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Original poster

Lucy Letby: have you changed your mind?

1000 replies

Kittybythelighthouse · 09/08/2025 20:42

I’ve been sensing a shift in opinions on the Lucy Letby case and I’m interested in hearing from people who have changed their mind either way.

Did you used to think she was guilty and now you don’t, or you aren’t sure? What changed your mind?

Also vice versa: did you used to think she was not guilty but then changed your mind to guilty? What convinced you?

The reason I’m using the term ‘not guilty’ rather than ‘innocent’ is because courts don’t prove innocence. Not guilty is a legal conclusion about whether or not the state met its burden of proof.

OP posts:
Thread gallery
18
kkloo · 10/08/2025 00:14

Heylittlesongbird · 10/08/2025 00:06

I've said I think her guilty and I do.

Not because of her flatness or lack of emotion. I can well believe that an innocent person would shut down in the face of this accusation. I genuinely believe that my daughter would in this situation and she would elicit no sympathy.

I always felt for Louise Woodward when she appeared to be convicted, in part, because of a lack of emotion. And I felt her conviction was wrong.

No-one from Letby's life stepped forward for her. No other nurses, not the doctor she was allegedly involved with. The circumstantial evidence appears overwhelming. The way she tried to interact with the parents of deceased children with a sense of excitement is disturbing. She shouldn't have had the handover notes, certainly not to that level. Her desire to get straight back in to the sickest babies jars as unusual behaviour. There is so much more.

The police worked the case by creating corridors of information and not talking to each other whilst a team each took a baby to investigate. Then when they put the evidence together they all came back to Letby from their independent enquiries.

And I get the argument that the NHS cover up. I've worked in it since the early 90s. However, in my experience they cover up by closing ranks and working together, denying the problem. Not by phoning the police and asking for help.

I genuinely don't want to see an innocent person in prison. I haven't seen anything to convince me her conviction was wrong. But, if a team out there can convince the justice system to look at it again and have convincing evidence, then fair play to them.

Show quote history

Didn't another nurse say she wanted to be a character witness but was warned not to?
The doctor she allegedly had a relationship with. He clearly lied in order to get anonymity, at a pre trial hearing he said that he was the subject of unrequited affection, which was clearly a lie, it's obvious in the messages that it was very much requited.
He also said his wife had been targeted by Letby on social media.

I wonder why that wasn't used in court then, it was interesting that he wasn't questioned about any of it in the trial, considering the prosecution did allude to her 'boyfriend'. I think they knew that he was going to perjure himself rather than admit it.

Heylittlesongbird · 10/08/2025 00:15

Lostmyusernametoday · 10/08/2025 00:11

Completely agree - and something I hadn’t really thought about is when is a jury not fit for purpose. I would consider myself to be a fairly intelligent, well read person, but on watching the documentary found of course I had to believe every expert because I have nowhere near enough knowledge to apply the critical thought that I would to say, the victim of a stabbing and then the accused hiding clothing and dumping a murder weapon. So of course a jury almost had to believe the expert - they had no means by which to question him. Also a very unusual nuance to have a scenario where it could be this person, it could be someone else, or it could be nobody at all and a tragic system failure.

the whole thing is horrific for all the families of everyone involved and if she’s not guilty for LL herself.

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I do think that there is an argument to be made for professional juries, i.e. clinicians in medical cases, qualified accountants in financial cases etc. I think it would be much more efficient for the cases.

Spidey66 · 10/08/2025 00:16

Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:04

Bear in mind that Dewi Evans and Dr Ravi Jayaram both signed letters in support of Roy Meadow who wrongly convicted Sally Clarke and Angela Cannings (the SIDS mums). Dewi Evans also called on Dr Ward Platt to be an expert witness in the Letby case, but he died before the trial. Dr Ward Platt had backed Roy Meadow’s junk logic that multiple baby deaths in one family must mean smothering, this was a baseless, pattern-matching theory that helped send innocent mothers to prison. The conviction collapsed when proper science and genetics were brought in, but the damage was done. Sounds familiar.

