Lucy Letby - new thread (part 2)

[anonymousamy]

A thread for anyone who was on the last one and wanted to continue the discussion.

What I cannot wrap my head around is Letby’s seemingly completely normal upbringing. Usually serial killers have displayed some kind of markers by the time they start killing, but AFAIK she literally had none. 100% believe she is guilty BTW - just cannot begin to understand it.

And she was unanimously convicted of attempted murder of child F and child L.

We only know what has been reported about her past which is pretty scarce, the articles I've seen from psychiatrists have said they haven't had access to anything else so presumably they're working from the limited info too. I'm not overly surprised to be honest that not many people have come forward to comment on her past, perhaps they will in time but personally I don't think it's indicative of her guilt or not just because she doesn't fit the mould. You can see glimpses via the texts in court and testimony and messages from the NICU parents that she wasn't always sweet- she wanted her own way and was quite scathing towards others. She also reported colleagues for minor things which as I said earlier does then seem weird that she wasn't concerned about the abnormally high level of collapses and deaths.

It does seem odd that the only emotion she showed in court was when Dr A was called- no tears for these babies just for herself.

Apologies the 3 unanimous verdicts were for one murder and two attempted murders - so three of the convictions.

She was found guilty of 7 murders in total and 6 attempted murders.

Yet people still think she's innocent.

Completely baffling to me.

And when photos of her home were shown.

There was absolutely no one else it could have been once you listen to how the police tackled the evidence

I think judging someone in an extreme situation you have never been in because they broke down at the wrong moment is completely ridiculous.
If she had cried when talking about the babies that would have been wrong too - crocodile tears, evidence of her psychopathy. If she never cried she would be cold and emotionless.

Nope.

I could easily conclude that no babies were murdered.

Which was the conclusion of initial post mortems and external independent reviews of excess deaths on the unit. Which was, a pretty shabbily run unit.

The Countess of Chester neonatal unit that LL worked on was downgraded at the managers request to a less medically intensive unit around the time LL was moved from the unit. Because CQC reports were terrible and an independent report by the Royal College of Paediatrics found no obvious cause for the elevated number of neonatal deaths but did identify a number of staffing, equipment and staff communication issues.

At that time the linked maternity unit had an unusually high number of stillbirths.

Since then, the CQC reports among others have highlighted the unusually high number of women needing emergency hysterectomies after traumatic births and the attached maternity unit being judged as unsafe.

Is there someone on the maternity wards and has been for years you think, deliberately neglecting birthing mothers or doing something so their babies die? Or so they need emergency hysterectomies?

What do you think is happening?

Mischief you misunderstand my post about the dumping.

What I'm saying is there's no way it happened accidentally so many times causing collapse. It's too much of a simple thing to tube feed.

I could easily conclude that no babies were murdered.

Well after a lengthy trial the jury concluded otherwise. They, and only they were in a position to determine whether there was sufficient evidence to reach a guilty verdict.

They have seen the prosecution and defence case, the medical evidence and will have been given legal advice on how to weigh evidence etc by the judge.

LL is guilty. The fact that the CoC has had failing procedures provided some of the opportunity to kill, particularly after the whistleblowers were dismissed but this does not detract from the fact she is the most prolific baby murder this country has ever seen.

That is huge speculation and projection.

Based on one friend who said LL told them she was the result of a difficult birth and that's why LL went into child nursing.

That friend could be lying. That friend could be misremembering and thinking of someone else she knows.

Or if true, it could be LL Mum said "yours was a difficult birth, we're so grateful that we both came out healthy and the staff were great, how wonderful"

Complete speculation and projection to suggest LL was a victim of a dysfunctional/emotionally abusive parental relationship where she was constantly told about her difficult birth and made to feel some way about it.

That's the worst kind of inappropriate armchair pseudo- psychology which this case has suffered from from the beginning. It's embarrassing to be honest.

It’s an opinion based on virtually nothing though, isn’t it? You knowing people who’ve been damaged by their parents doesn’t mean this is what happened here.

We all know how easy it is to jump to conclusions, how we’re all predisposed to cherrypick facts to fit with our biases and that people are unfairly judged all the time. Yet people still do it.

I don't think anyone knows for sure but the messages they read out in court seem pretty vanilla, maybe a little flirty and overfamiliar and not messages I would be happy with my husband sending but nothing that hints explicitly at an actual romantic relationship. But of course it was only a snippet of their correspondence and the fact it was on fb messenger is telling i think.

Because they would have simply pointed to all the evidence that shows they were not in fact natural deaths.
Think logically. The defence team were not a bunch of incompetents. They had access to these records, and to medical expertise to interrogate the findings of the prosecution's experts.

What would have happened, is that the prosecution would have simply gone through and systematically shown what was missed in the original post-mortems (which were not done by forensic pathologists looking at the possibility of non-natural interference with these babies) and how the evidence showed that where there were atypical presentations and anomalies in these unexpected and odd (but assumed natural in that murder was simply not one of the causes being contemplated at the time) collapses, these specific issues are explained when one looks at non-natural mechanisms.

Yes.

And also, it's not as simple or linear as experiencing abuse automatically means that's a reason or justification to perpetrate abuse.

It doesn't work that way.

It could be that you witnessed domestic violence as a child and went on to be a domestic abuser in adulthood. It would be extremely rare that even if that behaviour was modelled to you in childhood, that you would not realise that was wrong, caused you harn as a child and not want to replicate it in adulthood.

Which It could be said, could be extremely difficult if you've not been taught to manage your emotions without using violence.

