Lucy Letby #5

[LaBlonde]

I just couldn't defend someone I wasn't sure about... his career will take a dive if he loses.

Who has he defended before and won?

i don’t think the legal profession can think about it in that way though - plenty of lawyers/solicitors defend people they’re not sure about, it’s ultimately just a job to them, not a comment on their own morals. he’s being paid to defend her and so he will defend her.

his career won’t really take a dive unless he handles the whole case badly, which i doubt based on his reputation. again, legal careers don’t get affected in that way, you “lose” because the evidence goes against you. your reputation only comes into play if you either mess up in court or say something awful as part of your defence etc. he’s going to be fine whatever happens.

 

[MmmB777]

Omg..yes definitely the guy with a glittering 40+ year career is the baddy. Plot twist eh! Didn’t see it coming but yep- he’s absolutely chilling with all his bloody experience and knowledge. Gross. Definitely a sicko. And remember that one time a judge said he shouldn’t have done something a certain way- lying devious bastard I reckon. Anyone know if he designed Chester neonatal unit and whether he checked the machines? He can’t even use the buggers so probs not! What’s his handwriting like? Does he moonlight as a therapist and what’s his fertility like??

 

[Haveyouanywool]

Just re. the comments on her behaviour being 'weird' or some of her actions being suspicious. Every single one of us is different...all of us have different stress reactions or ways of responding when our mh is poor. The fact that some of us wouldn't have smiled in a situation, or written wildly on a post-it, or admitted to something we hadn't done doesn't automatically mean she's guilty.

I know quite a lot of posters, here and elsewhere, have found her Facebook searching on Xmas day to be particularly suspicious...yet not everyone celebrates Xmas. Some people have a low key day, before I had my son I would see family but do my normal things during the day (reading news, looking at the internet etc.) And of course, lots of NHS staff will be working on Xmas day, so I hardly think the fact that it's Xmas day makes it any weirder than it already is.

I have to disagree. She shouldn’t have been searching these families on any day, it’s against NHS social media boundaries polices.
Searching on Christmas Day doesn’t necessarily have great significance but it could, just could, indicate a desire to witness someone’s misery on what most would see as a happy family day.
Some might say there’s nothing wrong with her regularly searching for these families but I find it a bit voyeuristic and creepy.

 

[mdizzl3]

This is true, I suppose number is very subjective. I personally think at this number we went past coincidence a long time ago but I recognise not everyone feels the same.

Actually it’s not subjective, there’s statistical analysis exactly for this purpose. Say there are 10 possible nurses a baby could be assigned to, and some number of deaths per year, there’ll be a point where a certain number of deaths for 1 nurse will be so unlikely that you can say with 95%/99% confidence that it’s not random anymore. Here we have not only total deaths up by a huge amount, but all linked to her - if it was random or hospital negligence it would be distributed across various nurses. I think this number of deaths being linked to her must be statistically significant. I guess they’ll get experts in for this.

 

[just_nicole]

Interested to know why people feel she is innocent (genuinely interested in views, not looking for a bun fight). What makes you think that?

For me, the fact that she'd had direct contact with/was always on shift when the 7 babies died and the 10 others nearly died cannot simply be a coincidence. I also cannot accept that that the babies often improved when away from her care and then deteriorated when near her again weren't being attacked by her - again just too much of a coincidence. Also the dr who walked in on her observing a baby who's stats were falling and yet she was doing nothing about it is a huge "guilty" flag for me. The notes are concerning yes, but it's the sheer volume of babies who died whilst in her care for me.

I do also find it astounding that if she was suspected of harming/killing babies, why on earth she wasn't removed instantly from the ward. Do we think that will come out?

Apologies if this has already been discussed - these threads move so fast, I can't read everything.

I personally don't think she's innocent, I just don't know if she's guilty. When the polls were up it was a pretty even split of guilty and not sure and a tiny minority of thinking she's innocent.

But the thread seems to have taken the turn of unless you think she's guilty, you're obviously saying she's innocent.

Reasoning behind my thinking is my life experiences both professionally and personally,

I honestly dont care at all if i am right or wrong, this isnt something anyone can win.
I do however, want justice for the families.

 

[Hot_Dogs_Or_Toes]

I've always wondered how people knowingly defend someone who is guilty. I know it's just a job, but I couldn't do it.

They don't. If a client admits guilt to their barrister the barrister cannot mislead the court by saying that their client is not guilty. It's the same with anything the client tells them, they can't then go in to court and say something different.

For example, if a person had been charged with hitting someone over the head with a shovel, had pleaded not guilty but in private tells their barrister that whilst they did hit the other person but it was actually with a hammer not a shovel the barrister couldn't go in to court and say that their client hadn't hit a person at all. They could say my client says he did not hit him with a shovel and leave it at that. However, they couldn't outright lie and say they didn't hit them at all as the barrister would know this to be untrue and would be misleading the court.

