TODAY Lucy Letby – serving 15 whole life sentences for killing seven babies and attempting to murder six others – will make another appeal against one of her convictions.
For now she remains one of Britain’s most notorious serial killers but there is now a powerful campaign to free her by crusaders who insist she is the victim of a monumental miscarriage of justice.
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But in a new documentary for The Sun, baby death expert Dr Dewi Evans – whose evidence in court helped nail Letby – debunks eight of their theories.
There is simply no doubt in the mind of neonatal expert Dr Dewi Evans.
Not only did Lucy Letby ruthlessly murder seven tiny babies in her care – there is evidence that she may have killed more.
Speaking to The Sun at his CCTV-protected house in Wales, Dr Evans told how he has been under a constant barrage of threats since Letby’s trial from armchair sleuths on social media who he described as “Poundshop Poirots.”
MPs, media commentators and medical and scientific professionals are turning on him, too.
Some conspiracy theorists have even suggested millionaire tech tycoon Mike Lynch’s yacht was deliberately sunk in Italy earlier this year because he was preparing to bankroll Letby’s no-guilty plea.
But for Dr Evans, the case remains clear cut.
He said: “I think the campaign to try and prove that Lucy Letby is innocent is frankly astonishing.
“It seems to be led by people with the least amount of information about the cases.
“People who had no access to the clinical records and were not there for the trial.
“I think it reflects the shock of having to come to terms with the fact that how on earth could a young nurse deliberately harm babies in her care?
“Lucy Letby had a fair trial.
“The convictions are absolutely solid.
“There are no grounds for appealing any of her convictions.
“In fact, the evidence is that she’s responsible for placing more babies in harm’s way.
“And that’s the most concerning aspect of all.”
Letby will have her appeal against her convictions for attempted murder on babies heard at the Appeal Court today.
An appeal heard in May was dismissed by three senior judges for lack of new evidence.
Her new barrister Mark McDonald is now also planning to take her case to the Criminal Cases Review Commission.
After her convictions, the Free Letby campaign was turbo-charged by a 13,000-word report in the New Yorker magazine.
Now her case has been taken up by campaigners such as MP Sir David Davis.
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‘Do it properly’
He insists: “I have spent three months going through the evidence.
“I think most likely – you can’t be certain – but most likely, like 90 odd percent, not guilty.’
“The most likely reason is one of two things, either poor management of the hospital – the Royal College found that, or a superbug – an investigation found that, or both together. That is much more likely.”
“I don’t want to declare her innocent. I want a retrial – do it properly.”
But as well as a raft of circumstantial evidence against Letby heard in court, other information has come to light since her conviction.
The Thirlwell public inquiry into Letby’s crimes has heard disturbing evidence of the nurse potentially tampering with babies’ breathing tubes while on two work placements at Liverpool Women’s Hospital in 2012 and 2015.
Richard Baker KC, representing the families of 12 babies, said that during her time at Liverpool Women’s Hospital babies had collapsed due to dislodgement of endotracheal [breathing] tubes during nearly 40 per cent of her shifts – despite it happening on average in less than one per cent of nursing shifts.
Letby was convicted of poisoning two babies by injecting them with insulin.
New evidence seen by BBC’s Panorama also showed a blood test from a third baby being cared for by Letby at Chester in November 2015 also recorded very high levels of insulin and low levels of C-peptide.
Tests later revealed the baby had congenital hyperinsulinism (CHI) – a condition where the body naturally produces too much insulin.
But four experts said that CHI could not explain such an exceptionally high insulin reading for the infant – pointing to Letby’s potential guilt.
I’ve no doubt Lucy Letby is guilty
Dr Evans
Letby will challenge the last of her convictions at the Court of Appeal today.
The former neonatal nurse denies attempting to murder a baby at the Countess of Chester Hospital in February 2016 but was convicted in July and given a 15th whole-life prison term.
Letby’s bid to challenge her original 14 convictions was rejected in May.
But Dr Evans believes Letby should never be released.
He said: “I’ve read all 58 pages, all 209 paragraphs of her original appeal and it comes out very strongly, I’m pleased to say, in relation to the strength of the prosecution evidence and in relation to the evidence given by those of us acting as independent witnesses.
“I’ve no doubt Lucy Letby is guilty and it’s not just because she was there and she was in sole care of most of these babies but their pattern of collapse was something you simply don’t see.
“She was hiding in plain sight.
“The deaths that we’ve discussed are all the result of deliberate harm caused by one rogue nurse.
“Lucy Letby.”
Dr Evans debunks the theories
For The Sun’s documentary Dr Evans has now taken each theory put forward by Letby supporters to prove her innocence – and explained why they are wrong.
THEORY 1: LETBY WAS CONVICTED BY “FLAWED” NURSES SHIFT CHART
One of the most damning pieces of evidence in Letby’s trial was the use of a chart showing she was the only nurse present for 25 cases of baby death or collapse.
