Scribbled words have emerged for Lucy Letby’s cursed “angel of death” from her own pen.
Scribbling on a sticky note, the nurse wrote: “I killed them on purpose because I’m not good enough to take care of them.”
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Lucy Letby is currently languishing in HMP Bronzefield, serving 15 life sentences for seven murders and seven attempted infant murdersCredit: SWNS
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Still, Internet armchair detectives suggest Letby, 34, was the victim of an all-powerful miscarriage of justice — and now experts are beginning to question the evidence that convicted herCredit: AP
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Letby’s supporters stand with banners calling for justice outside the High Court in London in AprilCredit: Alamy
And – in capital letters – she added in a note found in her bedroom: “I AM EVIL I DID THIS.”
Currently languishing in HMP Bronzefield, serving 15 life sentences for seven murders and seven attempted baby murders, justice seemed to have been served.
Still, internet armchair detectives suggest Letby, 34, is the victim of an almighty miscarriage of justice.
Many dismissed them as conspiracy theories, and now leading academics, doctors and statisticians have questioned the evidence on which Letby was convicted.
If she reads this article, my message to Lucy is, ‘It might take us a while, but we’ll get you through it.’
Professor Richard Gill
Professor Richard Gill from Leiden University in the Netherlands is even convinced that Letby is innocent.
The Surrey-born academic — whose expertise is in medical statistics — has given evidence that two other nurses convicted of murdering their patients have been released from prison.
The Cambridge-educated statistician, 72, told The Sun: “I’d bet a million to one that she’s innocent.
“If she reads this article, my message to Lucy is, ‘It might take us a while, but we’ll get you through.'”
While Dr Svilena Dimitrova, NHS consultant neonatologist (a doctor who specializes in the care of newborns) said: “The theories put forward in court were not convincing and the prosecution was full of medical inaccuracies.
“I wasn’t there, so I can’t say Letby is innocent, but I don’t see any evidence of guilt.”
‘Deep Malice’
While former government minister and renowned civil liberties campaigner Sir David Davis believes there are “real questions about the evidence”.
Sir David — who is spending the summer analyzing the case — will ask to visit Letby in prison if he concludes that on the “balance of probabilities she is innocent”.
He launched the investigation after raising questions in parliament about why a court order blocked people in this country from reading an article in The New Yorker that questioned Letby’s guilt.
The former Brexit secretary told The Sun: “Like most people, I thought this woman had killed seven children and should go to jail forever.
“After I raised the issue in the House, several people contacted me expressing their concerns about the evidence from the trial.
“And they weren’t conspiracy theorists. It was a former president of the Royal Statistical Society, a professor of neonatology, a professor of forensic medicine, several lawyers and so on.
“So really very serious people, not crazy, and probably better qualified than some who took part in the trial.”
Letby continues to protest his innocence. During her second trial, she told jurors she was not “the kind of person who would kill babies.”
Her two trials revealed no apparent motive or psychological background consistent with a serial baby killer.
However, her judge said she had shown “deep malevolence bordering on sadism” after she was convicted of hunting babies small enough to fit in the palm of her hand.
And the seven consultants who worked with Letby – with more than 100 years of experience between them – are convinced that she deliberately harmed newborns.
Letby’s sentence means he will die behind bars. And many will say good riddance.
Convicted of such heinous crimes, she joined a pantheon of monsters including Ian Brady and Myra Hindley, Dr. Harold Shipman, and Fred and Rose West. But is this quiet, church-going nurse who slept with teddy bears on her bed really the angel of death?
Even after nearly 60 hours of observation and questioning in the dock, Letby remains an enigma.
Detective Chief Inspector Nicola Evans, who led the investigation into Letby, described her as “beige”.
The officer added: “There is nothing extraordinary or outrageous that we have found about her as a person.”
Still, the prosecution argued that the nondescript Letby was a killer hiding in plain sight.
As Letby’s first trial began on October 10, 2022, a key document relating to work schedules at the Countess of Chester Hospital was placed before the jury.
The chart showed 25 suspected deaths and collapses compared to the shift schedule of the 38 nurses who worked on the ward.
In my opinion, statistically speaking, there was nothing unusual about the death jump.
John O’Quigley, University College London
Most of the nurses had only a few crosses on the chart where they were on duty during the incidents. Only Letby was on the scene for every death and collapse.
