Letby Case (part 2)

[OneFrenchEgg]

www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4652340-lucy-letby-court-case?reply=121815754

follow up, remember rules around discussion of active cases

Mira have you considered there was no one to call? That no one could dispute the facts that have been presented in court?

What would you have done if you were Ben Myers?

Which is irrelevant to this case and what actually happened to these babies.

The massively obviously negligence in this case is how the doctors concerns were ignored and a potential killer was allowed to do this for do long.

I don't think anyone is attacking anyone.

I am happy to listen to genuinely relevant information however she doesn't give any and that's frustrating which may prompt the odd, perhaps inappropriate, comment at times from people. In fact it would be massively interesting to hear why her medic/lawyer friends are undecided, it would stop us going around in circles and becoming even more frustrated with each other.

I'm sure as its the defence job to defend LL and she has a very good team, that every avenue will have been explored and if it hasn't been spoken about then its not relevant/would perhaps do more harm than good due to cross examination.

This is a bit of a non-sequitur - are you referring to expert witnesses?

You have a set of medical data, some inexplicable deaths, but still no really strong evidence that LL was responsible.

You can hire an expert witnesses to say what you like, although to be fair, their duty is to the court.

I would think the defence has decided to focus on reasonable doubt that LL was responsible, rather than getting bogged down in complex medical detail.

It’s not irrelevant, although inadmissible, as it was apparently Dr Jarayam’s, and other CoC doctors’ mistakes.

I don’t think an expert witness can say whatever they like. That would be perjury.

From what I remember the defence’s opening statement and their cross examination of witnesses for the earlier cases did involve negligence and staffing being involved. I would have expected that if that was their argument there would be an expert witness called by the defence to provide an alternative explanation for the same data / medical records.

It seems that either they have moved away from that argument, they couldn’t find a witness who could interpret the data to make it or they just didn’t bother.

For the avoidance of doubt - I’m not here to convince you or anyone of my perspective. I’m here to read summaries of events and views I find of interest. I’m not actually interested in what you think of my views.

For my money - Myers I’m sure is an extremely able QC but he’s not a medical specialist and LL could have done with one of my friends who was medic who retrained in law.

For it to be perjury the witness would have to believe something other than their testimony.

I’ve no doubt Myers is an extremely able QC, however LL could have done with a friend of mine who was a medic who retrained in law and specialises in complex medical cases.

I do feel the defence has rather dropped the ball on the poor performance of the unit (particularly the gaps in medical and nursing rotas, the insufficient senior doctor cover, poor decision making and a reluctance by some staff to approach colleagues for advice etc), as well as the expert witnesses.

To take the case of Noah Robinson which is in the public domain - a breathing tube was inserted into his gullet rather than his trachea, a fact which then went unnoticed for some time. In different circumstances that could be argued either as intentional or negligent.

In the context of that level of basic negligence - sudden and unexpected deaths are not such outliers as they would be in a well run unit.

If you don't want to share why you have the views and opinions you have, then it's up to you I suppose. It might help us understand your standpoint if you did though.

I genuinely don't think bringing up past negligence cases would help though. I think it would just give the prosecution another chance to hammer home how that did not contribute to the deaths of these babies.

I don't agree you can get any expert witness to say anything you like in court. I can't help but feel you have a deep distrust of the justice system and/or medical establishment managers that may be influencing you.

I try my best to give people the benefit of the doubt, but it just seems in the case of LL, to do that we are required to go with the much less likely scenerio in each case again and again and again..... with nothing to back it up but her word, which has been shown time and time again to be unreliable.

What's more likely, one person telling lots of lies or everyone else involved in the case conspiring against her? I have found many of the parent testimonies to be the most powerful and they have highlighted LL to be a liar, the parents want justice and to know what happens to their babies so why would they lie?

For my money - Myers I’m sure is an extremely able QC but he’s not a medical specialist and LL could have done with one of my friends who was medic who retrained in law.

BM is a very accomplished and talented defence lawyer, I would be very surprised if your mate who retrained would be any better in a case of this magnitude. They have access to medical experts and can call on the resources they require, it's not the case that decent lawyers benefit from an in depth knowledge themselves.

Important to remember as well that a defence lawyer isn't about getting someone who is guilty off the hook or getting a tonne of NG verdicts; it's about upholding the principles of a fair trial and ensuring that this is the case for the accused. I bet he wishes she hadn't take the stand although he cannot influence or advise her in this regard.