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Thank you. Watching the documentary, my gut feeling kept going back to those mums.....now know why!

Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:16

EmeraldShamrock000 · 10/08/2025 00:08

It's a strange case.
I don't know a lot about the conspiracies
but assume that she is guilty.

The only real conspiracy is the one claiming that 14 eminent international experts from the worlds leading research and practice hospitals clubbed together to make fake reports proving there were no murders because they all collectively lost their damn minds over a baby killing British nurse half the world away. Now that is a conspiracy.

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Spookyspaghetti · 10/08/2025 00:17

Kittybythelighthouse · 09/08/2025 23:56

I’m not actually sure what your point is here, but you’re clearly very emotional about it.

Do you really think I’m “so invested in someone convicted of murdering babies” that I’m questioning the conviction? That’s wild! On what basis do you think I love baby murderers? Don’t you think it’s more likely that I’m genuinely not convinced by the flimsy evidence presented in court vs a panel of high level international experts?

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I think they are trying to say that you are more interested in headline grabbing conspiracy theories, and Daily Mail pod casts than the real lived experiences of families who deserved the justice they got but now have to go through the crushing blow of seeing many members of the public support the narrative of a woman convicted of multiple baby murders and her team over them.

Tiredofwhataboutery · 10/08/2025 00:17

I think some of the evidence (the use of statistics) was really very questionable. Also the experts who are coming out and saying that they don’t believe these babies were killed. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of another case where multiple renowned experts put their reputations on the line for free! I might be wrong but I feel like there needs to be a review.

Sometimeswinning · 10/08/2025 00:19

Kittybythelighthouse · 09/08/2025 23:56

I’m not actually sure what your point is here, but you’re clearly very emotional about it.

Do you really think I’m “so invested in someone convicted of murdering babies” that I’m questioning the conviction? That’s wild! On what basis do you think I love baby murderers? Don’t you think it’s more likely that I’m genuinely not convinced by the flimsy evidence presented in court vs a panel of high level international experts?

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Sorry. You’re right. I tend to be emotional when babies die or in this case are murdered.

The families have said it’s devastating for them to hear comments and arguments like yours. They lived this. But who cares about them?

You watched one documentary and consider yourself an expert. I have a few words to describe you! The nicest one is clueless.

Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:20

Hexwood · 09/08/2025 23:56

Seeing the way many people talk about Lucy Letby is quite alarming. People saying they have no interest in new evidence, they just know in their gut she must be guilty. That she didn't pull what they consider the right facial expressions so she must be guilty, that she's blonde and youngish therefore anyone who thinks she isn't guilty must fancy her, that she looked up patients families on facebook, etc.etc.etc. And that's beside some of the actual people involved in the trial who seemed to just make things up. It's genuinely making me rethink my entire opinion on the justice system, it's making me wonder if there are a huge number of people wrongfully convinced that we don't know about. Many people genuinely do not seem to give a shit about evidence or justice. I think people are a lot more emotion driven and a lot less logic driven than I had naively supposed.

Edited

This times a million, There is way too much literal witch trial logic on show around this case. It’s…disconcerting.

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ScruffMuffin · 10/08/2025 00:24

If she is in fact innocent... a shocking and terrible miscarriage of justice has occurred.

If she killed the babies, that's shocking and terrible too.

The worst thing about this is that the families will always have to live without their children who died, or who now have medical problems due to coming close to death. This debate is set to run and run... who knows if they will ever get the truth?

Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:25

kkloo · 10/08/2025 00:01

Do we know yet when Dr Shoo Lee was first contacted?

