Lucy Letby: have you changed your mind - thread 3

[Typicalwave]

New thread for those following or wishing to comment - originally started by @kittybythelighthouse.

Mmm, they wouldn't be difficult articles to write! The broadsheets too. He'd be an obvious choice for designated can carrier, I wonder if he realises.

If she is exonerated (and I’m certain she will be) this isn’t the kind of MoJ that quietly goes away. It’s a landmark, historical MoJ that exposes so many deep issues with the justice system, policing, the NHS, even the media, and is so high profile, that there will have to be inquiries and reform.

The tories talked about ‘Broken Britain’. Nothing has exposed just how broken Britain is more than this case. These are major cornerstone public institutions that we all rely on and the issues are structural. These are not one-off mistakes that we can just chalk up to a bad day and move on from.

For that reason this is going to continue to be an issue of great public interest for years. LL will either go somewhere else and (try to) quietly live under a new identity or she’ll be the poster girl for how things have gone so wrong, doing one on one interviews with Emily Maitliss or Amol Rajan. In a year or two it’ll be hard to find anyone who admits they were all over X and Tattle every day entertaining themselves by dissecting the corpse of this as a serial murder case.

We went from celebrating dancing nurses at the London Olympics to celebrating dancing nurses on TikTok during Covid and in between we managed to scapegoat a salsa dancing neonatal nurse as a serial killer in the midst of a nationwide neonatal crisis without missing a step.

On reflection I think it’s likely that Letby didn’t start becoming a killer in June 2015, or didn’t start harming babies in June 2015,” consultant pediatrician Stephen Brearey said during a November 2024 public inquiry, per the BBC. “I think it’s likely that her actions prior to then, over a period of time changed what we perceived to be abnormal’

What does this even mean? How was she shifting the hospitals Overton window of what they considered normal? She was killing and harming babies before this? Is he admitting that they didn't notice until Summer of 2015? She’d been nefariously prepping the hospital in the hopes that when she began her (obviously carefully plant and meticulously prepped) killing spree they wouldn’t notice?

I can’t make sense of what he’s trying to say

Apparently the Freemasons were in on it. I thought we were meant to be the conspiracy theorists?

But it's very confusing, overall. He's coming across as not rational at all.

A few observations.

Thanks to advances in medicine, I wonder if people - including SB it seems - have an exaggerated idea of its miraculous powers, and are less understanding of the vagaries of the human body especially at its most vulnerable times. The very young and the very old both have heightened vulnerabilities, the former, especially if premature because they are still "forming" and if premature, doing so in a hostile environment compared to the womb. For the elderly the problem is physiological breakdown of cells and organs, so at the opposite end of the spectrum.

I think perhaps we are so exposed to "the miracles" of modern medicine, we expect far more than we used to. Of course every effort should be made efficiently and promptly to save lives if "we have the technology" but there's a mind set here that implies if it doesn't work, it can't just be "one of those things" someone, or something must be at fault.

The main issue here is the narrow focus on Lucy Letby despite all the problems on the unit which are "acknowledged" to a point but discarded in favour of the serial killer narrative. And then the heroic doctors can claim martyrdom because they tried to do something but were intimidated.

I still stand by the fact that if RJ really thought he'd seen her doing something nefarious to a baby he could, and should have acted in that moment.

But now we're in the realms of pretty much any baby death in her entire career might be added to the charges, and some people are positively rubbing their hands at the prospect with very little understanding of what that actually means, both for Lucy and in the wider context. Utterly chilling.

Why on earth would the Freemasons care about some ordinary nurse in Chester? That’s just desperate reaching. That man is so creepy. He’s worse than Dr Jayaram imo. Dr Jayaram just foolishly made himself more visible in the media/press.

Who said that?

I think you’re spot on. Whose decision was it to upgrade the unit and take on very premature babies that no one was experienced enough to look after, with no neonatologist on site? This lack of familiarity with premature physiologies and norms is everywhere in this case. And then to do only two consultant ward rounds a week?!

