Clancy trial ends in deadlock

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Listen to Choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen. It's everything your business needs in one place, saving you time, headaches and serious money. Stop paying for missing pieces. Go to odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com to learn more. This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service. Hello, I'm Ankur Desai and in the early hours of Saturday the 5th of September, these are our main stories. A mistrial has been declared in the high-profile murder trial of Lindsay Clancy. The mother-child. is charged with murdering her three small children. A Russian drone has struck the headquarters of Ukraine's security service in Kiev, ahead of the expected arrival of US mediators in the city. And the UN General Assembly has voted overwhelmingly in favour of a resolution calling for a new world map that more accurately reflects the size of Africa. Also in this podcast, the latest rogue AI attack that even went as far as transforming the targeted website. And. We find out how Giorgia Meloni has managed to lead the longest-serving administration in post-war Italy. It's a case that's gripped not only the United States, but also, because of social media, the world. The trial of Lindsay Clancy. After a week of deliberation, jurors have failed to reach a unanimous verdict on the American mother, accused of murdering. her three children. The judge in Massachusetts, William Sullivan, declared a mistrial and thanked the jury for their hard work and effort. I watched every day, day after day, week after week, all of you performing that duty that you're braced for. And I just kind of wanted to let you know I understood how hard everybody worked in this case. I understood that you all gave everything you could, and probably more than you thought you could. Lindsay Clancy pleaded not guilty. to murder, but has never denied killing her children, aged between eight months and five years. Her lawyer, Kevin Reddington, entered a defense of insanity, saying she was suffering from postpartum or postnatal psychosis at the time, and could not distinguish right from wrong. If anything, this case showed clearly and unequivocally the woeful deficiency that women have when they're pregnant, when they have babies, and God forbid, when they're unmedicated. Medication because of postpartum depression, postpartum psychosis, it's just horrible what we saw in this trial. And maybe things have to change. Patrick Clancy told the court that Lindsay, his ex-wife, was a very dedicated mother who struggled with her mental health. After the verdict, he issued a statement thanking the court and jurors, adding that the prospect of a retrial would be extremely painful for his family. A correspondent, Anna Fagy, who's been covering the story, told me about the reaction to the verdict. There was a lot of shock that this was finally over because we'd been waiting for a while, and each day this week while I was in court, we thought today was the day, and then we came back the next day, right? And then yesterday, of course, we had this big moment where we found out that there was one holdout juror. And so we finally got some inclination as to which way they were headed. And then to come back today and get a final answer that there was a mistrial, I think people were just shocked after seven days where we ended up. Lindsay Clancy's husband says a retrial would be extraordinarily painful for his family. So bearing that in mind, has the prosecution given any indication of their intentions and their steps forward? Earlier this week, as the DA was walking through the hallway, reporters posed this question to him. And he basically said, should that be the outcome? We're going to retry this. Now, he said that to us before the Thursday note from the jury that indicated that there was a deadlock happening. So whether or not that's still his stance remains to be seen. But he did come out to the microphones on Friday after all of this happened and said to reporters, we're still mulling over what to do. They could bring the case again as first-degree murder charges, which is a premeditated intentional killing of someone. And of course, she was charged with three counts for all three children. Or they could bring a lesser charge. If they brought a lesser charge, which some have indicated they might have better success should they do that, they wouldn't necessarily have to have a jury-led trial. It could be a judge-led trial, which may lead to a jury-led trial. It could lead to a quicker or more resolute resolution here. And what happens to Lindsay Clancy now? She's in a psychiatric facility. She's been held there since all of this happened, and she'll remain there until we figure out what's going to happen next. If she's tried and found guilty, she could go to prison. If she's found not guilty, she could stay in that same mental institution that she's in now. And just finally, is this being seen as a turning point in postpartum cases now? I think so, for sure. I spoke to experts. I spoke to doctors who study postpartum psychosis and postpartum depression who explained extensively that this is an under-researched, under-understood part of the postpartum experience. And one of the reasons why that is in the U.S. is that postpartum psychosis does not have its own classification in what's called the DSM-5 or the Encyclopedia of Psychiatry. And without that classification, you can't get as much research funding. It doesn't show up in textbooks in the same way. And then you don't have gynecologists and obstetricians learning about postpartum psychosis. And then you don't have gynecologists and obstetricians learning what this is or necessarily knowing how to identify it in their patients. So we have this kind of cyclical problem as it relates to postpartum psychosis. And so cases like this one, and especially this one, because the attention in the U.S. has been wild over this case. It's all over social media. It's all over the Internet. Everybody's talking about it. Experts told me, you know, this is going to be a turning point. People are going to understand that there's a difference