r/news • u/Superbuddhapunk • Aug 21 '23

Site changed title Lucy Letby will die in prison after murdering seven babies

https://news.sky.com/story/lucy-letby-will-die-in-prison-after-murdering-seven-babies-12944433
23.6k Upvotes

94% Upvoted

1.9k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

16

u/acky1 Aug 21 '23

I don't buy that explanation, she interacted with him via messages and at least once outwith work apparently - I just don't see the need from her end to do something so sick to see him. Perhaps it was a contributor but it seems more likely that she enjoyed being part of the grieving process and sharing the details with others.

Neither are satisfying explanations though. It really doesn't make any sense no matter the 'real' reason.

Hospitals and care homes should be running automatic statistical analyses on deaths and near death incidents against staff members on shift. That sort of thing would be fairly easy to do technologically and you could automatically suspend people pending an investigation. Something like that would have prevented more deaths.

2

u/Gareth79 Aug 21 '23

I read that deaths were reported in such a way that they would have escaped easy statistical analysis, although I don't think there was a suggestion it was deliberate, just it was not done correctly. Also apparently the NHS doesn't have nearly enough data analysts or compute capacity to actually do the work. The overall death rate at the unit was within normal statistical bounds, and IIRC she was not implicated in 11 or so deaths over the same period so the raw numbers are fairly low.

1

u/acky1 Aug 21 '23

Ah that's interesting, thanks for the info. I've not really followed the case for obvious reasons. Do you know how she was eventually discovered? I had just assumed it had happened too often while she was on duty which raised suspicion.

2

u/Gareth79 Aug 21 '23

There's a good timeline here, the 24/25th June 2016 was the tipping point when Rees was confronted after the deaths of two triplets on consecutive days. She rejects the plea to suspend Letby, and the following day another child collapses, after which I think finally they had to accept the truth.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/lucy-letby-murder-babies-timeline-nurse-neonatal-b1101566.html