LONDON (Reuters) – Former nurse Lucy Letby, convicted last year of murdering seven babies and trying to kill six others, told an English court on Monday that she had never harmed or intended to harm a child in her care.
Letby, 34, was found guilty last August of the multiple murders while she was working as a nurse in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester, northern England, between June 2015 and June 2016.
The former nurse is on trial at Manchester Crown Court charged with one count of attempted murder of a further baby girl, known as Child K, in February 2016. The original jury had been unable to reach a verdict on the allegation.
Giving evidence on Monday, Letby was asked by her defence lawyer Ben Myers if she had attempted to kill Child K.
“No,” she replied, further denying she had intended to do the baby any harm.
Asked if she accepted she had ever intended harming any baby in her care given her convictions, Letby firmly replied: “No, I don’t.”
Child K was born prematurely at 25 weeks and was connected to a ventilator and other machines monitoring her heart rate and oxygen levels.
Shortly after the birth, while other staff were absent, the prosecution say senior doctor Ravi Jayaram entered the room where she was being looked after to find the baby’s breathing tube dislodged, alarms which should have sounded had become disabled, and Letby standing there “doing nothing”.
Prosecutor Nick Johnson has told the court that on two further occasions that night Letby interfered with the breathing tube after being “caught virtually red-handed” to give the impression there was a particular problem with the baby.
Quizzed about the incident, Letby repeatedly denied that she had displaced the breathing tube, and said she had no recollection of events of the night.
She also said she could not recall researching the baby’s name on Facebook two years later or why she would have done it.
In his questioning Johnson said Letby had denied being the sort of person who would kill babies but she was just that, saying to her that she killed seven babies on the hospital unit.
“No I didn’t,” she replied.
The trial continues.
(Reporting by Michael Holden; editing by Barbara Lewis)
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