 

[abelleza]

I don’t necessarily believe the scapegoat theory but I do beleive the department and the trust should be held accountable to some extent
This all happened in 2016 , care was questionable , staff levels were horrendous but yet here we are 2022 , 6 years down the line and the care, training and staffing levels are still at the same level they were previously . You have to question why 6 years late they have not improved at all and learnt from this

Because it’s the NHS? The NHS is a sinking ship. It’s a mixture of lack of staff, funds being misappropriated, too much money being spent on managerial staff who sit around twiddling their thumbs and patting each other on the back all day, whilst front line staff struggle to offer basic level care with broken equipment and everyone doing the work of three people. Of course the vast majority of NHS staff are good people trying their best, but it NHS culture will never change because the front line staff aren’t prioritised.
When I first qualified as a nurse and started my first job, I was full of ideas and hope which I took to management. Anything that made it past my managers (which was not much) was quickly poopood by upper management. I even remember writing a datix about a patient incident and being told to delete it because it ‘wasn’t appropriate’…more like it was too much hard work to deal with.

I know this is side tracking a little bit and like someone else said, two things can be true at the same time; LL could’ve killed those babies AND the hospital management allowed it to happen, over and over and over again. But the NHS will never change, things will never improve unless there is a full redo of the entire structure of the organisation.

 

[catlady29]

God this case is so difficult and my feelings on her innocence/guilt are all over the place...earlier today I seen the update about the note, I was like omg guilty bang to rights. Now I've seen the actual note, and I'm like...I think she didn't do it, I think she was in a dark place mentally...its so strange. God knows what I'll think tomorrow, the poor jury.

 

[LittleMy]

I honestly don’t see how anybody can think she’s innocent.

I think most people are just trying to keep an open mind.

I hope whatever the outcome will be, that it’s achieved after a thorough and fair trial. If she’s found guilty, it means less chance for a successful appeal later.

 

[Deeznutslol]

But the thread seems to have taken the turn of unless you think she's guilty, you're obviously saying she's innocent.

Exactly. A lot of people seem to be seeing it in black and white, but this case is just not black and white at all considering that pretty much all of the evidence we’ve heard so far is just circumstantial? So I don’t really get the vitriol which has been aimed at anyone who isn’t calling her an evil baby murdering witch, especially as we’re only a few days into the trial. I’m more than happy to change my mind if I see evidence which convinces me of her guilt, but so far, I’ve not seen that and I don’t operate on ‘gut feelings’.

 

[Magurndy]

I also just wanted to add to the whole why was she not sacked etc stuff...

To be honest I am genuinely shocked she wasn't suspended instead of being taken off clinical work. My colleague was accused of falsifying her parking permit and was suspended very quickly when they decided she had done this. Turned out someone had actually stolen her permit and even though her bloody payslip showed she was paying for it they still suspended her.... still... if my old trust could suspend someone for something so dumb as that, they could have suspended her with pay pending investigation.

 

[abelleza]

I also just wanted to add to the whole why was she not sacked etc stuff...

To be honest I am genuinely shocked she wasn't suspended instead of being taken off clinical work. My colleague was accused of falsifying her parking permit and was suspended very quickly when they decided she had done this. Turned out someone had actually stolen her permit and even though her bloody payslip showed she was paying for it they still suspended her.... still... if my old trust could suspend someone for something so dumb as that, they could have suspended her with pay pending investigation.

This is a bit of a derail but this is typical of they NHS - they’ll suspend someone for not lining their pockets but not for potentially causing harm to babies (whether they believed it was through malicious intent or just plain incompetence). This culture is half the reason so many of these babies aren’t her anymore, especially if LL is guilty.

 

[freaknasty]

For those that don’t know legal process, now that the prosecution and defence have both done their opening statement the prosecution will call their witnesses forward and show their evidence etc. Once they have asked the witnesses questions, the defence will ask the same witnesses their questions. They can then go back and forth until they have no further questions.

Once all the prosecution witnesses have taken the stand, the same thing will happen with defence witnesses.

 

[mchammerr]

Looking at his LinkedIn he also still has his foot firmly in the medical field so I assume he is still upto date with the medical advances of this current generation

Exactly, people are jumping the gun as if this man hasn’t set foot in a hospital for 20 years. He is clearly an expert in the field with many years experience.

 

[Polythene Pam]

I worry that she is innocent. If she is her entire life is destroyed because even if she is found not guilty there will be so many people who feel she is. It’s shocking. I really think cases like this they shouldn’t name the individual until they reach a verdict. Maybe that’s not possible I dunno. Just seems really crazy to me.

I’m not convinced she’s guilty from what we have seen so far.