between postpartum psychosis and postpartum depression. They're going to understand better now that this is a severe psychiatric emergency. That needs to be taken seriously. And hopefully, as medical experts said, it'll get classified in the DSM-5, which will just be crucial for widespread understanding and better treatment for those women who face this. Anna Fagy. A Russian drone has struck the headquarters of Ukraine's security service, the SBU, in central Kyiv, ahead of the expected arrival of U.S. mediators in the city. President Volodymyr Zelensky said the drone was aimed at the head of the service, but he wasn't amassed. Among at least 12 people injured in the attack. Mrs. Zelensky has promised a temporary ceasefire with Russia, while the U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner have talks in Moscow on Saturday and Kyiv on Sunday. My colleague Valerie Sanderson spoke to our diplomatic correspondent James Landau, who is in the Ukrainian capital. Kyiv has been under attack day and night by Russia for the last two weeks or so as part of a new tactic where Russia has attempted to instead of just attacking Kyiv during the night, it's tried to step up its attacks throughout the day, around the clock. On average, there have been about 10 air raid alerts a day. But during that period, most of the strikes have been on infrastructure and on businesses, warehouses, sometimes in residential areas. This is the first time they've directly targeted, as far as we know, the heart of the Ukrainian state and government, namely the head of their security services. It happened in the middle of the afternoon. It was during one of the alerts that was taking place and took place not far from where we are. And we had a very quick whoosh and then an explosion across the rooftops and smoke rising above the building. And it turned out that it had been, according to President Zelensky, not just a direct targeted attack on the security services, but against specifically the office of the man who heads up that agency. So you mentioned President Zelensky. What has been his reaction and that of Ukraine? Well, President Zelensky has obviously, he decried the attack. He has promised to make what he called an appropriate, tangible response. Ukrainian officials are describing it as a clear escalation. We haven't got, you know, we don't know when or how Ukraine will respond to that. But they're making it very clear that this is something that will require some kind of response. Mr. Zelensky has also very pointedly published a picture of him sitting down with the head of the security services, discussing what that response is. In other words, making it very clear to the Russians that Mr. Pokhlad, who is the head of the agency, you know, is alive and well. And James, the timing of this is crucial, isn't it, with talks coming up in Ukraine? That's the really interesting question, which is that why are the Russians doing this? Why are they carrying out this particular attack? Because if there are, as we expect, talks with US mediators, Mr. Kushner and Mr. Witkoff, both in Moscow and in Kiev over the weekend, WHY THE RUSSIANS choosing this moment to step up their attack and escalate the tensions. We don't know the answer to that question, but some speculation that is taking place here in Kiev amongst analysts is that the Russians may be trying to work on what are believed to be concerns by the American sides for the safety of Mr Kushner and Mr Witkoff were they to come to Kiev, because they would be coming to a city that has been under round-the-clock attack from Russia for the last two weeks or so. James Landau reporting from Kiev. Now to the latest case of artificial intelligence apparently going rogue. It's been revealed that OpenAI hijacked a German website earlier this year, even going so far as to repurpose the platform. The incident was uncovered by researchers who monitor the internet for signs of unauthorized activity by AI agents. It's not the first time something like this has happened and has raised even more questions around AI safety outside of human control. Zoe Kleinman is our technology editor. You may already be familiar with an event that happened in July when some AI products called agents developed by OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, hacked into another tech company called Hugging Face. And at the time it was described as the first ever cyber attack that was AI enabled because it was done by these agents. And it turned out that they'd managed to make, a secret message board and communicate with each other in secret to figure out how to access the internet and how to get to this company. The new report that's just come out suggests that actually OpenAI's agents have a bit of track record of having done this before, that they had taken over a website, a German website. It's like a Wikipedia style website. So it's one that, you know, anyone can contribute to. But they'd got into it and they'd made 15,000 edits to it. Over a three month period. And they were communicating with each other and they were sharing tips about how to avoid detection and remain hidden. And when the other editors of the website started noticing and taking pages down, the agents started sharing computer code about how to retrieve the deleted pages so they could get their communications back. So what we are starting to see is AI tools that are acting independently of humans, if you like, and also covering, their tracks and trying to not be as visible as we would like in terms of being able to see what they're doing. OpenAI says it can't respond meaningfully because it wasn't given the report before publication. The report was given to the news agency Reuters. It has now got the report and says it will take the necessary steps. It says it has already said it was aware that some of its agents had figured out how to use message boards and how to communicate. And it says that it has already been public about that. It's been open. But, you know, we've just seen just last night, OpenAI unveiled its latest AI model called Astra, and it says it's its most powerful yet, and that it can do a task that would take a human being five hours. It can do it in under three