LUCY Letby’s former boss thought that she was a “scapegoat” for the hospital’s failings and would be cleared without charge, a former chief executive has claimed.
Letby, 35, is serving 15 whole life orders after she was found guilty of murdering seven babies and trying to kill seven others at the Chester hospital.
She lost two attempts to challenge her convictions at the Court of Appeal last year.
This is despite medical experts claimed they found “no evidence” of murder and instead blamed the babies’ deaths on hospital errors, earlier this month.
Now, Tony Chambers was said to have had concerns about Letby’s initial detention by cops in July 2018, according to Dr Susan Gilby.
Dr Gilby joined the Countess of Chester as the new deputy chief executive and medical director weeks after Letby’s arrest.
And she revealed that she had a “quite bizarre” discussion with Mr Chambers at that time, while giving evidence to the Thirlwall Inquiry into the events surrounding Letby’s crimes.
Dr Gilby said she expected the hospital’s executive team would be “absolutely reeling” that a staff member had been arrested on suspicion of committing multiple murders and attempted murders “under their watch”.
She said: “What I found, and what Tony wanted to discuss with me, was his concern that actually he still believed, despite the arrest, that no deliberate harm had been caused.
“He kept repeating that there was no single cause found, and I said to him ‘well it’s not for you to find the cause, you have unexpected and unexplained collapses and deaths of patients and even one of those is a cause of concern’.
“And he just was very focused on the worry that the paediatricians may have caused this nurse harm, and his worry was a wrongful conviction.
“But he was still confident, even though she had been arrested, there would be no progress and there wouldn’t ultimately be a charge.”
Letby was moved out of the neonatal unit to non-clinical duties in June 2016, shortly after consultant paediatricians told bosses they feared she may be deliberately harming babies.
Hospital executives, including Mr Chambers and then medical director Ian Harvey, opted to commission several independent probes into the increased mortality.
And police were not called in to investigate until May 2017.
Dr Gilby said she sensed that both men believed the paediatricians were wrong about their concerns, and that no evidence of deliberate harm had been found in their reviews.
“On a number of occasions it was said to me, [the paediatricians] were just looking for somebody to blame,” she said.
“They just felt the paediatricians were unable to accept they weren’t the best and so when outcomes were poor they were looking for somebody to blame.
“I was being given the impression that I had some ‘problem doctors’ that needed dealing with.”
Dr Gilby later replaced Mr Chambers, who stepped down in September 2018.
Dr Gilby also warned that the medical profession would see killers like Letby again if lessons were not taken into the profession and training.
She said: “It isn’t unthinkable, [serial killers have] happened time and time again.
“But the [Clothier] report, for example, published after the crimes of Beverley Allitt, was not something considered or mentioned in terms of the training I’ve done … I think that’s something that needs to change.”
KILLER NURSE
It comes after Lucy’s former boss said the nurse deserves “an Oscar” if she is lying over the deaths of babies she was found guilty of murdering.
Karen Rees, 62, was formerly head of nursing at the Countess of Chester Hospital, where seven babies died under Letby’s care.
She had first met Letby in summer 2016 when had to tell the nurse she was being removed from the neonatal ward following concerns over her “clinical practice”.
Rees claims that weekly management-advised wellbeing meetings she had with Letby following this revealed how “very distressed” the nurse was.
She added that Letby was always crying whenever the two would meet and claimed the nurse told her she would not be driven out from the “job that I love”, proclaiming she had “done nothing wrong”.
Letby was found guilty of attacking babies in her care often just moments after parents or other nurses left their sides.
She was found guilty of fatally injecting seven babies with air, guilty of trying to kill two others by lacing feed bags with insulin, and guilty of the attempted murder of another by thrusting a tube down the baby’s throat.
Dozens of medical documents belonging to her victims were found hoarded in her home, and Facebook searches on the babies’ parents were also discovered.
The charges Letby has been convicted of in full
Child A, allegation of murder. The Crown said Letby injected air intravenously into the bloodstream of the baby boy. COUNT 1 GUILTY.
Child B, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby attempted to murder the baby girl, the twin sister of Child A, by injecting air into her bloodstream. COUNT 2 GUILTY.
Child C, allegation of murder. Prosecutors said Letby forced air down a feeding tube and into the stomach of the baby boy. COUNT 3 GUILTY.
Child D, allegation of murder. The Crown said air was injected intravenously into the baby girl. COUNT 4 GUILTY.
Child E, allegation of murder. The Crown said Letby murdered the twin baby boy with an injection of air into the bloodstream and also deliberately caused bleeding to the infant. COUNT 5 GUILTY.
Child F, allegation of attempted murder. Letby was said by prosecutors to have poisoned the twin brother of Child E with insulin. COUNT 6 GUILTY.
Child G, three allegations of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby targeted the baby girl by overfeeding her with milk and pushing air down her feeding tube. COUNT 7 GUILTY, COUNT 8 GUILTY, COUNT 9 NOT GUILTY.
Child H, two allegations of attempted murder. Prosecutors said Letby sabotaged the care of the baby girl in some way which led to two profound oxygen desaturations. COUNT 10 NOT GUILTY, COUNT 11 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child I, allegation of murder. The prosecution said Letby killed the baby girl at the fourth attempt and had given her air and overfed her with milk. COUNT 12 GUILTY.
Child J, allegation of attempted murder. No specific form of harm was identified by the prosecution but they said Letby did something to cause the collapse of the baby girl. COUNT 13 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child K, allegation of attempted murder. The prosecution said Letby compromised the baby girl as she deliberately dislodged a breathing tube. COUNT 14 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT AT ORIGINAL TRIAL, GUILTY AFTER RETRIAL
Child L, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said the nurse poisoned the twin baby boy with insulin. COUNT 15 GUILTY.
Child M, allegation of attempted murder. Prosecutors said Letby injected air into the bloodstream of Child L’s twin brother. COUNT 16 GUILTY.
Child N, three allegations of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby inflicted trauma in the baby boy’s throat and also injected him with air in the bloodstream. COUNT 17 GUILTY, COUNT 18 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT, COUNT 19 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
Child O, allegation of murder. Prosecutors say Letby attacked the triplet boy by injecting him with air, overfeeding him with milk and inflicting trauma to his liver with “severe force”. COUNT 20 GUILTY.
Child P, allegation of murder. Prosecutors said the nurse targeted the triplet brother of Child O by overfeeding him with milk, injecting air and dislodging his breathing tube. COUNT 21 GUILTY.
Child Q, allegation of attempted murder. The Crown said Letby injected the baby boy with liquid, and possibly air, down his feeding tube. COUNT 22 JURY COULD NOT REACH VERDICT.
