cashier."

Danis noted in the "60 Minutes" interview that she tried to "take some of the weight from Pat."

"I can't bring his kids back," she noted. "But if I can honor them and allow Pat to grieve but also just continue to honor them in the present, I guess that's all I can do."

What's more, the couple shared with "60 Minutes" that they're starting a family — and Patrick is preparing to one day tell his future child about their older siblings, Cora, Dawson, and Callan.

"I think every parent can agree, you have different relationships with your kids, but they're all your kids," Patrick said, according to CBS News. "And I can't wait to tell them about their brothers and sister."

During Lindsay Clancy's murder trial over the summer, Patrick testified and found himself at the center of an online swarm of sleuths and influencers dissecting every detail of the case, developing theories that portray him as uncaring, unfaithful — and even the murderer of his children, CBS News reported.

"It's painful to see. And it makes it difficult to be in public, and it's possible that some of those people, after seeing lie after lie after lie, they start to believe it, and that's what we're left with," Patrick said in the "60 Minutes" interview.

CBS News reported that one of the catalysts for theories about Patrick was his apparent stoicism on the witness stand, but Patrick said testifying was difficult — and that he experienced a "massive, traumatic panic attack" on the second day of his testimony.

"They put me in an ambulance," Patrick noted in the interview. "They offered me some medication, but I said, 'I don't want it, because I want to go back, and I want to finish this so I can be done with this.' And I went back, and I finished the testimony."

Lindsay Clancy's trial ended with a hung jury earlier this month.

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