minutes. So on the one hand, you know, we've got these incredibly rapidly advancing, highly evolved technology. And on the other hand, it seems that there's increasing concern that it's starting to be able to operate as a human being. Outside of human control. And a lot of people are very, very worried about that from a cyber security point of view, but also, I suppose, from a rather dystopian point of view. Our technology editor, Zoe Kleinman. Here's a question for you. Which do you think is bigger, Greenland or the Democratic Republic of the Congo? Well, if you look at most maps, Greenland would appear to have a much larger landmass. But in fact, it's a good deal smaller. The UN General Assembly has just passed a resolution aimed at fixing that discrepancy. It's calling for the traditional world map to be replaced by one that more accurately reflects the size of Africa and other parts of the world. Helena Burke has the details. Back in 1569, the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator created a world map. Its main purpose was to help sailors navigate the globe, as the cartography professor James Cheshire explains. In Mercator's case, what he was doing was he was creating a projection that would work really well for the world map. It would work really well for navigating across oceans, which was principally what people were interested in using maps for. And so, in his view, he wanted a straight line to be drawn on a map to look like a straight line in reality if you followed a compass bearing. So that was what it was intended to do, and that's what it does brilliantly well. To keep those angles correct on a flat map, Mercator had to stretch the grid lines wider as they moved away from the equator towards the pole. The result was that the countries further away from the equator, particularly those in Europe, appeared much larger than they really were, while those closer to the equator appeared much smaller. In fact, the Mercator map makes Greenland look roughly the same size as Africa, even though the continent is actually 14 times bigger. More than 450 years on, Mercator's map is still the basis for many of the maps we see in classrooms, documentaries and online, including Google Maps. For years, Mercator's map was the basis for many of the maps we see African campaigners have been pushing for the Mercator map to be replaced with a more accurate, equal Earth projection. Moki Makura has been leading the charge. I've referred to this as the world's longest misinformation campaign because it's just wrong. Africa is made to look smaller than it really is. The distortion matters because it literally shrinks Africa's power and our place in the world. You know, the size being smaller than European countries when in reality, Africa is smaller than it really is. In reality, you can fit all of Europe, China, India, America and other countries into a continent. It makes the continent look less important, less powerful and less full of potential. And for me, this is really about truth and accuracy, but it's also about dignity and symbolism. I'd like to see the equal Earth projection used everywhere. So in school textbooks, online, on Google Maps, in PowerPoint templates and Canva templates. But decide. Does size really matter? Donald Trump certainly seems to think so. There's been some speculation that Greenland's gargantuan appearance on traditional maps may have partly informed the US president's desire to take over the territory. This enormous, unsecured island is actually part of North America. It's the United States alone that can protect this giant mass of land, this giant piece of ice. Now, years of campaigning for a more accurate representation of the world's countries has paid off. The UN General Assembly has passed the Correct the Map resolution with the support of 164 nations. The United States was the only country to vote against it and there were six abstentions. The resolution calls for the gradual phasing out of the use of the traditional Makata map. The change at the UN was spearheaded by Togo's foreign minister, Robert Dussie. A fair map does not change the geography of the world. It changes how we see the world. And when our perspective becomes more just, it paves the way for greater understanding, respect and peace among nations. The equal Earth projection is widely regarded as the most accurate display of the relative sizes of the world's land masses. But it's not perfect. The map still distorts some shapes, angles and distances, as Professor Cheshire explains. It's really hard to take a sphere or technically an oblate spheroid, which is the shape of our Earth, and put it on a flat sheet of paper. So there's no perfect way of doing it. And there's lots of different approaches you can take and you can preserve area or you can preserve shape or you can preserve distance and direction but not everything at once perfectly because otherwise you'd be back to a sphere. I think really what needs to happen is, you know, we start to move to a situation where people start to think more deeply about the maps they're looking at and asking, you know, why is this area bigger than that area and what impact is it having on me? And I think that's, you know, that's the real positive that comes out of this, I think. The Correct the Map resolution is non-binding, which means countries aren't required to implement it. However, the UN's decision will still spur changes to the maps used by institutions around the world. That report from Helena Burke. Still to come in this podcast. If you come to a sporting event, you have to respect the sport. And I feel like it's common courtesy to read up on the sport, especially like the etiquette. Frustration over the behaviour of social media influencers at the US Open Tennis Grand Slam. And to think, that's just a small taste of what Schwab offers. Because Schwab knows that when it comes to your finances, choice matters. No matter your goals, investing style, life stage or experience, Schwab has everything you need, all in one place, so you can invest your way. Visit schwab.com to learn more. Get more with BBC Podcasts, wherever you listen. Be the first to listen to your favourite shows, like Evil Genius, Good