GUILTY UK - Nurse Lucy Letby, murder of babies, 7 Guilty of murder verdicts; 8 Guilty of attempted murder; 2 Not Guilty of attempted; 5 hung re attempted #38

[Ruthbullock]

Yes my mind is currently shut down to prospect of anyone being guilty, because currently I’m not persuaded any crimes occurred on the unit.

I appreciate your POV and the discussion you bring, you certainly make me think, even if I don’t always agree. There is a definite irony to the people who are adamant she was found guilty in court asking if you are unable to see a different POV. I’m pretty certain when she was initially found guilty most people accepted that verdict until the Thirlwall inquiry started. Even the press conference didn’t shift a lot of people’s opinions- but it did get people to look a bit more closely.

 

[Sweeper2000]

Its an option that the handovers may have been given to someone else at the end of shifts maybe so they could copy what was on there or something like that, officially and by the authorised person. Explaining why some were there and others not, and why some with the babies names in the charges but from different dates.

As a side note and this might eb a clue. The dates of incidents marked in her diaries, do they correlate with babies whose names were missing from the handovers or something along those lines?

 

[Ruthbullock]

Letby received additional training on giving medication through lines, a few weeks before baby A. Part of this training was about the dangers of air embolism, Letby had documented this in her work book.

I don’t disagree, but can you please link the evidence

 

[Baileyboo]

I don’t disagree, but can you please link the evidence

It was mentioned in the prosecution closing speech.

 

[WaneLyrical]

As a side note and this might eb a clue. The dates of incidents marked in her diaries, do they correlate with babies whose names were missing from the handovers or something along those lines?

RSBM

We only know of asterisks in the 2015 diary: one week in August had 4 asterisks, two of which corresponded with the relevant dates babies E & F. She had a handover sheet from 31 July which listed E & F.

What we know of the 2016 diary, is the “LD - twins (resus)” relates to L & M. She had two handover sheets for them, one from two weeks later and the other six weeks later.

The 2016 diary also listed babies O and P (“LD plus initials”). She did have the corresponding handover sheets for those dates.

 

[katydid23]

Thanks Katy. I’ve read all the same evidence you have, possibly more. I don’t think any crimes were committed.

I have seen proof of some crimes she committed. She falsified some of her medical notes. For example, Baby E's notes about what time she saw blood and what the circumstances were.

There is no reason for her to write those false notes other than to cover up what time the bleeding began. And her notes are in conflict with both of the parent's testimony, and the attending doctor's testimony.

This thing about it all being so sudden and unexpected, I know this is what we were told at the original trial, but it just hadn’t held up to any scrutiny whatsoever. Many, many pieces of very important information have come out since then.

Yes, it has held up to scrutiny. We heard first hand testimony from dozens of nurses and doctors and parents---telling us minute by minute what happened to each baby. We have the medical logs, the observation notes, various medical tests and treatments, and witness testimonies, explaining in detail, each collapse.

The jury looked at each incident in great detail.

The neonatal doctors and nurses have a lot of experience with unresponsive incidents. They KNOW when something is sudden and unexpected. Maybe it can happen once or twice--but 27 times is WAY more than a fluke or a quirk.

And the way the babies all had such unusual reactions to the crash cart teams were shocking after awhile.

It is interesting that you can just shrug it off, as if it is meaningless. I saw and heard these medical professionals describing their total shock and confusion concerning these sudden unexplained collapses. THEY KNEW it was not natural, not normal, and it continued for over 18 months.

I’m not trying to “explain away each event”. Medical experts who know far more than you or me have done that for us.

Yes, the pro=letby experts have attempted to explain away each event. But you cannot look at them as individual events. They need to be seen in context.

I am however suggesting that the consultants noticed a ‘pattern’, with pattern-based reasoning replacing any evidence, and it led to a presumption of guilt without proof. Particularly when experts started being added to the mix. You’ve done it yourself by placing the number 27 in large and bold text, because if big enough numbers are shouted, then the numbers speak for themselves and evidence stops mattering.

The evidence always matters.

And the numbers and the patterns also matter.

I suggested reading Mother I’s thirlwall statement with an open mind, because it is one of the best examples that demonstrates this. I also mentioned again the Baby C xray, but again, no meaningful response to that.

This is not me saying “the case against Letby is weak” (it clearly is), I’m saying “the case is weak” and Letby just happens to be the person caught up in it.

No, she doesn't 'just happen' to be caught up in it. You are clearly ignoring why she was caught in it. Obvious as the nose on her face.

