Ex Cabinet minister: I’m ’90-odd per cent sure’ Letby is harmless
A former Cabinet minister has said he is more than 90 per cent sure that baby killer Lucy Letby is innocent.
Sir David Davis said he spent months examining the evidence, and has called for the former neonatal nurse to be retried.
Letby, 34, was found guilty of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill seven others at the Countess of Chester Hospital between 2015 and 2016.
She is serving a whole life term after an application to appeal the conviction was rejected by the courts.
But Mr Davis believes the convictions are unsafe and said he would be willing to visit Letby in jail to discuss the case with her.
Lucy Letby, 34, was found guilty of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill seven others at the Countess of Chester Hospital between 2015 and 2016
Sir David Davis (pictured) said he has spent months examining the evidence, and has called for Letby to be retried
Letby as she was arrested in 2018. The former neonatal nurse is serving a whole life term after an application to appeal her conviction was rejected by the courts
Speaking on GB News, Mr Davis said: ‘I have spent three months going through the evidence.
‘I think most likely – you can’t be certain – but most likely, like 90 odd percent, not guilty.’
He added: ‘The most likely reason is one of two things, either poor management of the hospital – the Royal College found that, or a superbug – an investigation found that, or both together. That is much more likely.
‘I don’t want to declare her innocent. I want a retrial – do it properly.’
John O’Quigley, a professor of statistics in the department of statistical science at University College London, has also raised doubts over Letby’s guilt.
Dr O’Quigley said the only conclusion that a diagram that showed Letby was on duty when those seven babies died was that she was on duty.
One of the main prosecution witnesses, Dr Dewi Evans, also performed an about-turn about how ‘Baby C’ died.
The baby died in the Countess of Chester Hospital around midnight on the night of June 13-14, 2016. It describes the method of killing as ‘air via nasogastric tube’, the injection of air into his stomach.
But Dr Evans now says this is not how the baby died following a Radio 4 programme, Lucy Letby: The Killer Questions.
Image of the corridor within the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit (showing the entrances to nurseries 2,3 & 4)
The victims’ families have slammed the ongoing speculation about Letby’s innocence, saying it is contributing to their pain and grief.
In it, several highly qualified experts cast doubt on this and much of the evidence accepted by the jury in Ms Letby’s first trial.
During that trial, Dr Evans said an X-ray of Baby C showed an unusual amount of air in the boy’s stomach, which could have been caused by the deliberate pumping of air into his feeding tube.
But the Radio 4 programme points out that Letby was not actually in the hospital on June 12 when the X-ray was taken. She had not even met Baby C at that point.
Dr Evans now says: ‘His demise occurred the following day around midnight (when Ms Letby was on duty) , and due to air in the bloodstream.’
The victims’ families have slammed the ongoing speculation about Letby’s innocence, saying it is contributing to their pain and grief.
In September, at the beginning of a public inquiry into the deaths, chairman Lady Justice Thirlwall claimed doubts about Letby’s guilt have come ‘entirely from people who were not at the trial’.