However, statisticians now say it was flawed as evidence because it did not include other deaths and collapses during the same period for which Letby was not charged and covered too narrow a time period.
John O’Quigley, professor of statistical sciences at University College London, said: “There was nothing statistically unusual in my view about the rise in deaths.
“All the shift chart shows is that Letby was on duty when Letby was on duty.” Professor Gill, 72, who helped free Dutch pediatric nurse Lucia de Berk after she was wrongly convicted of murdering patients in the 2000s, called the spreadsheet “ridiculous”.
Others insist that the prosecution’s chart provides clues to Letby’s guilt.
dr. Dewi Evans, the prosecution’s top expert, says he identified the suspicious deaths and the collapse before he knew Letby was a suspect.
It wasn’t until detectives compared those incidents to staff schedules that Letby was found to be present in each.
Doubts have also been raised about evidence of the methods used to kill or injure the babies.
Expert Dr Evans said in most cases Letby injected air or insulin into their bloodstreams or feeding tubes. The retired pediatrician — who has produced hundreds of expert reports for criminal and family courts — came under intense scrutiny from those who doubted the weight of the evidence against Letby.
The Guardian reported that seven neonatologists called Dr Evans’ theory that Letby injected babies with air through their nasal feeding tubes as “fabulous” and “ridiculous”.
‘It’s not me’
dr. Evans cited a 1989 academic paper that said the skin discoloration was due to air bubbles in the blood vessels, and he believed it was seen in a few babies.
But the paper’s co-author, Dr. Shoo Lee, told Letby’s appeal hearing that none of the descriptions of the spots on the babies’ skin given by witnesses matched those he recorded. The judges ruled that Dr. Lee’s testimony was inadmissible, noting that the defense could have called him to testify at the original trial.
The Court of Appeal judgment also stated that Dr Evans did not simply use a skin rash to diagnose that air bubbles had been injected.
Doubts have also been raised about the prosecution’s claims that Letby tried to kill the two babies by injecting synthetic insulin into their food bags.
Forensic chemistry expert Professor Alan Wayne Jones said the type of tests carried out on samples from the newborns were not enough evidence of “foul play in the prosecution of murder”.
Letby is a young, white, English nurse from a respectable, normal background. So it’s no surprise that some people respond to the fact that she was found guilty of infanticide by saying that it didn’t happen.
dr. Dewi Evans, chief expert witness for the prosecution
However, Letby’s defense did not question the prosecution’s thesis that there was a poisoner in the department. The nurse insisted that “someone” added insulin to the drip, adding: “It wasn’t me.”
dr. Evans points out that his findings were supported by eight medical specialists during the trial.
Last month he said: “Denial is the natural response to these shocking revelations.
“In this case, Letby is a young, white, English nurse from a respectable, normal background. So it’s no surprise that some people respond to the fact that she was found guilty of murdering babies by saying that it didn’t happen.”
Those who doubt Letby’s guilt are quick to point out that she was never seen injecting the baby or harming them in any way.
But what about the apparently confessional slips of paper? Letby also kept 257 confidential ward shift handover sheets under her bed. In twenty-one documents relating to 13 children, prosecutors allege that she caused harm.
The nurse also searched Facebook for bereaved families.
David Davis points out that the post-it notes also contained the words: “WHY ME? I didn’t do anything wrong.”
Regarding the pile of documents, he added: “If you didn’t know she was charged with murder, you’d just think she was overly conscientious.”
And it raises the question of why her use of the Internet did not lead to a search for her killing techniques.
The deputy told me, “She allegedly killed those children with that exotic method of air injection. It is a difficult procedure. One would think that if she was going to use this method to kill children, she would have Googled it. But there was nothing.”
Letby received her 15th life sentence last month after a retrial on one count of attempted murder.
While they were taking her to the cells, she turned to the court and shouted: “I am innocent!”
Two juries have now sifted through a mountain of evidence and found her guilty.
Her attempts to appeal were rejected twice.
It may not be the end for Letby. Operation Hummingbird is still investigating four full years of her nursing.
Because Dr. Evans believes Letby could be responsible for even more deaths.
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Murderer’s parents John and Susan at Manchester Crown CourtCredit: PA
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Categories: Optical Illusion
Source: HIS Education