TRUE CRIME FRIDAY: LUCY LETBY

Ninetoes and his wife recently watched a NETFLIX doc on the tragic case of maternity nurse Lucy Letby and it made him think.

Hey there, true crime lovers! It is your favorite investigator, Ninetoes, and I am on the beat with The Lucy Letby Case. I have my notebook in hand and coffee in my system, so let’s get to it!

My wife and I recently watched a Netflix documentary, The Investigation of Lucy Letby. This one is a head scratcher and left me with some mixed emotions. As you read this article, I want you to keep in mind this question: What is more plausible, that a young nurse killed seven babies and tried to kill seven more, or was she the fall guy for an understaffed neonatal unit that had critical failures in many instances? As I said, it is a head scratcher.

Lucy Letby was a nurse on the neonatal unit at Countess of Chester Hospital. She began work at this hospital in January of 2012. She completed a neonatal specialization course in 2014 and went on to further training at Liverpool Women’s Hospital in 2015. Between these courses, she was qualified to work with infants in the intensive care unit. From the years of June 2015 to June 2016, she came under suspicion of the deaths of seven infants

Suspicions arose in June 2015 when there was an increase in collapses and deaths in the neonatal unit at Countess of Chester Hospital. A collapse is where there is a sudden drop of strength or consciousness, sometimes due to decreased flow of blood to the brain. At this time, four collapses occurred, three of them resulting in the death of an infant. The neonatal unit usually records three deaths a year. An informal review was done, and the deaths were attributed to medication errors. It was noted that Lucy Letby was on duty for all of these occurrences. It should also be noted that she was working extra shifts due to staffing issues.

In June 2016, neonatologist Steven Breary made a request that Letby be removed from clinical duties pending an investigation. She was transferred to the patient experience team and then later on to the risk and patient safety office. She remained here until her arrest in 2018. It should be noted that when Lucy Letby left the unit on June 30, 2016, the hospital reduced patient capacity and raised the gestational age threshold for admissions to the unit.

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) began an inquiry into the infant death in September 2016. In October, it issued a report that found no direct explanation for the rise in infant mortality rate, but did note inadequate staffing during the incidents.

Also in September 2016, Lucy Letby lodged a formal grievance in regard to her being removed from clinical duties. The hospital trust upheld the grievance in January 2017. They concluded that her removal was orchestrated by consultants without direct evidence. The chief executive apologized to her and her parents in December 2016 and instructed the consultants to apologize to her in writing.

In March of 2017, four consultants asked the management to get the police involved. They met the Cheshire Constabulary shortly before Lucy Letby was to return to clinical duty. As a result, Operation Hummingbird was established. This operation was to investigate the deaths of the infants. This operation lasted a year, and it considered a range of natural and clinical explanations as well as the possibility of deliberately inflicted harm on the infants.

Dewi Evans, a retired pediatrician and expert witness for the prosecution, contacted the National Crime Agency to offer his assistance. He did this after he read about the investigation. Evans reviewed sixty-one cases that involved infant death and collapse. Evans produced multiple reports for the Cheshire Constabulary; his conclusions were peer reviewed. The police then narrowed the investigation down to twenty-two cases, which were used to form the basis for the charges used at Letby’s trial.

Lucy Letby was arrested on July 3, 2018, on suspicion of eight counts of murder and six counts of attempted murder. Detectives reviewed her entire nursing career, right down to the time she spent at Liverpool Women’s Hospital. She made bail on July 6. She was arrested again in June 2019. She made bail again. She was arrested for the last time in November 2020. She denied all allegations and attributed the collapses to staffing issues and hygiene at the hospital.

Her trial started on October 10, 2022, at the Manchester Crown Court. Mr. Justice Goss presided over the trial. Lucy Letby pleaded not guilty to seven counts of murder and fifteen counts of attempted murder. Letby’s parents and the parents of the infants were in attendance at the proceedings. The babies were anonymous and referred to as Baby A through Baby Q.

The prosecution had a mountain of evidence against Lucy Letby: parental testimony, witness testimony, text messages sent by the defendant, Facebook searches done by Letby on the anniversary of infant deaths, over 250 patient notes from the hospital were found in a box in her closet (she said she did not have a shredder to take care of them, yet one was found in her closet). Consultants testified that the incidents began after Letby was qualified to work in intensive care in 2015. The prosecution provided a chart of the shifts that were covered by Lucy Letby that coincided with deaths or collapses of infants in her care. There were at least twenty-five incidents cited on this chart.

Her defense argued that she was a qualified nurse who was working in a system that was failing. They argued that staffing issues and shortcomings in care on the neonatal unit could not reasonably be the cause of a single person. The defense also maintained that the prosecution did not present sufficient evidence on just how the infants were harmed. The only witness the defense called aside from Lucy Letby herself was a plumber who testified that he was called to the unit on multiple occasions to fix recurring plumbing problems, including sewage backing up into the sinks.

On August 18, 2023, the final verdicts were delivered. Lucy Letby was found guilty of seven counts of murder and seven counts of attempted murder relating to six infants. She was acquitted on two counts of attempted murder, and the jury was unable to reach verdicts on six additional attempted murder charges. The prosecution requested 28 days to consider whether to seek a retrial on those counts.

On August 21, 2023, Lucy Letby was sentenced to life imprisonment with a whole life order. This is the most severe penalty under English Law. She was the fourth woman in Great Britain to receive such a sentence.

For more information on this case, watch the Netflix Documentary mentioned at the beginning of this article.

Until the next time, I bid you successful investigations.

Darren “Ninetoes” Perdue is a book and media reviewer. When he is not reading, he is watching true crime shows, cooking for his family, or working on a plan for universal domination. If you see him on his porch, say hi. He does not bite…much.

PLEASE NOTE: The views and opinions of the staff of Memento Mori Ink do not necessarily represent those of Memento Mori Ink or Crystal Lake Publishing. Thank you for understanding.