People forget that Steven Brearey was Unit Lead Clinician, which is a managerial role, he was responsible for things like governance, rota organisation, and representing neonatology at management level. People think this was a case of plucky doctors vs managers, most of the doctors were actually managers too! Brearey has serious culpability here whether or not she’s guilty.

“I still stand by the fact that if RJ really thought he'd seen her doing something nefarious to a baby he could, and should have acted in that moment.”

Of course he could have and he should have. They were already talking about her being a serial killer by the time of the Baby K incident. It’s utterly incoherent to praise them as heroes when they sat on their hands emailing management for over a year instead of doing something about a serial killer nurse stalking the wards.

“But now we're in the realms of pretty much any baby death in her entire career might be added to the charges, and some people are positively rubbing their hands at the prospect with very little understanding of what that actually means, both for Lucy and in the wider context. Utterly chilling.”

This is exactly the thing. What is Thirlwall aiming to do? Avenues to whistleblow this already existed. The consultants didn’t use them. They instead expected management to fire a nurse without offering a single iota of evidence, instead darkly pointing to a “drawer of doom” (Brearey’s words) which they refused to share! We cannot allow consultants the power to have any nurse fired based only on their say so with no evidence offered, but that’s what they are asking for! It’s ridiculous.

In the article, there's a couple of paragraphs on it:

The inquiry heard that Dr Brearey had previously suggested that a number of former bosses were freemasons.

Richard Baker KC, representing some of the babies’ families asked the consultant: “You had a sense that there might be some deals going on behind the scenes, some element perhaps of corrupt behaviour?”

@Kittybythelighthouse
I've heard about this 'drawer of doom' in passing a few times but I'm not quite clear on at what point, if ever, Brearey passed on this evidence? Presumably he shared it with the police...or is it just something he's referred to and we don't really know? It's all so bizarre.

Blimey, I've never picked up on the insinuations about Freemasonry and dodgy deals. That is wild.

I'm not a fan as it broadly excludes women, and they do "look after their own", and can massage local business and things like planning. But for it to crop up in this case is 😳

It does sound like conspiracy theory fodder, especially as high ranking police officers can also be Masons ..... so there's a contradictory element here.

The bus only had four wheels, but SB makes it sound like 8 of them have fallen off..... bizarre.

(Maybe he wanted to be one and wasn't invited?).

The thing that strikes me overall is that it may be true that Lucy Letby is a baby murderer, but in all the cases that have been presented (and the ones left out) a serial killer is not required for the things that occurred, according to other medical experts.

We also have an overstretched department, younger/sicker babies taken on because of full units elsewhere, no dedicated neonatologists, consultants doing ward rounds a lot less than they should have been, hygiene issues on the ward, problems in the maternity department and so on that could all contribute to a higher rate of death/collapse. Some of it accidental and some neglectful and poor care standards. Poor care is not murder but it still kills babies. Across all that background I don't know how you 100% definitely pick out deliberate harm several years later without really solid evidence if it wasn't even suspected at the time, especially if you don't have a cast iron timeline of events and cause of death.

If she'd been charged with just one offence - any one of them - rather than all of them then I can't see how she would have been found guilty and I'm not sure that weak evidence x 14 = strong evidence.

For those arguing "but Harold Shipman..." there was clear evidence of wrongdoing in his case. As well as his death stats being above those of comparable doctors, he used lethal doses of morphine in each case (as evidenced by a postmortem on an exhumed body), he had a drug problem earlier in his career and forged prescriptions for himself, forged medical records and he tried to profit financially by rewriting the Will of one of his patients using his own typewriter.

I know some Freemasons. They look upon it as being a club for doing good in the community. I'm confident that they both would resign rather than be involved in covering up a killer.

However I'd say that the police (and army) are rife with Freemasons, especially at the upper end, so it's more likely that it's been used against LL than the other way - she can't have been one for obvious reasons, but the consultants could be.

One thing I've noticed with unpleasant people is that they're inclined to both assume others are using underhand methods that they use, and make loud accusations about others - I'm not sure whether this is defence to try and hide what they've done or a bit of paranoia because having done it themselves they know people will use it.