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He was not contacted by either defence or prosecution. He was retired and peacefully running a farm in Canada, minding his own business. He never wanted to be an expert witness. Post conviction someone drew his attention to the case in a newspaper article because his research was the only diagnostic evidence used to convict on the air embolism charges. He inserted himself into the case because he was appalled at how the prosecution misused the research.

OP posts:
kkloo · 10/08/2025 00:27

Lostmyusernametoday · 10/08/2025 00:11

Completely agree - and something I hadn’t really thought about is when is a jury not fit for purpose. I would consider myself to be a fairly intelligent, well read person, but on watching the documentary found of course I had to believe every expert because I have nowhere near enough knowledge to apply the critical thought that I would to say, the victim of a stabbing and then the accused hiding clothing and dumping a murder weapon. So of course a jury almost had to believe the expert - they had no means by which to question him. Also a very unusual nuance to have a scenario where it could be this person, it could be someone else, or it could be nobody at all and a tragic system failure.

the whole thing is horrific for all the families of everyone involved and if she’s not guilty for LL herself.

Show quote history

Agreed.
I personally wouldn't feel comfortable being a juror for a case like that because there's so much missing information and I wouldn't even know what parts of the puzzle that I'm not seeing.

I read that sometimes expert witnesses are called on and will never take the stand but they'll be there to help the barrister in cross-examining etc, because even though the barrister is surely going into it fairly prepared, they're still not going to pick up on things or know exactly what to ask that is relevant the way an actual expert in that field would.

As a juror, if the prosecution tell you there is no way this could have happened except for if they were intentionally poisoned and then the defence concede that then you have to accept that. Experts in insulin however didn't just accept that, as we're starting to see now.

I saw a neonatologist on another forum go through testimony about one of the babies before, and they literally listed out all their immediate questions that they had off the top of their head. How long had it been since X? Had the baby received X? Was this checked? Was that done? Loads and loads of relevant questions that ordinary people are never going to consider.

kkloo · 10/08/2025 00:29

Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:25

He was not contacted by either defence or prosecution. He was retired and peacefully running a farm in Canada, minding his own business. He never wanted to be an expert witness. Post conviction someone drew his attention to the case in a newspaper article because his research was the only diagnostic evidence used to convict on the air embolism charges. He inserted himself into the case because he was appalled at how the prosecution misused the research.

Edited
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This is what I find to be insane (well, one of the many things).... that they were allowed to use such an obscure paper from 1989, but not even the prosecution had to bother to check with the author.

EmeraldShamrock000 · 10/08/2025 00:32

Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:16

The only real conspiracy is the one claiming that 14 eminent international experts from the worlds leading research and practice hospitals clubbed together to make fake reports proving there were no murders because they all collectively lost their damn minds over a baby killing British nurse half the world away. Now that is a conspiracy.

Show quote history

Well that is a far fetched conspiracy.
It is not like a miscarriage of justice hasn't happened before.
Isn't there evidence that Levy Belfield could be responsible for Michael Stones crime.
Who knows.
In light of the new evidence, she deserves a retrial.
If it was overturned, she would always have people believing that she is guilty.

Oftenaddled · 10/08/2025 00:33

Spookyspaghetti · 10/08/2025 00:08

She also took an unprofessional level of interest in the families of her victims. Searching them on Facebook etc. Some of the things she said to parents after their babies died, like trying to push for babies to be bathed… A best case scenario is she is neurodivergent and doesn’t understand that the things she says and does are inappropriate. Crushing on doctors and making opportunities to be around them. Constantly inserting herself into situations where she had more time with sick babies.

Let’s just assume she was just crap at her job and that it was fully the negligence of her bosses to not just move her to a different area of the hospital with less responsibilities. If her being alone with all those babies and being crap at her job contributed to their deaths then she still bares a lot of responsibility for their deaths in my eyes. She should have realised her limits and change careers.

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There's no evidence she was bad at her job. The hospital did a review of nursing for all cases, co-led by Letby's chief accuser. They found nothing wrong with nursing care for any of the babies she was responsible for.