But even if that is the case, the criminal justice system doesn't say you are not responsible, they may adjust the consequences based on your experiences if you've been diagnosed as having a mental disorder as a result of your childhood but they don't just 'let you off'.

And for a number of years in early serial killer research which suggested some serial killers had suffered extreme childhood abuse and there was therefore a connection. Ongoing research has demonstrated that in the main, most serial killers had not experienced childhood trauma that was uncommon so could not be seen as a potential causative factor.

I currently work with violent offenders. A lot have a history of ACEs (adverse childhood experiences) but so do many people. What is significant is that they come from cultural and societal backgrounds where criminal and violent offending is common and antisocial behaviour, not engaging in school or work including crime is the norm.

I had an extremely close relationship with my mum. If I'd lived alone with two cats this is exactly the sort of sweet, thoughtful thing she'd have done - albeit with a pinch of silliness.
LL and I have very similar family lives. Swap Torquay for Woolacombe and Dartmoor, nursing for a different career and I had a very similar upbringing. We diverge as adults abd I didn't murder babies but I see many similarities between our parents. And consequently I feel very sad for them. I'm sure they just adored her with all their being abd that's why they did what they did at the trial etc

There's nothing concerning at all about her history, character or personality. Nothing.

It's not just a case of "well we don't know everything about her childhood or adult life". No we don't and we could theorise but that's with no external evidence whatsoever. No GP/CAMHS/MH/Police/CYPSS/Medical/training/ employment records at all.

The prosecution would have had access to that and came up with nothing.

The defence if they saw fit, could have presented her as having a mental illness which even if it didn't absolve her of responsibility, could be a mitigating factor. They didn't.

She was first arrested and her arrest in the news was years ago.

Nobody came forward with anything concerning. Because if they did, it would have been included in the prosecution case. Every other medical serial killer case has had a wealth of red flags and people coming forward to the Police to report their experiences and that was presented in court and witnesses called as part of the prosecution case.

There was ample opportunity for anyone who felt they had significant information or even just their experience of her to report that given the vast timescale between her arrest and trial.

And we're not just relying on people coming forward. Numerous people were interviewed by the Police during their investigation. People she did their nursing training with her and lived with in nursing accommodation, numerous ex and current colleagues, mentors and managers and parents of infants that Lucy Letby had cared of.

Not one person gave any indication of anything particularly odd or suspicious about her. Literally no-one.

Apart from one manager and colleague I think who thought it was weird LL wanted to work with the most unwell babies. Which LL defence presented a very good explanation for.

Even the consultants who accused her could come up with nothing unusual, odd or suspicious about her.

That doesn't mean she's innocent but it does mean, as the forensic psychologists have said, that if she's guilty, she is an unprecedented anomaly that would represent a complete overhaul of the previous theories and understanding of medical serial killers.

Which could of course be the case and I'm not excluding that possibility.

She did it for fun no doubt. Being a serial killer is a pretty niche thing “to do”. She walked on that edge and no doubt felt a euphoric rush. She could do what others could never do, and quite easily. She must be special. Or so she thought. Maybe if she had picked another career like teaching whereby it wouldn’t be so easy to kill small ones she wouldn’t have been a serial killer.

Who knows. I’m very glad she has lost her autonomy. I imagine for someone like LL that will sting every single day. She did get emotional when she viewed her bedroom, which reminded her of her life of freedom.

I think it's good to question those.

Because the prosecution were struggling to come up with a motive for LL harming and killing infants.

And motive isn't necessary for a criminal case but it helps.

In the absence of any psychiatric or other motive, they hypothesised that LL was harming or killing infants because she was infatuated with the Dr and wanted him to come on to the ward because of an emergency.

But he wasn't working there or on shift for many of those critical incidents.

If they were having an affair they managed to never say anything suggesting that on their 'phones. Which seems unlikely, but is possible.

And LL may have had a massive crush on him, which was never reciprocated by him but he either didn't realise or he realised but liked it or didn't know how to put boundaries down without hurting her.

So..its entirely possible that this wasn't any kind of affair at all. Let alone an affair that caused LL to harm babies.

That doesn't mean she's innocent but it does mean, as the forensic psychologists have said, that if she's guilty, she is an unprecedented anomaly that would represent a complete overhaul of the previous theories and understanding of medical serial killers.

What do you mean 'if she is guilty'?

She is guilty as determined by the jury at the trial based on the evidence produced by the CPS and witnesses.

She is a psychopath, she was very good at conning people. She took risks such as killing on 'significant dates'.

She admits that the insulin could not have got into babies by accident.

I find it astonishing that you are doubting this on the basis that she is an unprecedented anomaly according to psychologists, which psychologists are you referring to?

This article might help you overcome your perceptions of what a female serial killer might look like. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/aug/24/lucy-letby-serial-killer-forensic-psychologist-murderer

Everyone knows Sally Clark was guilty of killing her two sons, because a pathologist and a jury said so, only she wasn't, the pathologist Alan Williams withheld exculpatory evidence.

"A General Medical Council fitness to practise panel found Dr Williams, aged 58, guilty of serious professional misconduct in 2005 for not disclosing the results of tests on her second son"

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2078654/

Not really based on nothing, no. You try working with them for 16 years. Deeply disturbed people.

Had she ever had any relationship?

This is exactly what I went through.

At times I was thinking "that really can't be true" when listening to some of the evidence. But it was always backed up and more evidence was given that showed that was true.

It was when she took the stand and couldn't actually say "x happened like this. You're wrong".

She just said "no", "I can't recall" or "that's usual behaviour for me".

It was said for weeks her taking the stand would be bad for her. I didn't believe it until it happened.