The mother of Child I gave evidence at the Thirlwall Inquiry in Liverpool as she described the mass murderer as being ‘a bit of a loner’ before learning the horrifying truth
Parents of one of Lucy Letby’s victims thought she was an “odd loner” before discovering she had murdered their baby daughter.
Child I was injected with air by the evil nurse, who is currently serving the rest of her life behind bars for seven murders and seven attempts of infants at the Countess of Chester Hospital. The girl’s mother addressed the Thirlwall Inquiry into the crimes this week, saying Letby cut an odd figure and that they were stunned to realise how involved she’d been in their daughter’s care.
“Her face was always on the babies’ fundraising pictures,” the mum said in a statement to the inquiry in Liverpool. “I remember thinking she was a bit quiet and a bit odd. She always seemed a bit of a loner. We saw her around on the odd occasion but we didn’t have much to do with her.”
The mother said she was “absolutely shocked” at receiving her daughter’s medical records and realised how involved Letby had been. “She is all over her notes,” she said. “I have noticed a lot of the ‘care’ was when I wasn’t present.”
She also told the inquiry she felt hospital bosses on “huge salaries” had ‘protected and facilitated’ the killer by “trying to create their own narrative that Lucy Letby was a victim of bullying”. “I believe the doctors and nursing staff should have acted earlier,” said the mother, who cannot be named for legal reasons.
She added: “Those in positions of authority at the hospital should have listened to them instead of trying to create their own narrative that Lucy Letby was a victim of bullying and harassment. Someone should have investigated the concerns fully at the time.
“This is what management are paid so handsomely to do. They shouldn’t have been concentrating on saving their own skins and jobs and reputations. Babies died because someone in an office being paid hundreds of thousands of pounds didn’t want the hospital to look bad if they shut the neonatal unit down while they investigated why so many babies were deteriorating when they should have been thriving.”
Child I would have turned nine this year, the mother said, adding that no parent “should ever have to go through what we have been and continue to go through each day”. Letby, 34, is currently serving 15 whole life orders for the murders of seven babies and attempts on seven others at the hospital’s neonatal unit between 2015 and 2016.
The inquiry, led by Lady Justice Kathryn Thirlwall, was opened earlier this month at Liverpool Town Hall to examine what happened at the hospital and effectiveness of NHS management at the time of the deaths.