The experts who reviewed the cases recently have found lots of failings in care, but not by nurses. They are all doctors' misjudgements, like delayed blood transfusions, prescribing wrong medication or wrong doses, mistakes with intubation, ventilation, or delayed diagnosis, treatment and prescriptions.

You can see them summing up their findings at
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/video/2025/feb/04/no-medical-evidence-to-support-lucy-letbys-conviction-expert-panel-says-video

Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:38

Heylittlesongbird · 10/08/2025 00:06

I've said I think her guilty and I do.

Not because of her flatness or lack of emotion. I can well believe that an innocent person would shut down in the face of this accusation. I genuinely believe that my daughter would in this situation and she would elicit no sympathy.

I always felt for Louise Woodward when she appeared to be convicted, in part, because of a lack of emotion. And I felt her conviction was wrong.

No-one from Letby's life stepped forward for her. No other nurses, not the doctor she was allegedly involved with. The circumstantial evidence appears overwhelming. The way she tried to interact with the parents of deceased children with a sense of excitement is disturbing. She shouldn't have had the handover notes, certainly not to that level. Her desire to get straight back in to the sickest babies jars as unusual behaviour. There is so much more.

The police worked the case by creating corridors of information and not talking to each other whilst a team each took a baby to investigate. Then when they put the evidence together they all came back to Letby from their independent enquiries.

And I get the argument that the NHS cover up. I've worked in it since the early 90s. However, in my experience they cover up by closing ranks and working together, denying the problem. Not by phoning the police and asking for help.

I genuinely don't want to see an innocent person in prison. I haven't seen anything to convince me her conviction was wrong. But, if a team out there can convince the justice system to look at it again and have convincing evidence, then fair play to them.

Show quote history

Are you aware that her colleagues were warned off from supporting her at trial? And that at Thirlwall the reports from her colleagues overwhelmingly had no issue with her whatsoever?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/07/20/claim-nhs-hospital-told-nurse-dont-give-evidence-lucy-letby/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

thirlwall.public-inquiry.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Written-Opening-Statement-of-the-Senior-Management-Team.pdf

OP posts:
Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:45

Spookyspaghetti · 10/08/2025 00:17

I think they are trying to say that you are more interested in headline grabbing conspiracy theories, and Daily Mail pod casts than the real lived experiences of families who deserved the justice they got but now have to go through the crushing blow of seeing many members of the public support the narrative of a woman convicted of multiple baby murders and her team over them.

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Sigh. NHS failures and arse covering is unfortunately routine. No one is suggesting a “conspiracy”.

The real conspiracy here is the fanciful idea that 14 top level experts from all across the globe decided to simultaneously tank their solid gold reputations and extremely lucrative careers to shill for a serial killer nurse half the world away, and to do it pro bono.

It doesn’t wash. Sorry.

OP posts:
Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 00:57

Sometimeswinning · 10/08/2025 00:19

Sorry. You’re right. I tend to be emotional when babies die or in this case are murdered.

The families have said it’s devastating for them to hear comments and arguments like yours. They lived this. But who cares about them?

You watched one documentary and consider yourself an expert. I have a few words to describe you! The nicest one is clueless.

Show quote history

Good lord. First of all I have not “described myself as an expert”. Secondly, a fair and rigorous justice system protects the innocent, holds the guilty to account, and shields everyone from abuse of power. It ensures verdicts are based on solid evidence, not bias or public pressure, and that rights and freedoms are upheld for all. That’s important to all of us, or it should be!

Everyone feels for the families, but if a conviction is unsafe, it has to be overturned no matter how emotive the case. Ignoring a miscarriage of justice to spare feelings doesn’t help the families, it just keeps an innocent person in prison, leaves the real truth buried, and potentially endangers all of us to wrongful conviction. We cannot wrongly imprison people for life to save the feelings of anyone. Which is assuming the parents don’t have questions now anyway. They aren’t a monolith.