The table, which covered a 13-month period between June 2015 and June 2016, showed that while the 38 other nurses were in attendance on just a handful of occasions when suspicious incidents occurred, Letby was at the scene of all of them.
The Royal Statistical Society has since described the chart as “worthless”
Dr Evans said: “It’s not that the statistics were worthless.
“They were irrelevant.
“If statistics were relevant I’d expect the prosecution to engage a statistician.
“If the defence had felt that the prosecution was using statistics wrongly I’d expect them to engage with that decision.
“They didn’t.
“The evidence was not based on statistics.”
THEORY 2: POST MORTEMS SHOWED NO FOUL PLAY
Letby supporters say expert pathologists who carried out post-mortems on the babies who died found no evidence of foul play.
Dr Evans said: “Six of the seven babies who died had postmortems.
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“Those babies who died from injection of air would not be expected to show any abnormality confirming the diagnosis.
“The importance of the autopsy was that it ruled out infection as a cause of death, it ruled out haemorrhage as a cause of death, and it ruled out a congenital problem as a cause of death.”
THEORY 3: DOUBTS OVER CLAIMS THE BABIES WERE INJECTED WITH AIR
Pro-Letby campaigners say Dr Evans relied solely on a medical paper written in 1989 by Canadian expert Dr Shoo Lee to back his theory that the babies had been injected with air because they showed “discolouration” or rashes before they died.
Dr Lee gave evidence in Letby’s defence at her appeal saying none of the rashes were characteristic of so-called air embolism.
But Dr Evans also included in his witness statements research from 18 other experts.
His evidence was also backed up at trial by two other experts.
Dr Evans said: “I presented 18 research papers discussing air embolism in babies, not just the one involving Dr Lee. I broadly played down the significance of the skin discoloration as part of the air embolism because the local staff had not realised its significance and had not documented the information at the time.
“So my diagnosis of air embolism was not dependent on discovering this peculiar rush described by Dr Lee.”
THEORY 4: TESTS SHOWING BABIES F & L WERE POISONED WITH INSULIN WERE ‘UNRELIABLE’
Letby was one of only two nurses on shift when two baby boys – Child F&L – each received a highly dangerous dose of insulin.
Letby accepted in court that the babies were both given insulin – but denied any involvement.
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It was claimed the babies’ intravenous feed bags were contaminated – but experts have come forward to say the insulin testing was unreliable and the readings could have been wrong.
Dr Evans said: “I was very satisfied that the tests were reliable and I claim no specialist scientific expertise regarding how insulin is measured.
“The evidence given by the scientists I thought was excellent.
“What’s important, of course, is that the insulin values were very, very high.
“Higher than anything I’ve ever seen.
“And a value of the other, if you like, non-active insulin called C-peptide, that was virtually unrecordable.
“So I was suddenly convinced that this could be explained only for one reason these babies had been given insulin.”
THEORY 5: THE DEATH OF BABY C
As part of an investigation, the BBC’s File on 4 programme said Dr Evans admitted he changed his mind about the death of one of Letby’s victims – Baby C – after learning that Letby was not present at the hospital when x-rays showed a large air bubble in his stomach.
Experts have said Baby C died of an obstruction.
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Dr Evans said: “This baby would not have died but for Letby’s interference.
“What I’m sure occurred was that he was stabilising.
“She was on duty.
“It was coming up to midnight.
“She went into his nursery.
“She injected him intravenously with air that caused immediate collapse and also explains why resuscitation failed.
“That is what I am now confident happened to this particular baby.”
THEORY 6: THE BABIES WERE KILLED BY A SUPERBUG
The Chester neonatal unit suffered an outbreak of bacteria lethal to babies at the time when infant mortality rates spiked between 2015 and 2016.
The bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa – had colonised taps in the nurseries.
This led to a theory that the spike in deaths was caused by a superbug.
Dr Evans said: “I was unaware that they’d isolated Pseudomonas organism, which is a very deadly pathogen for small babies.
“But Pseudomonas was not responsible for the deaths of any of these babies.
“Five of the seven babies who died had no evidence of infection.
“One of the two babies who were infected was infected prior to his admission.
“If Pseudomonas was in the bloodstream, the fatality rate is very high, but that baby would show evidence of infection.”
THEORY 7: THE CHESTER UNIT WAS UNSAFE
Letby’s supporters say the baby unit was understaffed, under-resourced and not capable of caring for so many tiny and vulnerable babies.
They insist Letby has been made a scapegoat for hospital failings.
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Dr Evans said: “There’s no evidence that she was a scapegoat in any way or form.
“There were concerns that she was present during each of these collapses and that, they became aware of that from early on, but what the doctors failed to do was establish a diagnosis and that was the concern.
“And I went on record following the verdict that Cheshire Police should explore the principle of corporate manslaughter, which they’re now doing.”