Stephen Cross the trust’s director of corporate and legal services and the lawyer he instructed to advise on the consultants’ allegations were Freemasons, but both have denied that the instructions or advice had any Masonic context.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwy9enw2xw1o.amp

Yeah I see that now.

That is truly wild.

Its not worth engaging @Typicalwave - you cant argue with people whose idea of debate is bombastic and self important statements, rather than facts. Thank god for all the people on this thread who actually have something of value to add, like actual facts.

I’d highly doubt though that Freemasons would decide to deploy a nurse with a penchant for dispatching neonates for (I can’t even think of a motive) whatever purposes - which seems to be what Brearey was getting at.

If he was trying to imply that the hospital KNEW that there was a nurse with a penchant for dispatching neonates at large abx they wanted the Freemasons to use theif clout to cover it up, it didn’t work very well did it? If they KNEW the easiest thing to have done wouod gave been to pick up the phone to the coroner and the police and report it the first time it was raised to them, instead of dancing around arguing with Brearey et al. Unless they wanted her to continue unchecked - for what purpose?

Theres no reason at all.

We don’t know what was in it or what was ever shared from it. This came up at Thirlwall. It’s something he said to Karen Rees when trying to pressurise her to remove LL from the unit. When she asked if he would tell her what’s in his “drawer of doom” because she needed some sort of evidence in order to do that he just said no 🤡 but Karen Rees is the bad guy for not immediately chucking a nurse out the door on the mere say so of a doctor.

archive.is/5m9Mp

We cannot allow consultants the power to have any nurse fired based only on their say so with no evidence offered, but that’s what they are asking for! It’s ridiculous.

As I have said before, it is a lot easier to point at one person rather than a system when things go wrong. And in whose interest is it to find a scapegoat? Managers, whether operational or clinical.

@MargaretThursday Yes good point about the police! Lots of freemasons.
Honestly it's so bonkers that Brearey even went there. I think he's just spent so much time ruminating it's seriously affected him, mentally (which is sad). But talk about paranoid. 🤯
I also know some freemasons (my grandfather was one) and they aren't particularly sinister as far as I can see!

The bizarre thing is, Cross asked this lawyer to advise, and the lawyer advised setting up a meeting so that consultants could lay out their concerns to the police.

So ... what exactly was the great Freemason Conspiracy meant to be aiming at, here?

(ETA - appreciate you aren't arguing there was a conspiracy here. I just don't understand why this interaction is supposed, by anyone, to be suspect).

I had some awful events at work about six to eight years ago, and they have never left me and I found it very hard not to ruminate on them. They still preoccupy me sometimes, more than I like. I've become accustomed to the fact that, when I have to revisit emails, things aren't quite in the order I expect, and when it comes up with colleagues, they remember things I had forgotten and vice versa.

And of course, it was nothing as bad as seeing small children die unexpectedly, perhaps fearing losing my job, being made (for some reason) to help with a police investigation over years afterwards. I do think it likely that some of the consultants have been very much damaged by this, and for this or some other reason, a number of Dr Brearey's statements really don't seem rational.

Just jet washed my car and thought how they went for the most complicated explanation to prove guilt rather than the simplest to prove innocence. See screen grab from private eye regarding the control test. (Part 19)

It shows the very simple explanation rather than a complicated one, including where she would have had to get hold of insulin without it being noticed and then sneaking in whilst off to tamper with a feed bag, which then had to be just the one that was selected by another nurse.

Was I flouting the hose pipe ban? I was using a jet washer connected to a hose pipe disappearing down the side of the house, so the simple explanation was that yes, I was flouting the ban. But in a reverse, it was a more complicated explanation to prove my innocence. What couldn’t be see was the other end of the hose pipe was connected to a water butt pump, in one of my many water butts containing collected rain water.

I’m surprised with some of what was suggested that they didn’t propose she had access to a fully functioning time machine to go back to inject the air before the X-ray was taken showing it in the stomach.

I think the rumours being referred to may have included that Letby’s father was also a Freemason, but I have no idea if there is any substance to that.

I don’t think either of those possibilities are what he’s getting at. I think he’s suggesting it as a possible explanation for the level of protection she was given by the trust after the consultants had raised their concerns.