Lucy Letby - programme on ITV now

[Viviennemary]

I think this must be a new programme and not a repeat. Experts are being wheeled out to try and say Letby is innocent. I'm not convinced at all. None of them were even at the trial or worked with Letby. It's all theories and opinions..

And then he wrote two reports for the application to the court of appeal, which were not accepted as fresh evidence.

Why did he do that?

On the somewhat doubtful basis that evidence from this Canadian scholar and medic, who does not normally take legal business because he doesn't enjoy it, was available at the first trial.

That is the sort of problem Letby faces. Of course it doesn't affect the reality of her guilt or innocence, but it can block justice.

If Dewi Evans had acted properly at the first trial, and described air embolism as a remote possibility in some cases rather than the only possibility, Lee would never have been needed. He shouldn't have been needed. It would have been taking a sledgehammer to crack a nut, if Evans had been honest under cross-examination.

We don't have access to Lee's reports for the court of appeal, but it's clear reading the first of his published articles that Evans misunderstood or misused it, and it's clear reading the second that there's no evidence Letby inflicted air embolisms.

I'd be irritated if I were Lee, and I couldn't care less if he's motivated by hubris (though I see no sign of it). Unlike Evans, he is a man of science and communicates facts rather than fantasies.

It must be awful for the parents of the babies that this is still being debated but in their place I would want to know the truth - and despite the outcomes of the trials, the truth is still not clear. A terrible situation. An explanation of why the original defence didn't call these expert witnesses at trial might provide some clarity?

In his own words, before he’d seen any of the medical records:

That is very mildly expressed, a long way from hubris. In his opinion, not quite right.

And he wouldn't need to have been the medical records to know that the evidence used to convict Letby was "not quite right".

He knew that she had been accused of inflicting air embolisms, and on what grounds, and what arguments had been made in court. He knew that it had been suggested that air embolism was inflicted gradually, or that a baby crying for half an hour was a symptom of air embolism. He knew that she had been accused of the nonsensical murder with air in the stomach.

He did not need, as an actual neonatal specialist, to see the medical records to state an opinion that that sort of evidence was "not quite right"!

When it comes to hubris and not seeing all the evidence, Dewi Evans saying he knew within 10 minutes of starting to read the papers that the baby had been murdered dwarfs anything Shoo Lee might have done.

Possibly money? They will be paid by the integrated care board for providing a service, if they don’t provide that service they don’t get paid.

a lack of realisation by the staff that they weren’t caring for these babies appropriately or safely. It’s hard to see the wood for the trees when you’re in the middle of it.

The biggest thing I struggle with is the fact that consultant rounds were twice a week. This wasn’t the 1980s! I can’t understand on what planet anyone thought this was ok. As the ex ward sister said in the documentary you can think of a neonatal unit as an intensive care unit for babies. Even on a normal ward there are daily ward rounds. I assume this place had daily rounds but with registrars not consultants….thats not appropriate.

There was a senior neonatologist from Addenbrokes who expressed his shock on the radio and said that it was 3 times a day at his place. Clearly consultants being on it is seen as crucial to the well being of sick babies, not just an optional extra.
What gets me about it is how they can have been so distant from those babies and yet so certain there could be no other explanation than murder for their collapse.

My post was more in response to the “man of science and communicates facts rather than fantasies” comment.

He felt that some of the evidence pertaining to the air embolism cases only was “not quite right”, yet determined to find alternative causes of death for all the babies without having seen a single medical record.

He also said that he deliberately updated his 1989 paper (which essentially collated other people’s work) purely so that it might be seen as fresh evidence.

What gets me is on an individual basis nobody suspected anything out of the ordinary at the time of death. Nobody called the police. It was obviously within the realms of possibility that it was natural causes/prematurity. Some of these babies had post mortems and still nothing untoward was suspected.

You are missing information there. Lee could see the evidence was not quite right. So he agreed that he would assemble a team to examine the medical records and share the results whether or not they were favourable to Letby.

If the science had shown murder was likely, so be it. But leaving her locked up without sufficient evidence was obviously wrong.

Anyone working in science or academia or medical research will recognise what you call "collating other people's work" as a review paper. This is where you collate, review and synthesise all relevant published works on a topic. It is a standard method in science, and every medical journal is full of such papers. They are particularly important in studying rare and dangerous phenomena, since you can't usefully hang around watching on the off-chance one will happen, and you can't inflict them as an experiment.

So if you meant that to imply there was anything wrong with Lee's paper for using this method, you are wrong there.

If new research on such an area is wanted, the way to do it is to look at papers published since the last comprehensive review paper. Gathering the new data added since 1989 would be a very obvious and necessary step - you refer to it as an update, and yes, we would expect such updates from a scientist focusing on the data. It would be odd for Lee to ignore 35 years worth of data.

You seem to be criticising Lee here for following standard scientific methods. I have seen that reaction online a lot, and I think people reproducing it might want to pause and think. Why are people so critical of someone following standard scientific processes - is it because they are unaware of these processes? Because they don't like the results?

There's nothing at all wrong with Lee's words or the approach that you describe there. I can't over-emphasise how standard and appropriate Lee's approach is, in his scientific field.

