Lindsay Clancy, Art Heist, and the Best of August

Good morning, it's Friday, Aug. 28. The Lindsay Clancy case is now in the hands of the jury. First time reading? Join over 4.7 million insatiably curious readers. Sign up here.

Also in today's Digest: a four-minute museum heist (Need To Know), a potential criminal complaint against FIFA (Sports, Ent., & Cult.), gene mutations linked to autism (Sci. & Tech.), Benjamin Franklin's alter egos (In-Depth), and much more. 

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 Need To Know 

Jury Weighs Clancy

Jury deliberation began yesterday in the first-degree murder case against Lindsay Clancy, who killed her three young children before attempting to kill herself. The televised trial has drawn national attention to postpartum mental healthcare and how courts assess criminal responsibility. 

Clancy, 36, admits to the January 2023 killings but says she suffered from bipolar disorder and postpartum psychosis, both of which she was diagnosed with after their deaths. Prosecutors characterize Clancy’s actions as premeditated, pointing to findings that she did not take all her prescribed medications for postpartum depression and anxiety. The trial has captivated Americans, with conspiracy theories circulating online, hundreds of Clancy supporters wearing pink outside the courthouse, and a smaller group wearing white in remembrance of the three children.

Clancy faces life in prison without parole if convicted. If found not criminally responsible, a judge may decide whether she can be released or must remain in a mental health facility.

‘Butcher of Bosnia’ Dies

Ratko Mladic, the Bosnian Serb general convicted of genocide for orchestrating the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, died yesterday in UN custody at age 84.

Known as the "Butcher of Bosnia," Mladic was one of the most notorious figures of the 1992-95 Bosnian war, which killed roughly 100,000 people. He commanded Bosnian Serb forces that besieged Sarajevo and, in July 1995, overran Srebrenica, a UN-designated safe area. A hard-line nationalist who portrayed the conflict as a historic struggle against Ottoman rule, Mladic celebrated the capture on camera. His troops then removed women and children and killed about 8,000 Bosniak Muslim men and boys in Europe's worst massacre since World War II (see a timeline of the attack). A UN tribunal convicted Mladic in 2017 of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes and sentenced him to life. He evaded capture for 16 years before his 2011 arrest in a Serbian village.

Hear testimony documenting the massacre and its aftermath from 100 Srebrenica survivors here.

Spanish Museum Heist

A group of men raided the so-called Treasure of Villena from a museum in eastern Spain yesterday. The four-minute heist deprives Europe of its most extensive prehistoric treasure, a roughly 3,000-year-old collection valued at over $2M.

The robbery took place between 5:20 am and 5:24 am local time, with thieves luring police to a sports center at the town’s outskirts minutes before the raid. In that time, they took all but seven of the collection’s 66 artifacts—bracelets, bowls, bottles, and other pieces made of gold, silver, mixed metals, and amber (see photos). The robbery is the latest in a series of museum heists culminating in a Europol warning last week.

Villena's Bronze Age collection was discovered in 1963, when archaeologist José María Soler found the pieces in the town's dry riverbed (watch an archival newsreel; click "settings" for English captions). While the inclusion of two iron pieces stumped researchers for decades, a 2023 study found the metals originated from a meteor.

Sports, Entertainment, & Culture

> Yayoi Kusama, a Japanese pop artist known for her polka-dot designs, dies at age 97 (More) | Scroll through a gallery of her life and artwork (More)

> Voice actor Peter Cullen dies at age 85; the Canadian star voiced Optimus Prime in "Transformers" and Eeyore in several "Winnie the Pooh" projects (More) | Listen to over 45 of his character voices (More)

> UEFA is reportedly preparing a criminal complaint against FIFA president Gianni Infantino for alleged financial mismanagement over his dead $20B plan to sell stake in the World Cup (More) 

Science & Technology

> Largest-ever map of gene mutations linked to autism reveals hundreds of previously unknown protein interactions that impact brain development (More) | Why autism diagnoses expanded to include Asperger's in 2013 (More, w/video)

> Engineers create reconfigurable electronic devices that keep working as they change shape, with potential applications in robotics, disaster response, and more (More, w/image) 

> Electrically charged raindrops found to corrode metal surfaces treated with Teflon, like that of the Eiffel Tower, helping explain why the iconic structure needs frequent repainting (More) | How water droplets generate electricity (More)

Business & Markets

> US stock markets close higher (S&P 500 +0.7%, Dow +0.2%, Nasdaq +1.6%) as tech stocks rally (More) | CrowdStrike shares close up 20% in their best day ever after the cybersecurity firm beat Wall Street's expectations (More) 

> South Korean chipmaker SK Hynix breaks ground on more than $4B advanced memory-chip packaging and research hub in Indiana—its first US facility (More) | How do microchips work? (More) 

> House Oversight Committee releases transcript of former Barclays CEO Jes Staley's testimony over his ties to Jeffrey Epstein; see takeaways (More) 

Politics & World Affairs

> President Donald Trump signs executive order to change Lake Ontario to “Lake America” amid trade war with Canada (More) | See all the places Trump has renamed while in office (More) 

> Nepal flood death toll reaches more than 390 as of this writing, with over 1,400 missing, including tourists from over 30 countries (More) | See how the catastrophic floods unfolded (More, w/visuals)

> Federal aviation officials are reportedly working to fire two air traffic controllers who left work an hour early on the day a jet crashed into a firetruck at LaGuardia Airport; the March 22 collision killed two pilots and injured six other people (More) 

In-Depth

> The Women Who Changed Pop

Longreads | Lisa Whittington-Hill. Take a trip back to the ‘80s with Madonna, Cyndi Lauper, Grace Jones, and more stars whose influence echoes through today's chart-topping tunes. (Read)

> Ben Franklin’s Alter Egos

Smithsonian Magazine | H.W. Brands. Founding Father Benjamin Franklin didn’t always write under his own name. Meet the colorful cast of characters he invented to get his ideas published. (Read)

Editor's note: More than 12 million monthly clicks can't be wrong. Here are the most popular stories we ran in August. Enjoy!

(8/11/26) "Larping" is Gen Z's new favorite insult.

(8/4/26) World's third-smallest country changes its name. 

(8/27/26) The moon turns red tonight. Here's when to look up.

(8/1/26) Could you survive eating George Washington's diet?

(8/25/26) Five factors that influence how likable you are.

(8/6/26) West Virginia sky lit up by spectacular fire rainbow.

(8/3/26) The salacious scourge taking over formal events: "naked" dressing.

(8/14/26) Struggling to declutter your space? Try the “poop rule.”

(8/10/26) Do you live near one of the US' top-ranked hospitals?

(8/20/26) The US' most fun states, ranked. 

(8/25/26) Ranking the nation's top 25 party schools. 

Clickbait: Eight experiences people don't have anymore because of phones. 

Read how Madonna and fellow '80s icons changed pop music. (In-Depth)

Meet Benjamin Franklin's alter egos. (In-Depth)

One more: Listen to the sounds of a Jurassic Period rain forest. (And keep scrolling for more great content!)

Historybook: Black teenager Emmett Till is lynched (1955); Martin Luther King Jr. delivers "I Have a Dream" speech in Washington, DC (1963); Shania Twain born (1965); Prince Charles and Princess Diana divorce (1996); Actor Chadwick Boseman dies (2020).