I don’t think Letby was a particularly good nurse, although she’s certainly been described as conscientious and by the book, she was still inexperienced. We’ve since learned that the unit had, for a great number of years, been replacing registered nurses with nursery nurses, and hadn’t been replacing their advanced nurse practitioners. A constant loss of experience and institutional memory.

We also now know that the unit had a sustained increase in acuity and the length of time babies required intensive care, from the start of 2015 onwards. And of course, we know the consultants were supposed to be rounding twice a day and instead were doing it twice a week. No consultant even went to see Baby C for the 3 days he was alive, despite him being so desperately ill, and half the size he should have been even for his early gestational age.

We’ve all seen the email from the doctor to the management saying this isn’t sustainable any more, the staff cannot cope, and children will pay for this with their lives.

I could go on, and on, and on, but there’s really no point. The only people interested in reading it are the ones who send DMs saying they’d rather not comment publicly on the forum. Because the righteousness and pressure within this forum to suppress doubt means people are left feeling like they are cruel or immoral, or “think of the parents” just for questioning whether the evidence holds up to scrutiny. Never in my life have I been attacked for presumed character flaws because I’ve tried to discuss a case in good faith. For some reason, in the Lucy Letby case, those who agree with the conviction have decided to moralise doubt itself.

Doubt is fine unless people are blindly ignoring important facts and shrugging them off. Pretending those other details do not exist. Assuming she is just a scapegoat because she took so many extra shifts.

I don’t know why, I can only assume it’s fear that a serial killer could be exonerated, which would obviously be an horrific outcome.

YES, it would be a horrific outcome if people ignored all of the evidence of her guilt by trying to explain away her horrific actions.

 

[katydid23]

Letby received additional training on giving medication through lines, a few weeks before baby A. Part of this training was about the dangers of air embolism, Letby had documented this in her work book.

AND, IIRC, the prosecution had asked her questions about that and she had stated that she did not know much about air embolism or how it worked. And he pushed back on it, showing that she had taken a class about it.

 

[katydid23]

I thought air going in an NG tube is what causes tummies and bowels to be full of air, not a long line. Isn’t that what we’ve all learned?

The point of the datix was that they had to go up to the children’s ward to get the equipment needed for the IO access. The reason for the IO access was because they couldn’t get blood from the existing access.

But that accusation by her turned out to be unfounded.

It was not 'twisted' into 'somehow' showing deliberate harm was caused. Deliberate harm was caused---repeatedly, cold heartedly, obsessively.

It’s quite remarkable seeing how this is being twisted into somehow showing that deliberate harm was caused.

 

[Marantz4250b]

I have seen proof of some crimes she committed. She falsified some of her medical notes. For example, Baby E's notes about what time she saw blood and what the circumstances were.

There is no reason for her to write those false notes other than to cover up what time the bleeding began. And her notes are in conflict with both of the parent's testimony, and the attending doctor's testimony.

Yes, it has held up to scrutiny. We heard first hand testimony from dozens of nurses and doctors and parents---telling us minute by minute what happened to each baby. We have the medical logs, the observation notes, various medical tests and treatments, and witness testimonies, explaining in detail, each collapse.

The jury looked at each incident in great detail.

The neonatal doctors and nurses have a lot of experience with unresponsive incidents. They KNOW when something is sudden and unexpected. Maybe it can happen once or twice--but 27 times is WAY more than a fluke or a quirk.

And the way the babies all had such unusual reactions to the crash cart teams were shocking after awhile.

It is interesting that you can just shrug it off, as if it is meaningless. I saw and heard these medical professionals describing their total shock and confusion concerning these sudden unexplained collapses. THEY KNEW it was not natural, not normal, and it continued for over 18 months.

Yes, the pro=letby experts have attempted to explain away each event. But you cannot look at them as individual events. They need to be seen in context.

The evidence always matters.

And the numbers and the patterns also matter.

No, she doesn't 'just happen' to be caught up in it. You are clearly ignoring why she was caught in it. Obvious as the nose on her face.

Doubt is fine unless people are blindly ignoring important facts and shrugging them off. Pretending those other details do not exist. Assuming she is just a scapegoat because she took so many extra shifts.


YES, it would be a horrific outcome if people ignored all of the evidence of her guilt by trying to explain away her horrific actions.

Agreed, there is plenty of evidence of her crimes. She was convicted, after all!

To say there is no evidence of any crime is silly; the insulin evidence is clear, in that it absolutely 100% was artificial insulin rather than naturally occurring insulin. Everyone is in agreement about that, including the defence. We can argue whether LL was the origin of that insulin (the evidence as a whole tends to suggest that she was) but it is not arguable that it was put there criminally. It clearly was. Hence, a crime was committed.

