A neonatal nurse, arrested in 2020 for allegedly killing or attempting to kill babies in the neonatal unit where she worked, pleaded not guilty on Monday to the horrific crimes — 22 in all.
According to Fox News, Lucy Letby, now 32, killed seven babies and attempted to kill 10 others between 2015 and 2016 at the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester, England, by injecting some with insulin and others with air. One baby was nearly killed on three occasions, and the youngest killed was just a day old, pronounced dead within 90 minutes of Letby beginning her shift. It is alleged that she injected air into the baby’s blood stream. Prosecutor Nick Johnson argued before a jury at the Manchester Crown Court, calling Letby a “constant, malevolent presence.”
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Following a three-year-long investigation into the deaths of the prematurely born infants, Letby was arrested on three separate occasions, including in 2018 when she was released “pending futher enquiries.” She was arrested again a year later in connection to the murders of eight babies and attempted murder of three others. The investigation had revealed that the babies who died had suffered heart and lung failures. According to reports at the time, she was charged in the murders of eight babies and attempted murders of 10 others.
Johnson told the jury that “a poisoner was at work” within the neonatal care unit as there had been a “significant rise in the number of babies who were dying and in the number of serious catastropic collapses” after January 2015. Letby was found to be the “common denominator” in each of the infants’ deaths, which coincided with her changing work hours. When she was working night shifts, the babies died at night, but when she was moved to day shifts, the deaths began occurring during the day.
“Lucy Letby was on duty when both were poisoned, and we allege she was the poisoner,” Johnson told jurors. “There’s a very restricted number of people who could have been the poisoner, because entry to a neonatal unit is closely restricted.”
Johnson continued, “The collapses of all 17 children concerned were not naturally occurring tragedies. They were all the work, we say, of the woman in the dock, who we say was the constant, malevolent presence when things took a turn for the worse for these 17 children.”
Letby’s trial is expected to last about six months.