Absolutely nothing wrong with a review paper (not sure why you’re suggesting I think there is?) but deliberately tailoring a paper purely to meet the criteria to be considered as new evidence to defend or appeal a specific criminal case does not scream rigorous scientific independence and you will not be able to persuade me otherwise.

And how convenient that we were only told after the experts had already formed their opinions that the results would have been shared whether they were favourable or not…

If you didn't mean to criticise the nature of a review paper, that's fine. So, we agree that Lee undertook standard scientific research.

Updating the paper with 35 years worth of data may or may not meet the court's criteria for new evidence, but was clearly necessary anyway.

I think that you - and others I've seen repeating this criticism online - are confusing motivation and bias here. It is rare for any scientist to approach a project without motivation. They may hope to cure cancer. They may hope to gain research funding for a further project. They may hope to establish someone's innocence.

The question then becomes, do they follow the scientific approach and share their workings and findings appropriately with peers in their field who can (and are invited to) reply with a scientific critique.

This is what Lee has done. It is what Evans and Bohin have not done. He presents data and subjects his work to scientific criticism. They have not done so. That is why I refer to him as a man of science and distinguish between fact and fantasy.

The petulant response to a normal and respectable scientific approach from people determined that Letby must be guilty has been quite something to behold.

I agree that the intense criticism of Shoo Lee is unfair, he got brought into this case when his research was misused to convict a person of murder, which may not be a safe conviction. I presume as a man of conscience he does not want to let that stand unchallenged and is now using all of his legitimate research and expertise to get it looked at again. Not exactly new evidence but a fresh and hopefully less biased look at the original evidence. If people are so convinced of Letby’s guilt, why are they so adverse to him doing this, would they rather her stay in jail while her conviction stands on flimsy or even discredited medical theories.

At least Evans’s reports and opinions were peer reviewed by a neonatologist, supported by the other prosecution expert witnesses, tested and challenged by experienced counsel via a lengthy trial, and then thoroughly considered by court of appeal judges. So far literally all we have to go on for Shoo Lee is a summary report and accompanying press conference.

Surely if the police proceed with the charges of corporate manslaughter, some of this new evidence will get an airing as it is relevant. For example the shift patterns and Lucy's presence during adverse events. Also what of the doctor's email saying she had called him to an event. This evidence can be tested then. It will be part of the managers' defence but assists Lucy.

On the contrary - we have peer reviewed publications in prestigious professional scientific journals, from Lee. That's the work on air embolism we are discussing.

Evans' work hasn't been peer-reviewed in the scientific meaning of the term. It has not been critiqued for publication. It has been approved, though not reviewed blind, by another expert witness working with him for the prosecution.

Courts don't make science. But obviously Lee and the others are asking for the opportunity to present their work in court. I hope that happens soon.

What evidence is there that any of these poor babies were actually murderedfor a conviction or manslaughter they would need to prove that the babies were murdered which might be their defence plea

Yes - there will be pros and cons for Lucy Letby if this happens, but I would definitely expect a robust defence and I hope the managers wouldn't be prevented from sharing information about the state of the ward and the construction of the case against her.

The problem is it would take a long time to happen.

This is exactly why the death penalty should stay abolished. The amount of people saying bring it back for her, yet she may well be innocent.

I believe he showed a clear bias by in his own words setting out to find alternative causes of death for all the babies when he had not seen evidence, nor had any particular insight or specialist expertise relating to all of the cases. I don’t care what he and McDonald might say after the fact about how they were always going to share the panel’s findings come what may.

Convenient maybe, but it contrasts very favourably indeed with the lack of rigour displayed by Cheshire Police in beginning to consult a statistician (Prof Jane Hutton) then dropping her when it became clear her expert advice didn’t fit with the version of events they had decided on. As if their goal was getting a conviction rather than finding out what most likely actually happened to the babies. They, of all people, needed to be objective.

I find this extremely far fetched to the point of inconceivable that some of you consider that multiple separate consultants have gone to the effort of colluding and conspiring against a nurse to the extent where she was reported to the police, criminally charged, convicted, they supported the conviction and publicly spoke in its favour (and still do). One has to be a wild conspiracy theorist to believe this. I do not for one second believe they did this deliberately and for no reason, do you really think they studied the rota, matched with some baby deaths where it suited them, made up first hand witness account stories related to LL and then reported her once they figured out this could be a credible case?! It's absolute madness. These are the same people Letby's boss was working with and in her own words, she described CoC as a good workplace. Of course they suddenly decided to accuse one of their nurse colleagues of murder, because that's perfectly normal behaviour for no reason. If they knew something else was wrong, they'd have covered their arses by writing to the CoC raising those exact concerns. But they wrote to CoC specifically about LL - for a reason that so many of you are very quick to dismiss.

No reasonable person and certainly no healthcare professional researches dead babies' families on social media, it's entirely unethical and frankly, creepy. This behaviour can only be explained by said person having a link to the events that is abnormal and absolutely warrants a disciplinary and wider investigation.

I am pleased the consultants raised their concerns about her and I believe they did not come from nowhere and they were right to do so.