A 33-year-old British nurse was found guilty of murdering seven babies at a hospital neonatal ward where she worked, while trying to kill six others, between 2015–2016. She had evaded suspicious questions from doctors, who at one point were even asked to apologize to her for their concerns. But when police found a bunch of handwritten confessional notes at her house, the jig was up.
Lucy Letby, slapped with the gruesome label of England's "worst baby serial killer in recent times" by CNN, killed her victims by injecting them with air, overfeeding them, and poisoning them with insulin, according to the case. She would then come home and spill her guilty conscious onto paper, with notes such as "I am a horrible evil person," as well as "I don't deserve to live. I killed them on purpose because I'm not good enough to care for them," and "I am evil I did this."
From CNN:
Doctors at the hospital began to notice a steep rise in the number of babies who were dying or unexpectedly collapsing, the court heard.
But concerns raised by consultants over the increased mortality rate of patients under Letby's care were initially dismissed by the hospital's management, the UK's PA Media news agency reported.
In September 2016, Letby filed a grievance against her employers after she was relocated from the hospital's neonatal ward. She was put back on clerical duties after two male triplets died and a baby boy collapsed on three days in a row in June 2016.
Later that year, she was notified of the allegations against her by the Royal College of Nursing union, but the complaint was later resolved in her favor. Doctors were asked to formally apologize to Letby in writing. …
She was scheduled to return to the neonatal department in March 2017, but her return did not take place. The hospital trust contacted the police, who opened an investigation.
And soon after the investigation opened, Letby's self-incriminating notes were found. She was arrested three times between 2018–2020.
"Lucy Letby sought to deceive her colleagues and pass off the harm she caused as nothing more than a worsening of each baby's existing vulnerability," said Pascale Jones of the Britain's Crown Prosecution Service.
"In her hands, innocuous substances like air, milk, fluids – or medication like insulin – would become lethal. She perverted her learning and weaponised her craft to inflict harm, grief and death."
Letby will be sentenced on Monday.
