It is with grim fascination that I have observed a gradual but unmistakable swell of concern develop around the safety of Lucy Letby’s guilty verdict given in August 2023. In May 2024 the New Yorker published a 15 page article. In great detail, with quotes taken from the trial itself, it presented numerous reasons why Letby’s guilt should be questioned. It was embargoed in the UK because a further trial concerning an additional death was pending, and it still cannot be accessed through the NY’s website. The article is available to read here – although accessing it still feels like a transgression. In fact, even considering the possibility that Letby is innocent feels vaguely heretical.
Now, Dr Phil Hammond, the retired GP and writer for Private Eye who has intervened in previous healthcare scandals, is publicly explaining why he feels the trial did not deliver justice. He is concerned about the lack of statistical rigour around the compelling correlation between Letby’s name on the roster and the shifts which saw babies deteriorate, and some forensic inconsistencies. These relate two methods of murder, deliberate insulin overdose and inflation of babies’ stomachs with air. On X, he says,
3. Numerous credible experts across multiple scientific disciplines have expressed reasonable doubts about the verdicts after the trial, arguing that the deaths and harm more likely happened from natural causes in an overstretched unit.
In his Private Eye special report, Hammond also points out that Letby’s legal team decided not to present their own expert witnesses in her defence on the assumption (which appears ill-judged now) that the prosecution case was based solely on circumstantial evidence. Therefore, the jury heard only one side. Hammond is now asking for people who knew Letby and who worked with her to come forward, and appears to be performing an independent investigation, with the intention of persuading the courts to grant a right of appeal.
How should I, a healthcare worker who was horrified and depressed by the crime, and who was pleased that the culprit had been received justice, feel about this? Many will be examining their own reactions, and I think it is worthwhile exploring them (even though they will have no influence on events). My own are contradictory.
My first response is: leave it! – she’s clearly guilty. I would dearly like the case to be over, and for Letby to serve her 15 whole life sentences. The families have been through enough, and right now they have an explanation. By moving on, this tragic sequence of murders, this aberration of humanity, can be put behind us, although the grief of the bereaved families will never truly fade. Letby’s guilt satisfied those who wanted and needed to see justice done. In the same mood, I ask – who gave Hammond the right to take this on. Well, as I have explained, this is what he does, and history has found him to be on the right side more than once. But these largely emotional reactions need to be challenged.
There is ample evidence that our justice system does not always make the right decisions. I have written here about two gross negligence manslaughter trials which resulted in guilty verdicts. David Sellu, colorectal surgeon, was imprisoned, but exonerated on appeal. Hadiza Bawa Garba, a paediatrician, saw her career and life derailed, but again, following an appeal against the GMC’s decision to erase her from the medical register, was able to continue work. After this case, the GMC chair Charles Massey suggested that criminal law may be unsuited to serious medical cases, where the ‘risk of death is a constant, […] in the context of systemic pressure.’ Beyond medicine, we have seen how the families affected by the 1989 Hillsborough disaster had to battle over many years to achieve justice. And what of the Post Office scandal, which has seen over 900 sub post-masters prosecuted and many imprisoned? In the 1950s, Derek Bentley and Timothy Evans were hung for murder and subsequently pardoned. If Letby had killed 60 years ago, she would be dead by now. Is it naïve then, to accept a guilty verdict without question? Yes, probably. In many cases, the story did not end with the first verdict.
A successful appeal would have wider consequences. Letby would be freed and rehabilitated – a wronged woman, no longer an angel of death, just a martyr to circumstance – and a further example of the difficulty the justice system has in detecting, prosecuting and judging those who are accused of crimes in healthcare settings.
Then, we would have to reappraise the hospital’s response to the whistle blowing process. At the moment, senior managers who did not immediately remove Letby from the neonatal unit, and who asked consultants to apologise to her, are being judged. By public opinion, by their regulators, perhaps even by the courts in terms if a corporate manslaughter trial ensues. The Thirlwall inquiry is currently examining the organisational response, and its findings are likely to be harsh. If Letby is found innocent on appeal, their hesitancy, their apparent vacillation, will be viewed as justifiable. A nuanced response, a sensible decision to gather more facts, and to observe Just Culture guidance. And what of the consultants with ‘hundreds of years of experience’ between them? They, who remain convinced that Letby is guilty of murder, will also be judged.
For now, we watch, and wait to see if this swelling wave of concern breaks, and if the powers that be are persuaded to grant Lucy Letby the right of appeal.
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