Bad Billionaire and You're Dead to Me, with a subscription to BBC. podcasts premium on apple podcasts you can also enjoy a range of our podcasts ad free with an amazon music subscription ever wonder why we make the choices we do and how to make smarter ones introducing choiceology an original podcast from charles schwab join wharton professor katie milkman an award-winning behavioral scientist and author of the best-selling book how to change as she shares true stories from nobel laureates authors athletes and everyday people about why we do the things we do and how to make better choices to help avoid costly mistakes each episode covers the latest research in behavioral science and dives into themes like the power of self-control shaping your mindset for success navigating new beginnings and why starting over can feel so hard listen to choiceology at schwab.com slash podcast or wherever you listen this is the global news podcast there's been an upsurge in fighting in yemen between iranian backed houthi forces and saudi-backed government troops more than 120 people have died in what would have been described as the deadliest clashes between the two sides in years the latest fighting in a civil war which began in the late 90s and ended in the late 90s and ended in the late 90s in 2014 started when the houthis tried to take control of coastal territory on the red sea that sea route has become increasingly important since the u.s iran war closed the straits of hormuz in the gulf saudi arabia in particular is now reliant on the red sea to export its oil valerie sanderson find out more from our middle east analyst sebastian usher as of everything in yemen i mean nothing is that clear we don't really have independent reporting from this so we hear different accounts from the two sides the government the pro-government side is really playing this up they're the ones who've been giving the information about how many people they say have been killed this was essentially assault that was launched by the houthis on thursday the houthis are playing it down saying it's just more clashes it's kind of what goes on but i think there's more to it than that i mean this is in and around the key city of thais in a province which has been divided for a long time now there was a loul in fighting for the past four years or so but it's begun to ignite over the past few weeks very much to do with the iran war and the contagion of that but more specifically recently with the babel mandeb strait that is like the state of hormuz it's another key waterway for energy spies to go through saudi ships have been using that instead of the state of hormuz and the houthis have been firing at them to try and close it down now there's a port and thais is the way to it called mocha mocha is where the coffee comes from the name but it's also an absolute key port for if you want to control the babel mandeb straight that's where you want to be so it would give the houthis a much better chance of essentially shutting it down if they wanted to so what are the chances do you think of a ceasefire i mean you said there had been a lull in the fighting previously yes i mean there basically hadn't really been any movement or any real fighting for a long time i mean there was a u.s of ceasefire that came in 2022 and the houthis essentially were increasing their control of where they were fighting and they were fighting where they had the control up in the north and sana and the government down in the south that's all been thrown up into here as i say by what's been happening with iran saudi arabia which backs the pro-government forces has come much more to the forefront again in yemen and in terms of a conflict with the houthis the saudis and also the uae which was one of the big outside forces had really wanted to get themselves out of this war because it wasn't as far as they were concerned achieving anything but they've come back in now and the houthis very briefly the houthis yes they're iranian backed yes they are doing this to some extent to help iran but also they have their own agenda they're not just a proxy they want to increase their power their control within yemen as well sebastian usher final rallies have been held in the eastern german state of saxony anhalt ahead of sunday's state election polls suggest the far-right alternativa for deutschland will win more than 40 of the vote there and could even for the first time be in a position to form a state government campaigning has now ended our europe correspondent jessica parker spoke to us from an afd rally in the city of magdeburg if the afd managed to secure power following the election on sunday in the state of saxony anhalt it'll be the first time since the party was founded that it will have power at a state level the states in germany they hold significant powers through their state parliament schools policing culture so the afd would have real power here locally and the afd see it as a potential stepping stone for their ambitions to take power at a federal level even though they are way ahead in the polls there is no guarantee that they're going to get into power because other parties won't work for them with them so they're looking to try and secure a parliamentary majority which would be quite a feat in german politics the party's critics of which there are many and we're expecting demonstrations over the weekend they are deeply concerned about some of the things that the afd outlines in its manifesto the manifesto talks about defunding anti-german art it uses the term remigration in its manifesto which is a bit of a slippery term but is understood by some people to mean the mass deportation of people from a migrant background the afd insists their plans are focusing on people who are here illegally but this is a controversial party it is designated by domestic intelligence here in the state as right-wing extremists a designation the party rejects the afd has particularly strong in the former communist states of eastern germany so saxian holds they have really managed to establish their strongholds although they are popular in other parts of the country they're leading the polls nationally as well um i think there's like