By Samantha Jones-
The nurse accused of murdering babies on a neonatal ward wrote notes that amounted to an admission of murder. jurors listening to the horrifying details of her trial heard.
The trial of Lucy Letby was told on Thursday that police had recovered several handwritten documents from her home after her arrest in July 2018. On one note shown to the jury, headlined “Not good enough,” she wrote: “I will never have children or marry. I will never know what it’s like to have a family” and “I can’t breathe.”
Lucy Letby is charged with murdering seven babies and attempting to murder 10 others at Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015 and 2016.
Her trial at Manchester Crown Court was told the notes were found following a search of her home. Ms Letby, 32, denies 22 charges.
The court heard the passages were written on post-it notes, and included phrases such as “what allegations have been made and by who? Do they have written evidence to support their comments?”.
The notes also contained “many protestations of innocence,” prosecutor Nick Johnson KC told the jury
One said: “I haven’t done anything wrong and they have no evidence so why have I had to hide away?”
Other notes read “I am a horrible evil person”, the court heard, and “I killed them on purpose because I’m not good enough”.
In one, in capital letters, Ms Letby wrote “I am evil. I did this,” the jury was told.
The parents of some of the babies concerned were in court to hear the prosecution speech, and saw the note as it was shown on large screens.
She allegedly tried to kill 10 others by injecting them with air, milk or insulin between June 2015 and June 2016. Letby denies all 22 charges.
Letby was eventually removed from the neonatal ward in June 2016 – four months after a senior doctor had started to connect her to unexplained deaths and collapses, the trial has heard. In that four-month period she is alleged to have murdered two brothers from a set of triplets and to have attempted to kill five other babies.
Day four of the trial at Manchester crown court heard how police recovered notes that included “many protestations of innocence” when they arrested Letby at home in Chester on 3 July 2018.
On another handwritten note shown to the jury, she wrote: “I don’t deserve to live. I killed them on purpose because I’m not good enough to care for them.”
Nurses notes: Image:CPS
Ms Letby, of Hereford, showed no reaction.
Mr Johnson said: “Well, ladies and gentlemen, that in a nutshell is your task in this case.
Decision
“Whether or not she did these dreadful things is the decision you will have to make when you have heard all the evidence.”
Defending her, Ben Myers KC, said “anyone with an ounce of human understanding” would see the notes as “the anguished outpouring of a young woman in fear and despair when she realises the enormity of what is being said about her”.
He said they also contained passages such as “I’ll never marry or have children” and “I haven’t done anything wrong”.
The notes showed “anguish not guilt”, he said.
The baby boy was from a set of triplets and died the day after she is said to have murdered his brother, Child O.
Child P suffered an “acute deterioration” before preparations were put in place to move him to another hospital.
Just before the planned transfer, a doctor was said to be “optimistic” about his prospects but then “all of a sudden Lucy Letby said to him something like ‘he’s not leaving alive here, is he?'”, Mr Johnson said.
The baby collapsed and died shortly afterwards, the court heard.
Mr Johnson said: “That remark surprised [the doctor] but Lucy Letby’s prediction came true.
“After all, she knew what she had done to him and therefore she knew what was likely to happen. It is certainly what she intended because it was something she had done to so many other children.”
Ms Letby has denied causing Child P any deliberate harm.
“They did not, at the time, have the benefit of the evidence that you are going to hear and the decision was made by the hospital to remove Lucy Letby from a hands-on role.
“She was moved to clerical duties where she would not come into contact with children.”
The police were contacted and a “very lengthy and complex” investigation followed which involved instructing independent paediatricians and other specialists to review many cases that passed through the neo-natal unit, the court heard.
The trial continues.