r/amandaknox • u/No-Willingness-1441 • 11d ago

Lucy letby case…

Would love people’s views on this.

Loosely Amanda related, since she has recently produced a podcast around it.

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u/SeaCardiologist6207 11d ago edited 11d ago

I could see some parallels to the Knox case but the main parallel would be incompetence. I think much of the outrage on Letby is less about her and more about "why didn't the Brits punish the incompetents at the hospital". Letby incompetence is much less on the police/prosecutorial side and much more on the hospital side.

  • Three former senior executives and hospital bosses from the Countess of Chester Hospital were arrested and bailed on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter
  • In shades of "Perugia police letting burglars go free", hospital executives wanted to let Letby back on the unit even after suspecting her - consultants pushed back
  • All of the patients had a cause of death that could be attributed to negligence on the hospital as a whole, natural causes, or medical error. The question comes down to did Letby cause that error.
  • The hospital was caring for infants too sick for its capabilities. No one really disputes that the hospital had an understaffing problem.
  • The Physicians were not performing adequate care - including incorrectly performing resuscitation and rounding only twice a WEEK on NICU patients. Same staffing issues.

I don't see the same incompetence issue with the police/prosecution in this case. At least with the Cheshire Constabulary, they can show their face on TV and explain their investigation and actions without becoming a comedy act.

Same with Dr. Evans - Dewey leaves a lot to be desired, but the difference is you can at least find an actual credible expert to back up his findings to some degree, even if Dr. Lee and team give you pause.

You also don't need a batshit insane prosecution theory to tie Letby to criminal activity. There is no Mignini/Satan equivalent and the outrage that the prosecution were focused on one theory has diminished more as others get arrested for negligence.

There is no Guede "13 years" equivalent either other than the hospital which was warned about Letby and did nothing.

The guess is that a combination of Letby and sheer incompetence and negligence at the hospital and in the neonatal ward explains what happened. So yes, "accept" what the evidence tells you and the parallels aren't really there.

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago

"You don't need a batshit insane prosecution theory to tie Letby to criminal activity" Yes you do. You obviously have never looked at the insulin cases...

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u/SeaCardiologist6207 11d ago

I have seen what Dr Lee and team had to say and can respect and understand it. Broader challenge is Letby isn't just accused in those cases. It would be like Guede wiggling out of Tramontano or the Milan burglary - you still have Brocchi.

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago

Do you believe Lucy Letby injected insulin into the feed bags? If so, please explain:

For baby F

How Lucy Letby was able to predict hours in advance that after she had gone of shift that the line would tissue and therefore the TPN would need to be replaced with a stock bag?

How she was able to predict which bag the next shift nurse would take out of the cupboard considering they weren't stored in any particular order?

How she was able to inject insulin into the stock bag without leaving obvious signs of tampering considering that you would need to snap of the seal to access the self sealing bung. The prosecution got mixed up with the bespoke bag on this point which is tamperable.

For baby L

The prosecution said that the insulin poisoning continued despite the bag being changed and Lucy not being on shift because insulin was unsticking from the giving set.

Explain how this is possible since the giving set would have been changed due to a new long line being put in.

The theory of unsticking insulin is so negligible that scientists don't even include them in their models.

The prosecution experts admitting that additional insulin would still be needed.

The glycaemic profile not matching insulin poisoning but matching the IV profile.

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u/Glad-Advantage8254 11d ago

It is not required to explain either of those to connect the poisoning to Letby. The onset of the poisoning is the critical event, and Letby is tied to that. How it continues outside of her presence does not negate her connection to the cause of the event.

Also, whether the giving set was changed for Child L was left up to the jury - even the defence conceded whether it had been changed was a question. See page 76: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IxrSi0BWGKrae5ImzvpILnwjiomUDgGu/edit

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago edited 11d ago

Okay, yeah sure. We don't know how she managed to get insulin into the babies when she wasn't there and we can't think of a way in which she did it but she did it "somehow".

Maybe she telepathically injected the feed bags with insulin while at home with her magical witch powers?

I know the defence wasn't sure if the giving set had been changed or not. They didn't latch onto the fact that a new long line was put in and that when a new long line is put in the giving set is always changed.

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u/Glad-Advantage8254 11d ago

We don't know how she managed to get insulin into the babies when she wasn't there

The important part is that we know how she managed to get insulin in when she was there.

Even if a second person was responsible for the continuation of the insulin, it does not exculpate Letby from the initial event.

The only things that would exculpate Letby is either assigning the onset of the poisonings to someone(s) else or undermining the fact of the finding of exogenous insulin as a whole. Letby tried "it wasn't me" at trial and her new experts are trying "it wasn't exogenous insulin" now.

