Lucy Letby innocent?

[dubsie]

I posted a thread a while back saying that the conviction of Lucy Letby was questionable and I believe it might be a miscarriage of justice.

The more I read and the more evidence that comes to the public space the more I think this is going to be one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in British history.

Turns out there's no medical evidence at all

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/feb/04/no-medical-evidence-to-support-lucy-letby-conviction-expert-panel-finds

So the conviction has been based on circumstial evidence and a written note authored on the advice of a therapist.

I think a rapid look at this trial and the evidence is imperative.

If there is a retrial to appease the baying public, then trial by media (and Mumsnet) is alive and well, it seems. I can imagine the government stepping in with the timing of a retrial in the interest of "damage limitation". Again, I don't know which way the truth lies. And I can understand @NamechangeRugby 's suggestion that colleagues might have been reluctant to act for the defence.

Was the case widely public at the time of trial, or at the time of her arrest? Was there a witch hunt with people baying for her blood? I tend to avoid news in general for a whole host of reasons, so maybe I didn't notice it, but I had never heard of Letby until her conviction. Was it kept relatively quiet until then?

No, it was all over the media at the time of the trial. They couldn’t fit all the journalists in the court room. There will be no baying mob demanding a retrial and even if there was they’d be ignored. It’s not how our justice system works. The only grounds for appeal is new evidence and there isn’t any, just reinterpretation of evidence from the trial. You can’t keep having retrials and appeals until you get the result you want.

But even the point about the other babies that died when she wasn't on shift wasn't made (that i'm aware of) and the biased nature of that being part of her prosecution. If that is a valid argument that people are making that point on a message board, how on earth did they fail to bring this to the jury's attention?

Sorry I know I keep banging on about her défense but it's just so confusing to me.

Just read the Guardian article, haven't watched the press conference yet but I'm utterly shocked. I was completely convinced of her guilt but I honestly don't believe all these eminent neonatologists would be coming out to support her if they didn't truly believe she had been wrongly convicted. I think she must be innocent....or at least, she's one of multiple manslaughter contributors but not a sole mass murderer.

How the heck were her defense so bad? Was it that she didn't have finances to pay for better or was it a hush job?

It’s been pointed out repeatedly @Blossomtoes that new academic papers do constitute new evidence so your loud insistence that there isn’t any is false. I don’t personally understand why any reasonable person wouldn’t support exploring areas of doubt when so much is at stake for all of us.

I’m no louder than you @PinkTonic. There is no new evidence that fits the legal definition.

But even the point about the other babies that died when she wasn't on shift wasn't made (that i'm aware of) and the biased nature of that being part of her prosecution. If that is a valid argument that people are making that point on a message board, how on earth did they fail to bring this to the jury's attention?

I'm pretty sure the causes of death of all the other babies that died during that period were brought up at the trial weren't they? I can't remember them all but I think that at least a couple had congenital abnormalities and had been expected to die, and maybe another they knew had an infection?

The only grounds for appeal is new evidence and there isn’t any, just reinterpretation of evidence from the trial.

I notice people keep saying this. I wonder why. It's obviously wrong.

We've only seen a sliver of the full report the panel will give the CCRC, but even there, it's obvious the panel have relied on new academic research to support their conclusion. The summary by Chase on the insulin cases actually spells this out.

This is like saying, the experts who challenged Sally Clark's conviction were only offering a reinterpretation of evidence from her trial.

Of course they were reinterpreting evidence from her trial. And they were doing so based on new evidence, new research.

Three points worth remembering because this "not new evidence" nonsense is all over the internet and will keep coming up, since it's easy to say and doesn't involve acknowledging or challenging the substance of the panel's findings

• The panel summary certainly contains new evidence, and their full report will likely contain far more.

• There is plenty of other new evidence that has emerged from Thirlwall, hospital leaks and police investigation leaks since the verdicts.

• New evidence is not the only basis on which the conviction can be reviewed, referred and overturned anyway.

Phil Hammond, the Private Eye journalist who has been investigating this case for a while, says that the judge ruled in advance of the trial that discussion of other deaths wasn't admissible evidence, and that the reports showing failings of care for children on the charge sheet and not on the charge sheet could not be presented as evidence for this reason.

It's a bit of a mystery to me, but that's the only information I've seen on it.