The handover sheets are also extremely damning. Nurses simply do not accrue vast collections of handover sheets - ever. There is simply no rational explanation for it. Yes, it's perfectly reasonable for the odd one to end up at home because it's been left in a pocket but nurses know to destroy them or return them to the confidential waste bin on the next shift. Keeping over 250 of them is a gross breach of data protection law, not to mention the ethics of medical confidentiality.

Perhaps it could be explained away as some form of extreme obsessive-compulsive disorder but for that to manifest itself only in the form of hoarding handover sheets seems exceptionally improbable. Moreover, if it was due to some severe psychological condition, then she had ample opportunity (like two years or more) to explain that and to arrange to be examined by experts in the field who she could then call in her defence. Yet the best she could come up with after sitting in a cell for two years was "I collect paper". Really, Lucy??? Even that was patently false because - where are all the other papers she collected?

Put this in the context of any other employment circumstances, from any other walk of life, and it alone would raise massive, massive questions about the motivations of the employee involved. If one of my staff were found to have a stack of over 250 copies of our customers confidential, personal information, or was randomly taking home controlled goods they had no authority to possess privately, there would be big flags raised and the police would be looking into their motivations for doing so! That number of carefully curated handovers cold have got her sacked on their own so why on earth would any rational person risk that?

Too many people are desperately attempting to prove her innocence for whatever reasons. We've gone over the potential reasons a million times so I wont do so again. The attempts are becoming ever more ridiculous and detached from reality, imo. She's waived privilege now, though, so I doubt it'll be too long before these people are thoroughly discredited.

Edit: For everyone who's convinced she's innocent think of it this way; look at the handovers in complete isolation, if the police had an entirely unrelated reason to search her house - or even to enter it for non-investigatory purposes (say she witnessed an incident or got assaulted walking home or something) - and found a stack of confidential patient information there then what do you think they are going to think? In my opinion, the thought that "this person may be harming patients or their families" is an entirely reasonable one to have. I mean, it's right up at the extreme end of the reasons for hoarding them but it's so unusual (and illegal) that that assumption may be made. In any event, it would definitely result in her being investigated for it.

 

[Marantz4250b]

AND, IIRC, the prosecution had asked her questions about that and she had stated that she did not know much about air embolism or how it worked. And he pushed back on it, showing that she had taken a class about it.

Yes. There's a word for that, what is it, now......Oh yes, that would be a lie!

 

[Sweeper2000]

Big thanks to whoever got me that account upgrade. Very top of you

 

[May72031]

The "there is no evidence of crimes" line is the equivalent of "there were no planes on 9/11".

 

[Marantz4250b]

Very true!

 

[Parker Knoll]

It does remind me of Clinton and the Monica L denial !
Erm … yes you did !

 

[Sweeper2000]

I'm sure they went to cockington?

 

[joltz]

Ok, yes, so is the suggestion that when Gibbs (?) first mentioned air embolism, that got back to Letby at the same time it got to jayaram, and then the open bung happened, with the datix to follow later once Powell finds out?

We have no idea who first mentioned air embolism. It was brought up in a consultant meeting where Dr. J was present. It wouldn't have needed to 'get back' to Letby given that she caused the problem so knew about it well before anybody else.

P

You have just minimised them yourself- she wasn’t the only one and it was in the press that other staff acted that way as well. I’m not attempting to minimise it, I think it’s irrelevant as evidence- it would have been relevant if she had the handover sheets for the children she was convicted of murdering, but she didn’t. Yes she had some, but not others. Perhaps there is a pattern to why she kept them that we don’t know about- every record is of a baby collapsing or something else- but from the evidence we have they aren’t trophies, they aren’t anything. We will never know, but what if 95% of the handover sheets were from babies with no medical incidents and no desaturations and have since lived healthy lives. I’m sure you could attempt to believe that the other sheets were all failed attempts or attempts to work out a better plan- but I’m dubious, I genuinely think she was a typical young 20 year old who wasn’t as organised and tidy with her paperwork as she should have been. Does that make her innocent, not at all- but I’m not convinced it makes her guilty either. Would I like to see an investigative deep dive into the handover sheets- yes because I don’t want a guilty person released, but to me this isn’t evidence of guilt.

Previous paperwork breaches doesn't minimise what Letby did. It makes it worse. There are no details about what exactly those breaches were but the information is that would be further discussion with the staff about it.

