UK baby killer Letby convicted of attempted murder at retrial

A UK jury on Tuesday convicted child serial killer Lucy Letby of attempting to murder another baby girl at the hospital neo-natal unit where she worked.

It comes nearly a year after a different jury convicted the former nurse of murdering seven newborn babies and attempting to kill six others, making her Britain's most prolific child serial killer in modern history.

Letby, 34, faced a retrial at Manchester Crown Court for the attempted murder of the baby girl, referred to in court as Child K, at the Countess of Chester Hospital in northwest England in 2016.

Jurors at her original trial last year failed to reach a verdict on that charge.

However, the jury hearing the case this time took just over three hours to reach their unanimous guilty verdict.

Letby, who is already serving a whole-life prison sentence and was earlier this year refused an appeal bid, will be sentenced for the latest offence on Friday.

During the re-trial, jurors heard that the former nurse was "caught virtually red-handed" by a senior consultant as she displaced Child K's breathing tube.

The prosecution detailed how the consultant paediatrician walked into the unit's intensive care nursery room and saw Letby standing next to the incubator "doing nothing", as the infant's blood oxygen levels dipped.

The jury was also told of Letby's convictions last August of the other murders and attempted murders between 2015 and 2016.

Reporting restrictions prevent publication of the identities of the surviving and dead children in the cases.

 Ongoing probes 

 Appearing in the witness box last month, Letby denied attempting to murder or harm Child K, or any baby ever in her care.

Child K was transferred to a specialist hospital later the same day because she was born extremely prematurely.

She died there three days later. The prosecution has not alleged Letby caused her death.

The young girl's parents thanked the jury and said "justice has been served". "But this justice will not take away the extreme hurt, anger and distress that we have all had to experience," they added.

"It also does not provide us with an explanation of why these crimes have taken place," a statement read.

Letby, from Hereford, western England, was arrested and then charged in 2020 following a string of baby deaths at the hospital's neo-natal unit.

The prosecution at her first trial said she attacked her vulnerable prematurely born victims, often during night shifts, by either injecting them with air, overfeeding them with milk or poisoning them with insulin.

A public inquiry into events at the hospital unit will start to hear evidence in September.

Cheshire Police said Tuesday that a "complex and sensitive" corporate manslaughter probe into the hospital -- launched following Letby's convictions last year -- was ongoing alongside the original investigation into the ex-nurse.

It is "considering areas including senior leadership and decision-making to determine whether any criminality has taken place," Detective Superintendent Simon Blackwell said.

"At this stage we are not investigating any individuals in relation to gross negligence manslaughter," he added.

Meanwhile, the continuing probe into Letby includes a review of 4,000 baby admissions during a four-year period when she worked at the Chester hospital and at the Liverpool Women's Hospital.

Detective Superintendent Paul Hughes said only cases "highlighting any medical concern" will be further reviewed.