Lucy Letby showed emotion for the first time during her trial after hearing the voice of a doctor she was said to have a ‘crush’ on.
Letby, found guilty of killing seven babies, mostly sat impassive throughout the lengthy trial at Manchester Crown Court, even when the prosecution went into detail about the horrific crimes she committed.
But on February 16, the 33-year-old broke down in tears after hearing the voice of a doctor she used to worked with at Countess of Chester Hospital, where the murders were carried out.
The man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, was called to give evidence but had asked to speak from behind a screen.
This meant he was not visible to Letby or the public gallery.
When he confirmed his name the former neonatal nurse started crying, then abruptly left her seat and walked towards the exit of the dock.
Speaking in the witness box, she later said she loved the doctor as a ‘trusted friend’ but was not in love with him.
A nursing colleague of hers had teased Letby about ‘flirting’ with the man, while the prosecution said in court she had a ‘crush’ on the man.
The pair sent each other a number of messages, which were read out to the jury.
After returning home from a holiday in Ibiza with friends, she messaged the registrar in June 2016 about the arrival of triplets on the unit – two of whom she went on to murder.
She asked him: ‘What gestation are the trips? I don’t mind being busy anyway. Are you on nnu (neonatal unit) tomorrow?’
The doctor replied: ‘I like it when you’re in (intensive care unit) – everything feels safe and organised.’
The following day at work – before she went on to kill one of the triplets – she messaged him: ‘I’ve forgotten my sandwich!!! (Can I go home?) Still in holiday mode.’
The doctor wrote back: ‘Probably not – would you like me to write you a note? “Lucy can’t stay at work today because…”‘
Letby joked: ‘Yes please. Write yourself one too to escape clinic.’
The doctor replied: ‘Do you want me to pick something up for your lunch? Clinic should be done in a hour.’
‘Tapas?’ Letby wrote back.
Letby would often seek reassurance from the registrar, who was called to attend Child N, Child O and Child P in June 2016 as their health deteriorated.
The prosecution said Letby had attacked the babies to get his attention at work.
Dr John Gibbs, a consultant paediatrician on the unit, had raised questions with senior management about Letby on numerous occasions.
After concerns were raised about the care of Child Q – who the jury could not decide if she had tried to kill – she asked the doctor: ‘Do I need to be worried about what Dr Gibbs was asking?’
The doctor replied: ‘There is nothing to worry about. All he was doing was checking that there wasn’t a delay and that a room had been left empty. Nobody has accused you of neglecting a baby or causing a deterioration.’
Letby said: ‘I know. Just worry I haven’t done enough. We’ve lost 2 babies I was caring for and now this happened today, makes you think “am I missing something/good enough”.’
The doctor said: ‘If anyone knows how hard you’ve worked over the last three days it’s me. The standard of care delivered is tertiary nicu level.
‘If anybody says anything to you about not being good enough or performing adequately I want you to promise me that you’ll give my details to provide a statement. I don’t care who it is and I don’t care if I’ve left the trust. Promise?’
Letby replied: ‘Well I sincerely hope I won’t ever be needing a statement. But thank you, I promise.’
The doctor continued: ‘You are one of a few nurses across the region (I’ve worked pretty much everywhere) that I would trust with my own children.’
His name appeared repeatedly on a number of scrawled notes found at Letby’s home address following her arrest.
One described him as ‘my best friend’ and in others she has written ‘love was all we needed’ while referring to him.
Letby told the jury it was a lyric to a Craig David song which was ‘was obviously on my mind at that time’ but called it a ‘random thought’.
She said the two of them would meet socially outside work.
‘Sometimes he came to my house, sometimes we would go out for meals or coffee or walks,’ she explained.
Prosecutor Nick Johnson KC brought up an ‘away day in London’ with the doctor, which was referenced in social media messages and photos on Letby’s phone.
He asked her ‘Did you stay overnight?’ to which she replied ‘No’.
She added: ‘He is a married man. We were not in a relationship at all. It was a friendship.’
She said their friendship ‘fizzled out’ at the start of 2018, before she was arrested that summer.
Letby went to trial in October 2022, accused of murdering seven babies and trying to kill 10 others.
The trial went on for almost 10 months – in part because of the sheer amount of complex medical evidence the jury needed to consider.
In the end, it took the jury more than 100 hours across 22 days to convict her of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill six others while working at the neonatal unit.
Letby used various methods of attack, including injecting them with air to cause a fatal embolism, overfeeding milk, interfering with breathing tubes, or physically assaulting them.
Letby – who was in her mid-20s at the time of the murders – is now the UK’s most prolific child killer of modern times.
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