Again, it's not relevant.

The number of deaths shot up from 2/3 per year to 7/8 per year at the COCH during the period in question. Unfortunately negligence does and will always exist and it is heartbreaking but do you really think that is what caused a 3 to 4 fold increase in deaths after everything we have heard?

I am genuinely interested in your answer.

I agree @Marteenie

FWIW I think any strategy that the defence had, has been severely damaged by LL taking the stand

Indeed, contradicting and going against agreed evidence, raising new accusations and theories, saying things proven by other testimony to be untrue. Yikes.

Going to put my penny's worth in,

The things they say happened to them babies.. the air in their stomach. The air embolism is NOT something that can happen on one small unit so many times by "accident" especially when these babies have been so well.

I've seen the defence try and bring in the staffing issues as the problem... regardless of staffing it is very difficult for an air embolism to happen by accident. And I say that as a nicu nurse on a busy 38 bedded unit which often runs on 10-12 nurses instead of 19.

I do think, unless you're in the role it's hard to understand but, and I can only speak for myself, I care for each baby as if it was my own.

When an insulin prescription comes up (it does often as we take babies from 22 weeks now!) not only do we have it double checked, I always get the nurse in charge of the unit to check with us too, even before the letby case came out, insulin is a very scary drug with neonates and there is no room for error 🥲

@Marteenie hear hear!!! So eloquently put……

@Prevmidwife i hope you are not referring to myself re @Mirabai as I do like her/his posts and find his/her knowledge v interesting

@Prevmidwife gemma17 has hardly been bullying either - it looks like a debate to me

That is a great insight thank you

And LL ruled out staffing issues in all but one of the cases.

It was always going to be impossible to pull off what she has been accused of without being caught.

Theres a lot of thought/manipulation/calculation required to do what is being suggested

Not here to defend my views, I don’t care if you understand them or not. I’m here to pick up info on the case.

Negligence is not so much the issue as mistakes. It is indisputable that medical mistakes were being made at the unit and that is context that which unexpected deterioration happens. Can that be stretched to explain all the deaths - probably not. But it does create question marks over exactly what was going on in the unit.

No idea why you think I have mistrust of the justice system or doctors just because I’m reserving judgment.

As to what is likely - on the one hand it could well be that LL intentionally harmed the babies; on the other Jarayam took over as head of paediatrics in 2015 so if there is not a serial killer on the ward, his competence (and the other consultants) is on the line. I’m not suggesting for one minute that they would intentionally cover up or frame her - I have no doubt they are sincere - but they have a very strong incentive to believe that something extraordinary is going on that exonerates their own performance (particularly in the context of 2 cases of negligence.)

I am much less interested in discussing my views than the case itself. So can we shift away from wild speculation about my motivations and get back to the case?

In fact he is a QC of equal standing as Myers, they’re both tier 1 silks.

The defence team have access to medical experts but a comprehensive understanding of the medical issues from a member of the team would have been invaluable, if very hard to find.

The defence’s job is to advocate for the defendant and plead their case to ensure a fair trial.

Jayaram! Apols, my autocorrect keeps turning it to Jara yam.

This is exactly my thoughts. Medical knowledge is missing and this is why we are severely lacking in any great detail. As a former experienced HCP it alarms me that the court does not seem more knowledgeable to the detail required. But then maybe it has been decided that the detail isn't necessary and would be a convoluted way to reach the same conclusions.

The defence can call any experts they deem relevant to the stand, the fact none were medical and it was just a plumber was...interesting.

I actually attended court on one of the days and there was vast medical detail given, it was reported earlier in the case that the jury were given the ipads because there was such a large amount of this sort of detail and background to consider; they were also given demonstrations and explanations as to various procedures.

Medical trials are always challenging because there is so very rarely definitive and absolute evidence, I find it strange that people are concluding there hasn't been medical input though or that BM wouldn't have consulted and had access to people with extensive knowledge- of course he did.

For anyone that's been following the entire trial lots of the medical stuff was spoken about at the start so is a case of referring back.

I thought before the trial started that this was possibly about looking for scapegoats to cover for incompetence but the evidence points elsewhere . Babies were overfed, poisoned, had their breathing equipment tampered with, were physically hurt, were filled with air. Documents were falsified. Parents and staff given wrong or exaggerated information.... someone was doing all this. The hospital had nothing to gain from this court case, if anything it has opened them up much more than an enquiry would.