My gut says innocent, but that might just be because I can't imagine anyone committing these crimes, and obviously we need to see the rest of the evidence.

I do think the prosecution has presented the post it as a smoking gun and it's clearly far more nuanced than that. I'm intrigued to see whether other notes are also made public.

If they do have something that is a real gotcha! piece of evidence, you'd think she'd have pleaded guilty... I just have a feeling the case isn't as strong as it may seem.

It's so endlessly frustrating that she's the only person that really knows the truth and we will never really, truly know.

 

[JGirl1]

It has been suggested that she liked to get involved with particular cases that she wanted, not necessarily just the cases she was allocated to. I wondered if the line ‘I killed them on purpose because I am not good enough to care for them’ could relate in some way to her not being assigned to the babies she wanted each time? As in, the staff in charge (or maybe parents) don't think I am good enough to care for them, so I will hurt them out of spite.
That note is difficult to read, I hope they get to the truth for everyone involved.

 

[acsunderland]

All we have evidence of really is that she's a bit weird. Being weird isn't a crime and isn't proof of someone being a murderer.

If it was we’d all be locked up

 

[Ibrokethegoddamnwheel]

It’s taken me hours to catch up, this thread moves so fast! There will probably be a million more posts to sift through once I’ve finished typing, it’s nice to see most of us are being civil and tolerant of each other’s opinions. The Facebook group I’m on is too much, people are really extra on there - no room for healthy discussion. I’m feeling very mixed right now, I definitely have reasonable doubt. Yesterday I was starting to lean towards her guilt, today after seeing the note I don’t know what I think.

What I find interesting is how we all seemed to interpret the note found in her home when it was just being described in news reports compared to how we interpret it now we’ve actually seen it. I know it certainly changed my feelings a bit. Upon hearing she had written what essentially sounded like a confession, I was shocked, to be honest part of me thought there must be more to it as if it was a confession, then there wouldn’t be a trial - at least that’s my understanding of how these things work. Just shows how different it is reading about the trial compared to actually seeing the evidence. I do wonder what the jury must be thinking, don’t envy them at all.

Seeing the note itself, it is still shocking but in a different way, it looks to me like the ramblings of someone who is incredibly distressed and at a loss, someone who is catastrophizing and ruminating. Whether that’s because she’s guilty or because she’s being accused of awful crimes she didn’t commit, I have no idea at this stage. This note in isolation doesn’t scream guilt to me though. There’s something I find a bit sad and tragic about it, I don’t think she’s confessing with the ‘I’m evil’ ‘I killed them’ remarks, I think it could be her reflecting on what she thinks others are thinking. Could be wrong though.

With regards to the writing before the “i killed them on purpose” part. Could it read “they went” as in “they went, I killed them on purpose” I know that doesn’t make complete sense but sometimes people do use the word went when they mean said (or maybe that’s just where I’m from). Could be a reach, just thought I’d throw it out there. Really can’t figure out what that bit of writing is meant to say otherwise. I guess we will learn more about this note and other evidence as the trial goes on. I wonder if anything else was found at her house.

Anyway these are just my incoherent ramblings, brain feels truly scrambled. Both prosecution and defence have been doing a good job so far imo.

 

[Borntorun]

The part I struggle with massively is where they stated they moved her to days because of their suspicions! Like wtf ?! I can’t get my ahead around this. It doesn’t sit right with me and I can’t imagine any one else. So you suspect a potential murderer is on the loose during the nights and decide to switch them to days to test your theory?? How the f*ck was that allowed to happen. Who the hell approved this? I’m sorry but I think that is bullshit. For what it’s worth I don’t particularly buy her being innocent, but she sure as hell isn’t the only one who is guilty here. That scenario either never happened for the above reason, and they are using it now to suggest they were always suspicious of her (surely not). Or the unit Is entirely ran by incompetent fuck wits who equally should be held accountable, for that decision alone. Honestly I can’t shake that part of it at all. You can’t have it both ways suspect one of your nurse’s is harming babies but still allow her to work. If your suspicions were that strong you would have had her suspended and gone straight to the police. I just don’t buy it I don’t think her seniors had any suspicions at the time, I think it’s mostly hindsight and they are spinning a different narrative to try and save their arses!

It’s quite a typical thing to do with staff that are underperforming. It’s not to ‘test a theory’, it’s to do with offering that staff member extra support to improve. Because your first thought isn’t usually “this person is murdering patients”, you tend to think “this person is underperforming and has some competence issues, let’s move them to the day shift where there are more staff, as well as staff who’s entire job is to teach them (practice development nurses)” The theory is that if they work alongside someone for a defined period of time, they have the opportunity to improve their practice

 

[I’mThankyou_]

I think possibly, as time goes on and the trial drags out people may loose interest, or the opposite and it becomes even busier!