Lucy Letby Appeal

[blackcherryconserve]

I've noticed on some threads that there are Mumsnetters who believe that there has been a miscarriage of justice. I just want to point out this from parents of two babies 'treated' by Letby.
“Our family is deeply shocked by the ongoing speculation surrounding what is being referred to as a miscarriage of justice,” the parents of babies E and F said. “Certain pieces of evidence being discussed in the media are grossly out of context and misrepresented. Misinformation is being circulated about what transpired in court. Having attended the trial ourselves, we are fully aware of what was said.”
“It is infuriating to hear some people say, ‘I just have a feeling she hasn’t done anything.’ Serial killers often hide in plain sight — that’s how they manage to go undetected. They blend in and manipulate those around them. It is deeply disrespectful to the prosecution, defence, judge, and jury — who dedicated nearly a year of their lives to fulfilling their public duty with care and diligence. They took the necessary time to carefully consider all the evidence before reaching their verdicts.
“We have seen all the comments circulating on social media and in the mainstream news, and we find them both hurtful and distasteful.”

Under UK law she is entitled to ask for an appeal. This is how it should be. If there are no grounds then she won’t get one.
Not sure what point you are trying to make here really.

I would say it's the social media saying that LL is innocent and it's a miscarriage of justice.

This situation and the recent speculation has got to be appallingly unsettling for the parents who lost their babies, having reached, or so they thought, some sort of closure. Not that losing a baby is something you ever recover from. I cannot imagine their pain.

But as the pp said, justice has to work in a completely objective and factual realm and if there are legitimate discrepancies then an appeal will be the right thing to do. If not, it won’t be granted.

There are some serious legal commentators who think the evidence, handled differently, might not have been good enough for the jury to be 'so sure they are certain' that Letby killed the babies. Too much hangs on circumstance.

ISTR the jury verdicts for the main trial were by majority and only after a juror, presumably one who was part of the minority unwilling to convict, was discharged.

I have an uncomfortable feeling about it and think it's a question of how many years before the Criminal Cases Review Commission take it on and refer it back to the Court of Appeal rather than the verdicts remaining.

Agreed. The right to appeal- the right to request appeal - and the rexamination of contentious trials are fundamentally essential to justice. For everyone.

This isn't simply about Letby and whether she had been wrongly imprisoned, it is shaping up to be a case which will have far-reaching effects on the pursuit and execution of justice in this country and beyond.

Justice has to be fairly & equally applied even to the guilty. Especially to the guilty, because doing so ensures that the rest of us receive justice too.

The babies in this case, and those who weren't included but also died, and their parents are forefront of my mind right now. I cannot begin to imagine what their parents are going through, or how they find strength when they thought the conclusion of the trial would bring them some closure. It must be torturous for them and I hope their suffering & the tragically short lives of their children are not forgotten during this.

They deserve justice, its cruel that such a weighty question mark hangs over Letby's sentencing...but,if she is the victim of a miscarriage of justice then so are they.

The questions being asked now, the judiciary / evidential processes bring challenged are precisely about what was heard in court and how it was presented. About strong bias of evidence that could mean no other conclusion could have been reached. If that is found to be true, then it isn't just Letby who has been poorly served by the courts, but the victims too.

It is worth pointing out that what we're seeing isn't merely a social media campaign like Free Britney, but that serious concerns have been raised by eminent experts in the related fields of neonatalism and statistics, which are crucial corners of the case for both the prosecution and defence.

In spite of all of this, I keep thinking...what must it be like to lose your tiny, fragile child, to be told he or she was murdered and then when the killer is caught and jailed, to hear it was all a big mistake?

I believe the means of justice in this need to be rigorously retested, but my heart goes out not to Lucy Letby, but to the parents who lost their children in such awful circumstances.

People do get wrongly convicted. Andrew Malkinson and Sam Hallam are two recent ones to spend decades in prison then to be found not guilty and get no compensation. Hiw they were ever convicted I can not fathom. Serious convictions should always be reviewed properly in my opinion, it's just how it should be.

Basically my concern is that social media is at the root of calling the trial a miscarriage of justice.

From what I have read in the non social media it is a range of medical experts, legal experts and statisticians who have led the call for a review not ordinary members of the public on social media.
Justice must be done and the victims and their families will rarely if ever be able to be objective about the person they believe to be the perpetrator of a particular crime, most understandably.
Of course we will all have personal opinions on any emotive case such as this. People should express themselves respectively but human nature being what it is some will and some won’t.

I'm sure SM has spread the story but a number of well written and well researched pieces by lawyers and people specilaising in statistics and pathology have cast doubt.

'It is deeply disrespectful to the prosecution, defence, judge, and jury.'

All sympathies to the families, but no, it isn't. Being able to question and challenge is an essential part of living in a democratic society. Legal rulings must be able to stand up to stringent review. This one may or may not, but the right to do so is integral to a fair process for all.