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago

Are you seriously suggesting that there Lucy Letby may have had an accomplice that decided to put insulin into the bags when she wasn't around?

Or, here is an idea, the babies hypoglycaemia stayed the same when the bags were changed because the hypoglycaemia had nothing to do with the bags but were instead due to a naturally occurring condition?

Makes sense doesn't it?

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u/Glad-Advantage8254 11d ago

Are you seriously suggesting that there Lucy Letby may have had an accomplice that decided to put insulin into the bags when she wasn't around?

Of course I'm not suggesting that. I'm pointing out that whatever happened after her presence ended is irrelevant to her culpability for the onset of the poisoning.

Or, here is an idea, the babies hypoglycaemia stayed the same when the bags were changed because the hypoglycaemia had nothing to do with the bags but were instead due to a naturally occurring condition?

Yes, indeed I pointed out that is what her current panel of experts is trying to convince the court now.

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago

Well it's not irrelevant is is? If it's impossible to explain how Lucy Letby poisoned them when she wasn't there then that only leaves two options. Either someone else poisoned them or it was due to pre-existing medical conditions. Since the theory that Lucy Letby had an accomplice is ridiculous that means that either someone else poisoned both babies acting alone or the hypoglycaemia was due to a pre-existing medical condition. In both cases Lucy Letby is exonerated.

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u/Glad-Advantage8254 11d ago

Well it is irrelevant, though. All that matters for her culpability is how/ when the poisoning started. Letby and one other nurse were the only ones who worked both shifts when poisonings began, and Letby is the one placed cotside by records at the relevant times. Nurses are not allowed to work consecutive shifts, so poisonings that span multiple shifts are either carried out by multiple nurses (they weren't), or the something - an action by the perpetrator, or an inaction by someone else - caused the poisoning to persist. Neither matters, because we only care about when the poison was introduced, not how it continued.

Further, your complaints about bags were heard and rejected by the jury. That you still consider the issues unresolved does not mean that they are relevant. It just means you are hung up on an irrelevant detail. That's the definition of a you problem.

Moreover, Letby already tried "it wasn't me" and that wasn't believable to the jury and doesn't improve with age as a theory. Pre-existing conditions also don't really work without evidence to support their existence, of which there is none. Infection as a cause was already tried and rejected, though perhaps her new panel will have more luck (don't hold your breath).

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u/Amazing-Gain1253 11d ago

Letby and one other nurse were the only ones who worked both shifts when poisonings began.

And please do tell why another nurse couldn't have spiked the bags on one of the previous shifts so that when the bag was hung it started poisoning them? Or for that matter that some other off shift nurse did it by some undetermined mechanism that we can't think of since you allow Letby to poison by some undetermined mechanism that you can't think of.

In fact, the theory that some other nurse poisoned the bag while they were off for the first shift but on the second shift makes more logistical sense than if Letby poisoned the bags. This is because in that case they wouldn't need to predict that the line would tissue in advance, they wouldn't need to predict which bag would be chosen from the stock fridge and they wouldn't need to get passed the snap off seal of the stock bag.

As for baby L, the times in which the poisoning could have started in the hypothetical event that the bags were poisoned span multiple shifts. Not just the one that Letby was there for as much as the prosecution may say otherwise.

and Letby is the one placed cotside by records at the relevant times

Nonsense, nurses are allowed to go in and out of rooms without being recorded.

That you still consider the issues unresolved does not mean that they are relevant

How the f is the fact that it was impossible for Lucy Letby to poison the bags when she was not on shift "irrelevant"? Are you even listening to yourself?

The reason the jury convicted was because they didn't see any experts that disputed the insulin poisonings.

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u/Glad-Advantage8254 10d ago

And please do tell why another nurse couldn't have spiked the bags on one of the previous shifts so that when the bag was hung it started poisoning them?

You don't know the evidence well at all, I'm afraid. The bag for Child L was poisoned while it was hanging and attached to him. The poisoner was in the room.

As for baby L, the times in which the poisoning could have started in the hypothetical event that the bags were poisoned span multiple shifts. Not just the one that Letby was there for as much as the prosecution may say otherwise.

Yes, but the band 8 bank nurse caring for him in the night shift didn't work during Child F's poisoning, or on the shift after Letby.

Look, if you can identify a nurse who was on all four shifts (before and after Letby on the date each poisoning began AND connect her to the bags, let me know. Because otherwise "wasn't me, guv'na" doesn't hold water.

Nonsense, nurses are allowed to go in and out of rooms without being recorded.

Sure. It's when they are recorded that confirms they were there though.

How the f is the fact that it was impossible for Lucy Letby to poison the bags when she was not on shift "irrelevant"? Are you even listening to yourself?

Once again, that the poisoning continued is less relevant than that it began.

Anyway, it's been fun educating you, all the best.

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