Lucy Letby is a 32-year-old former nurse in Manchester who has been accused of poisoning at least seven babies to death while working her shifts in the Countess of Chester Hospital NICU.
The babies all died between June 2015 and June 2016. Letby stands accused of killing each baby with too much insulin.
Letby has denied the allegations against her, as well as allegations that she might have killed a further 10 babies. The hospital's attorney, Nick Johnson, has explained that deaths in the hospital's NICU were more or less the same as other hospitals in the United Kingdom before June 2015.
From that point, the hospital began to experience a "significant rise in the number of babies who were dying and in the number of serious catastrophic collapses."
He added, "It is a hospital like so many others in the U.K. but unlike many other hospitals in the U.K., and unlike many other neonatal units in the UK, within the neonatal unit at the Countess of Chester Hospital a poisoner was at work."
Letby became a suspect after investigators at the hospital deduced she was the "common denominator" in all the deaths. As Johnson explained, the hospital initially moved Letby to different shifts in the NICU, but the pattern of deaths remained the same.
Johnson also stated, "Lucy Letby was on duty when both were poisoned and we allege she was the poisoner. The collapses of all 17 children concerned were not 'naturally occurring tragedies.' They were all the work, we say, of the woman in the dock, who we say was the constant, malevolent presence when things took a turn for the worse for these 17 children."
Jurors were told that Letby began poisoning two of the babies within days of their births. These two babies survived the ordeal, and Johnson told the jury that "some of the babies who did not die collapsed dramatically but then – equally dramatically – recovered. Their collapse and recovery defied the normal experience of treating doctors."
The jury in the case has been encouraged to "put your emotion to one side" by Judge Sir James Goss, who acknowledged the sensitive nature of the case.
Letby was initially accused of killing eight babies. They were boys Cemlyn Bennett, Joseph Johnson, Barney Gee, Joseph Gelder, and Eli Gelder and girls Elsie McNall, Daisy Parkin, and Maddie Freed.
Letby was arrested for the first time in 2018 and again the following year. Authorities arrested her for a third time in November 2020.
One lawyer for the families spoke out following Letby's third arrest.
Neil Fearn explained, "The families are overwhelmed with the news and there is a mix of emotion. All the families now have hope that they can finally start to learn the truth of what happened in the first days of their children’s lives."
He continued, "We have been working with the families for many years on these cases and they have had to live with the consequences for all that time."
Lucy Letby has not commented on the ongoing trial and the allegations against her.