Can you quote the legal definition, with its source, and then explain why

• the prosecution’s expert witness publicly retracting his air in the stomach theory
• the information from statisticians about the misuse of the roster (the Texas sharpshooter fallacy)
• the revelation that the evidence relating to the absence of c-peptide is entirely flawed, because the analytical technique used was not capable of determining presence of exogenous insulin
• Dr Shoo’s new publication on air embolisms

do not meet the definition of new evidence?

What's that legal definition then, and how does it exclude new academic evidence?

I started following the trial thinking she was likely innocent and being used a scapegoat.

I finished following it believing she was guilty.

She was then found guilty.

I think this is why this case is so split in opinion. It's not clear cut by any means.

I still think she's guilty though.

Oh, you’re a lawyer? What is the legal definition please? And how does new academic research not fall within it? TIA

We've only seen a summary of the panels findings so think it's very premature to assume this will be the smoking gun for a retrial.
Also when it's fully presented it will inevitably need to be challenged.

So it's far too early to be able to say what weight should be put into these findings.

I'm like most of us, confused by her defence team and feeling that most of the evidence to convict was circumstantial.

Now I see people jumping onto the 'not guilty' bandwagon with such assurity.

It's like a pendulum manically swinging out of control.

It's in danger of becoming an entertainment sport again which serves no purpose to the families or our faith in our judicial system.

Is your Google broken? This panel has produced an opinion based on the same evidence. Opinion is not evidence.

I wouldn't even be certain it will be challenged. The CPS could decide not to defend the conviction or not to seek to rely on their existing evidence.

I take your point that it's early days, but it's worth saying that the summaries are clear, precise and produced by the world's leading experts. The prosecution expert witness, who has already contradicted some of his own findings in the press, is not in anything like the same ballpark.

The burden of proof is on the prosecution, so it's not as straightforward as a pendulum swinging back. If it's reasonable to believe there were no murders, there is no case.

So one of two extraordinary things has happened, and media and public interest is entirely justified either way:o

• One, fourteen world-leading experts with no vested interest in the case have independently decided it is worth ruining their reputations and committing perjury in favour of a nurse they had mostly never heard of a few months ago.

• Two, we have wrongly convicted a nurse of one of the worst cases of serial killing ever in this country, based on the known effects of confirmation bias, an expert witness system that is known to be in need of reform, and the known difficulties experienced in judging technical and scientific cases in our courts.

There has been plenty of evidence for 2. before this report and now it is near overwhelming.

People (not you) will dig their heals on and obfuscate over what counts as new evidence, why the defence didn't proceed differently, why Letby had paperwork at home etc but even if our legal system can't do anything about it, we are down to only two possibilities:

Those experts have collectively lost their minds or Letby is innocent.

How can they have committed perjury when they’ve never given evidence in court? And we’re a very long way from there being only two possibilities.

And how about the elements of their opinion based on different evidence?

What different evidence? To be equitable they can only use the evidence used in court or disclosed to the two legal teams. What is this new evidence and where did it come from?

Expert evidence given to the CCRC needs to meet the same standard of truth, since the panel members will refer to the report as expert witnesses in court in case of a retrial. They would rightly be challenged on discrepancies, as Evans was. McDonald has confirmed that they have all agreed to appear on Letby's behalf.

They still haven’t given evidence under oath which is the basis for perjury.

You don't appear to be reading anyone's answers to you on this point. That is strange, because you are answering other parts of their posts.

Here is @SnakesAndArrows with an existing reply to you on this point

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/politics/5267875-lucy-letby-innocent?reply=142004062&utm_campaign=reply&utm_medium=share

Here is a recent reply of mine

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/politics/5267875-lucy-letby-innocent?reply=142003900&utm_campaign=reply&utm_medium=share

I'm afraid you are just continuing to assert what you want to believe without presenting any evidence for your argument.

Completely agree with this.

And I know that this will attract the ire of some posters, but my gut is also telling me that once these new findings start to be forensically challenged one or two of the experts might start to distance themselves, or even withdraw their reports completely, on the basis that they weren't given all the necessary information to work with. Already a number of inaccuracies and oversights have been identified when cross-checked against what was examined and heard during the trials and subsequent applications to the CoA.

"have decided it is worth... committing perjury" is what I said, but it's not important. Drop the bit about perjury if you like. The argument still stands.

Please do tell us about these inaccuracies