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Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 01:02

Jellywobbles2 · 10/08/2025 00:13

Does she have any supporters I.e colleagues who worked with her, friends, someone she was in a relationship with?

Yes, nurses were warned off from supporting her at trial and at Thirlwall her colleagues mostly had no issue with her or actively supported her. In the documentary on ITV last week her best friend Dawn speaks fondly about her as does Karen Rees head of nursing at the time. She 100% has her supporters.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/07/20/claim-nhs-hospital-told-nurse-dont-give-evidence-lucy-letby

thirlwall.public-inquiry.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Written-Opening-Statement-of-the-Senior-Management-Team.pdf

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PeonyBulb · 10/08/2025 01:04

I thought she was innocent for ages but I’m absolutely convinced she’s guilty

RigIt · 10/08/2025 01:05

No I haven’t changed my mind. I followed the trial really closely and was shocked at the “evidence” (ie how flimsy and how little there was) and at the lack of defence in court. I was “concerned” before the trial. She seemed unusual for a serial killer in that there wasn’t anything coming out about her background and the constantly changing MO seemed very unusual. But I remained open minded and thought more would come out in the trial; I was expecting some “smoking gun” evidence (even if circumstantial and across multiple pieces of evidence) to come out, but there was nothing and some of the so-called “evidence” seemed very misleading and very poor quality (mainly the statistical evidence at that time) even to me. When the defence rested, I said to my DH, I’m pretty sure she’s not done this but she’ll definitely be found guilty because she had basically no defence. But then I thought, ok now she’s been convicted maybe more will come out - you know the typical stories about abusive backgrounds, antisocial behaviour when younger, other trauma, head injuries etc, that the press would have been withholding pre conviction. But then nothing. Zilch. Serial killers do not just appear out of nowhere, there is always something.

Then more and more medical and other experts came out casting doubt on the evidence provided to the court….culminating the panel of experts confirming that it is highly likely no murders ever occurred.

So I suppose I’ve changed my mind in that I’ve gone from “i suspect she’s innocent but the conviction is definitely unsafe, she’s not had a fair trial” to “I am sure she’s innocent and no murders occurred” as time and more criticism has come out.

I feel for her and her family though. Regardless of what happens now her life is ruined. You don’t get over trauma like this. And even if she’s released there will always be people that think she’s guilty so her life will be under threat. She’s not going to be able to live a normal life ever again. And I really feel for the parents. Who have been through hell and back, lost their babies, then told they were murdered and dragged through a trial only to find out they were never murdered at all and it was just an incompetent and filthy hospital. Lives ruined everywhere.

I hope that, if nothing else comes of this, there are significant reforms to our legal system to change the way both statistical and medical evidence is presented and used in court, to prevent anything like this ever happening again.

Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 01:07

EmeraldShamrock000 · 10/08/2025 00:32

Well that is a far fetched conspiracy.
It is not like a miscarriage of justice hasn't happened before.
Isn't there evidence that Levy Belfield could be responsible for Michael Stones crime.
Who knows.
In light of the new evidence, she deserves a retrial.
If it was overturned, she would always have people believing that she is guilty.

Show quote history

Yes, I don’t believe in that conspiracy either - it is indeed far fetched! Yet somehow if you have doubts about the case you’re constantly branded “a conspiracy theorist” by people who are literal conspiracy theorists.

OP posts:
Original poster
Kittybythelighthouse · 10/08/2025 01:10

PeonyBulb · 10/08/2025 01:04

I thought she was innocent for ages but I’m absolutely convinced she’s guilty

What changed your mind?

OP posts:
PeonyBulb · 10/08/2025 01:11

@Kittybythelighthouse

listening to the podcast explaining how the police investigated and reading up quite a lot about it

PeonyBulb · 10/08/2025 01:12

This one

Lucy Letby: have you changed your mind?
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