Letby was doing it before this and she kept on doing it after.

Letby had the personal identifiable paperwork of babies she was accused of harming and was searching for the familiesl

P

You have just minimised them yourself- she wasn’t the only one and it was in the press that other staff acted that way as well. I’m not attempting to minimise it, I think it’s irrelevant as evidence- it would have been relevant if she had the handover sheets for the children she was convicted of murdering, but she didn’t. Yes she had some, but not others. Perhaps there is a pattern to why she kept them that we don’t know about- every record is of a baby collapsing or something else- but from the evidence we have they aren’t trophies, they aren’t anything. We will never know, but what if 95% of the handover sheets were from babies with no medical incidents and no desaturations and have since lived healthy lives. I’m sure you could attempt to believe that the other sheets were all failed attempts or attempts to work out a better plan- but I’m dubious, I genuinely think she was a typical young 20 year old who wasn’t as organised and tidy with her paperwork as she should have been. Does that make her innocent, not at all- but I’m not convinced it makes her guilty either. Would I like to see an investigative deep dive into the handover sheets- yes because I don’t want a guilty person released, but to me this isn’t evidence of guilt.

Previous paperwork breaches doesn't minimise what Letby did. It makes it worse. There are no details about what exactly those breaches were but the information is that there would be further discussion with the staff about it, to reiterate the seriousness of it. And yet here's Letby, taking them home on purpose before that and then continuing to take them home after.

Letby never offered any explanation to say she was keeping them to monitor her practise or anything of that kind. From her own mouth, they just came home with her. She didn't think about them, she would have shredded them if she had a shredder.

I wouldn't necessarily call them trophies but they gave Letby the ability to research and recount.

By her own wording, Letby was taking them home, removing them from her pockets, putting them into her workbag and then ferrying to and from work everyday.

I personally don't believe that she was doing this, but this clearly shows that she had an awareness of what she was doing every single day. She choose to take them home with purpose. What that purpose was is debatable but it's a fact that she purposely took home the handover notes and kept them underneath her bed, moved with them and took them with her. She kept some at her parents home. If these are bits of insignificant paper that you collect by habit then you don't keep some in a box marked "keep"

The handover notes had an absolute significance, Letby kept them and took them with purpose. She stored them underneath her bed and took them to multiple properties that she moved to.

The handovers provided a key insight into Letby's behaviour when testifying. She altered her version of events to suit the questions being asked at the time, while contradicting things she had said previously.

She is not a reliable narrator and she was willing to lie about them, multiple times.

Why would anyone believe a word of what she says

The point is, she lied. She lied to the police and then she lied to the jury. It's a key insight into Letby behaviour..

Letby had the personal identifiable paperwork of babies she was accused of harming and was searching for. She also had the blood gas reading for one of the babies in her house and got it from the locked waste bin.

 

[Marantz4250b]

The thing that gets me is that she didn't even try to explain why she had them. Her best explanation was - "I collect paper" and "they've come home with me". That's pathetic.

She had literally years from her first arrest to come up with a plausible story centred around OCD or some other documented psychological condition, or somesuch. I mean, when you listen to her police interviews she's far from stupid and clearly has a very good knowledge of nursing and medical matters and she's obviously capable of making things sound plausible.

If she'd concocted any sort of story along those lines, and stuck to it, then I might have at least some tiny degree of sympathy for the people who are continually touting her innocence. A concocted story based on reasonable medical facts could
sensibly result in genuine doubts in someone's mind. The explanation "I collect paper" is completely ridiculous, though. Obviously so.

 

[Sweeper2000]

So we get a few more bits coming up. Looking g forward to seeing the result of her waving anonymity and waiting to hear from the ccrc. However im strongly inclined to think we have guessed the answers already. I'm almost certain about the anonymity.

 

[Marantz4250b]

So we get a few more bits coming up. Looking g forward to seeing the result of her waving anonymity and waiting to hear from the ccrc. However im strongly inclined to think we have guessed the answers already. I'm almost certain about the anonymity.

She's definitely waived privilege to the legal details prior to MM taking over. The CCRC has said that she has.

That doesn't mean to say that we'll get to hear them, other than what is mentioned in any decision made by the CCRC or the CoA if it gets that far.

 

[Sweeper2000]

She's definitely waived privilege to the legal details prior to MM taking over. The CCRC has said that she has.

That doesn't mean to say that we'll get to hear them, other than what is mentioned in any decision made by the CCRC or the CoA if it gets that far.

Why is that? I was thinking it would be open access at that point.