a bunch of different things going on in terms of why they're popular here people talk about having a real anxiety uh for their future i think there's been a sense of nostalgia sometimes at the afd manages to use but also i think they have managed to tap into people's concerns around being concerned about immigration a lot of people talk about not wanting to send support anymore to ukraine that comes up frequently jessica parker in central germany in our previous podcast we mentioned briefly that the italian prime minister had reached an important political milestone on friday miss maloney's government had been in office for 1413 days making it the longest serving administration in the history of the italian republic surpassing the previous record set by silvio berlusconi it's a remarkable achievement in a country famous for governments that don't tend to last very long our reporter carla conti told us more about why miss maloney has outlasted her predecessors well partly because giorgia maloney has proved to be a much more pragmatic politician in government than many expected she first came to power in 2022 as a hardline nationalist but once in office she actually became more moderate on some of the issues that could have caused real trouble so for example she has kept italy firmly behind ukraine she has worked constructively with brussels and maintained fairly tight control of the public finances and at home she has also been very good at managing her coalition there have been tensions with matteo salvini she's largely avoided the sort of major political fights or divisive reforms that have brought down italian governments in the past and it helps that the opposition is largely fragmented as well so really a lot of it comes down to the fact that her coalition partners have had more to gain by staying than walking away and they may not always agree with her but miss maloney has been quite effective at making sure that those disagreements don't ever go away or become full-blown political crises okay so she's had some time in the job we're in 2026 now how are italians viewing her opinion is certainly divided her supporters would point to some genuinely positive figures things like unemployment being at a record low at the moment italy's borrowing cost falling sharply and irregular migrant arrivals dropping sharply since their peak in 2023 and miss maloney herself has been a big part of that and she's been a big part of that remained quite popular she has cultivated this image as a down-to-earth direct and self-assured politician someone that can connect with ordinary italians but longevity doesn't necessarily mean that italians think that the government has delivered wages have stagnated economic growth remains sluggish and things like the cost of living immigration health care and security are still major concerns for voters okay so um the challenge is then ahead for georgie maloney and next uh next year elections are expected and like you said the government and her distinctions there what about the polls what are they saying in terms of her her hopes next year well there are certainly signs that her position isn't quite as dominant as it used to be her brothers of italy party is still comfortably the biggest single party polling at around 26 but the gap between her central right coalition and the opposition has narrowed significantly and interestingly enough one of the biggest threats this time is not coming from the left or the center but from within the right. The former army general Roberto Vannacci has launched his own nationalist political party and is polling at around 7%. And he's been attracting voters who think that Miss Meloni has become too moderate, too pro-European and too supportive of Ukraine. So the question now is whether she can convince Italians that this stability has actually improved their lives and persuade them to give her another term next year. Carla Conti. We end at the US Open tennis, where the two-times champion there Naomi Osaka has called for fans at the Grand Slam event to respect the sport's etiquette after her first-round match was disrupted by spectators filming themselves. One group held a photo shoot in the hospitality suite while play was going on. Organisers have invited a record number of social media influencers to the event, around 100, which is double last year's figure. But there's still a long way to go. Some of their conduct has drawn criticism. This report from our sports news correspondent, Andy Swiss. Forget playing. For some, it's all about the posing. The sight and sound of influencers filming themselves during US Open matches has become familiar, if not always popular. During Naomi Osaka's opening match, the umpire reprimanded some fans for holding a photo shoot in their hospitality suite while play was going on. And Osaka herself says the influencers at Flushing Meadows need to be more thoughtful. I think, obviously, if you come to a sporting event, you have to respect the sport. And I feel like it's common courtesy to, like, read up on the sport, especially, like, the etiquette. Around 100 influencers and content creators have been accredited for the tournament, twice as many as last year. In a statement, organisers said they wanted to attract new audiences. They said they wanted to attract new audiences. And they said they wanted to attract new audiences, but also needed to ensure spectators didn't interfere with the action. They're now putting more screen messages around the ground, asking fans to refrain from disruptive activities, including noise levels, flash photography and ring lights. Tennis traditionalists will hope the sport's new audience doesn't come at the cost of its old values. Andy Swiss. And that's all from us for now. If you want to get in touch, you can email us at globalpodcast at bbc.co.uk. You can also find us on X at BBC World Service. Use the hashtag Global News Pod. And don't forget our sister podcast, The Global Story, which goes in depth and beyond the headlines on one big story. This edition of the Global News Podcast was mixed by Mark Pickett and the producers were Paul Day and Helena Burke. The editor is Karen Martin and I'm Ankur Desai. Until next time, goodbye.