I'm sure SM has spread the story but a number of well written and well researched pieces by lawyers and people specilaising in statistics and pathology have cast doubt
But that again has been chewed, swallowed and regurgitated by the media in a way to twist readers' opinions.

The way popular opinions and beliefs iare manipulated and controlled by the media is so scary. As is how naive and gullible we are.

Horrendous for the families of all the babies but if this case is found to be a miscarriage of justice (and many experts have commented; can’t just blame social media)
then it would be a double blow for the parents and families. How on earth would they ever trust the legal system? (Or the health service)
Their nightmare never ends.

This is why you need a system that is objective, the parents of the children aren't objective they are subjective. As terrible as it is to lose a child if there is the slightest doubt LL was wrongly convicted there should be a retrial

As terrible as it is to lose a child if there is the slightest doubt LL was wrongly convicted there should be a retrial

Utter rubbish! This is part of the issue with the 'Free Lucy Brigade'.

If there is evidence of a wrongful conviction, then there should be retrial. 'Slightest doubt' means we'd be retrying so many cases, we wouldn't have time for new ones because someone somewhere thinks or says something is wrong.

Frankly, I'm going to hide this thread now because I'm deeply disappointed (to say the least) with the mumsnet Lucy Letby fan club, it's soured my enjoyment of mumsnet. I really don't think OP should have started this thread and given these people another avenue to spew their Free Lucy rhetoric disguised as anti- "unsafe conviction" with no substantial evidence.

The grieving parents don't deserve this raked over the coals on social media. If the experts are doing their professional digging, fine but not randoms on the internet sticking the knife in just for the "discussion". I hope none of you are ever in such a situation, where people are more interested in their entertainment than the impact it has on you.

@ThenYouLookAtMe I am not, in any way shape or form a member of any Letby fan club. I am though a long term observer of, and in a small way, participant in the UK's justice system.

There are serious legal, medical and statistical commentators who think that the evidence for the evidence for the prosecution was not sufficient to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. A new legal team has been appointed to pursue that via a referral to the Criminal Cases Review Commision. I think it's very likely that they will get such a referral. Better now then in ten or twenty years time as has been the case with so many people. Malkinson is but one example of people left far too long.

If you're a moderator with facility to 'hide' threads then the bar to do so should be a high one. Not liking the cut of posters' jibs is nowhere near enough.

Their feelings are valid and they are entitled to their opinion but if that was me and it was my child I would want to truth, not just any answer for closure but the real answer.

She's had a chance to appeal and it's been denied. Murderers can't just keep trying and trying to get the verdict they want. The conviction is safe.

As an aside, the inquiry has just said that at a previous hospital (not the one in question), babies on Lucy Letby's shifts had 40% tube dislodgement rate while she was caring for them. Normal rate on other people's shifts is less than 1%. Not only has she been found guilty of multiple baby murders, the evidence is mounting that it's the tip of the iceberg. Further police investigations continue.

People repeatedly use the word "experts". There are many experts who think the conviction is unsafe. Could someone tell me who these experts are and what their background is? Why do they apparently know more than the experts called at the trial and people who worked closely with Letby?

You may recall the the world exploded with experts during Covid. Every doctor, scientist, statistician and lab assistant (whether retired, struck off, or working in a completely different field to virology) suddenly knew the answer to everything. To say nothing of journalists, singers, film stars et al.

Wouldn't the parents want the truth. I can't understand why they would be so resistant to appeal.

It's not that I think she is innocent - it's more about whether she received a totally fair trial and that is is beyond all reasonable doubt, a safe conviction

So that's the key thing.

And if she is released because the conviction is deemed unsafe then god help us all. I'd literally despair of this country

It’s NOT just social media. There have been recent pieces on statistics and the evidence in The Economist and Financial Times. The pieces are not trying to say Letby is innocent but pointing out that the vast majority of people do not understand statistics.

The fact that an appeal has been denied does not make a conviction safe. The appeal was denied in part on the basis that the defence could have called one of the world's leading experts on air embolism but did not do so, and therefore his evidence that the prosecution expert was wrong is not new and hence not admissible.

If you want some names, take a look at the "Post-trial commentary on the safety of the convictions" section of the Wikipedia article on Lucy Letby.

I don't know whether Letby is guilty or innocent, but I am appalled that the lawyer for the families has told the inquiry that those questioning the conviction should be ashamed of themselves. We have had more than enough proven miscarriages of justice to know that juries sometimes get things wrong. Should those raising questions about the Guildford Four or the Birmingham Six have been ashamed of themselves?

From what I have read in the non social media it is a range of medical experts, legal experts and statisticians who have led the call for a review not ordinary members of the public on social media.

Exactly. The people who are claiming it is a bunch of crackpots or "The Lucy Letby Fan Club" or I've even seen a mumsnetter claim it is because people fancy her FFS, are just making themselves look ridiculous.