Lucy Letby is ‘probably innocent', says former Supreme Court judge
Lucy Letby is 'probably' innocent, one of Britain's most distinguished judges has said.
Lord Jonathan Sumption, a former Supreme Court judge, wrote in The Sunday Times that the case against the former neonatal nurse was based 'entirely on inferences from circumstantial evidence'.
Letby is serving 15 full-life terms for the murder of seven infants and the attempted murder of seven more.
However, there are growing fears that her case could be a miscarriage of justice amid concerns about how evidence was presented in her trials.
'We can only hope that the Letby case will not be added to the long and depressing list of uncorrected miscarriages of justice in the English courts,' he wrote.
Lord Sumption continued: 'These injustices destroy lives and discredit the whole system of criminal justice. A whole life order is a terrible thing.
'If Letby was wrongly convicted, and there is now a serious case that she was, it is horrifying to contemplate that this young woman of 35 may be locked up without hope until she dies, perhaps half a century hence, simply because our system is too rigid to allow a proper review of her case.'
He added that the lawyers and scientists now questioning the convictions are 'too numerous and too well qualified to be dismissed as troublemakers'.
Lord Sumption's comments come after it was decided that the Thirlwall Inquiry – which has been examining how the nurse was able to murder or attack the 14 babies at the Countess of Chester Hospital – will not be halted.
The inquiry has now finished hearing evidence, but the hospital's former executives and Letby requested a pause as there was a 'real possibility' her convictions may be overturned.
Last month, an international panel of neonatologists and paediatric specialists concluded that 'either natural causes or bad medical care' were the real reasons for the collapses and deaths attributed to Letby.
Those findings were passed to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which investigates potential miscarriages of justice. Lord Sumption labelled the panel's findings as Letby's 'only hope'.
If approved, it could refer her case back to the Court of Appeal, despite two previous failed bids.
Lord Sumption said the case mounted against Letby was 'very speculative' and that the prosecution had not clarified to jurors that 'most of the babies were not healthy and stable before their collapse'.
He added the chances of a nurse turning into a mass murderer rather than a baby collapsing from natural causes or human error were 'vanishingly small'.
The former judge highlighted the fact that in six of the seven murder cases against her, five post mortems found the babies had died of natural causes.
Lord Sumption also mentioned the 'apparently damning chart' that listed for jurors the 25 infant deaths and collapses that Letby was charged with. He wrote that the chart had been deemed 'statistically worthless' by experts because it only showed the collapses she was accused of causing.
Lord Sumption added: 'The families understandably want a definitive answer.
'But the reality is that in spite of the jury's verdicts they will not get one until the serious anomalies in this case have been addressed.'
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