The 3 crucial steps killer nurse Lucy Letby must make to secure freedom

A team of 14 international medical experts this week declared “we did not find any murders” after their extensive review of evidence presented to the killer nurse’s two trials.

The 35-year-old former neonatal nurse from Hereford, is currently serving 15 whole life sentences for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven others between 2015 and 2016 and last year she failed twice in her attempts to challenge her convictions at the Court of Appeal.

For many prisoners who protest their innocence that marks the end of their legal journey and they must resign themselves to serving out the rest of their sentence – or as in Letby’s case dying behind bars.

But the growing concerns over the safety of the convictions has intensified this week since Dr Lee, outlined his panel’s findings in a two-hour press London conference in central London.

All of the infant deaths and injuries at the Countess of Chester Hospital for which Letby was found responsible were “due to natural causes or just bad medical care,” said Lee, a retired doctor who is president of the Canadian Neonatal Foundation.

The case has been referred to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which confirmed it will take a preliminary look into the new arguments being presented.

Letby’s lawyer Mark McDonald, who took on her case following her convictions, says his client now has “hope” that she could still walk free in what would represent the biggest miscarriage of justice in British history.

McDonald has optimistically declared that “it could be overturned this year,” but most legal experts believe any potential path to potential could take years to wind its way through the courts.

The first hurdle to overcome is through the CCRC – the independent body that investigates potential miscarriages of justice – which must thoroughly review and analyse the evidence, including all the new evidence presented since the trial.

This will include claims made at the press conference that many of the babies died from sub-optimal care at the hospital, with doctors allegedly failing to spot dangerous bacterial infections, not giving life-saving antibiotics and making errors in inserting breathing tubes and IV lines.

Legal experts believe this process alone “will take years” but should the CCRC decide there is a realistic prospect of the Court of Appeal quashing the conviction, at least on some of the counts, then the case would be referred back to the Court of Appeal.

The numbers however are not in Letby’s favour. Between April 1997 to December 2024, the CCRC received 32,758 cases, more than 1,100 of which are still awaiting consideration or under review.

But of the 31,590 cases it has completed, just 855 were referred to the appeal courts with 592 ultimately reaching a successful outcome.

There are two other possibilities that could be reached should the case be returned to the Court of Appeal.

The first is that the verdict of both jury’s is completely quashed and the Crown Prosecution Service proceed with a re-trial.

The second option – which barristers say “will never happen” would be quashed convictions with no re-trial meaning Letby would instantly walk free.

McDonald expects the case to be sent back to the Court of Appeal and ultimately a retrial. He believes the CRC could decide within four months that the conviction is unsafe and if this plays out as he says, then he insists he will call everyone on the 14-strong expert panel to give evidence at the re-trial.

He said: “If the jury had heard what was said in that press conference they would not have convicted Lucy Letby.

“It’s not going to take [the CCRC] more than four months to recognise the conviction is unsafe and needs to go to the Court of Appeal,” he says.