LONDON - Former British nurse Lucy Letby, convicted last year of murdering seven babies and trying to kill six others, went on trial on Wednesday accused of the attempted murder of another newborn in her care.
Letby, 34, was found guilty in August last year of committing the crimes between June 2015 and June 2016 while she was working as a nurse in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester, in northern England.
Letby has requested permission to appeal her convictions. After a three-day hearing in April, a panel of judges at the Court of Appeal said it would deliver a decision at a later date.
Last month, The New Yorker magazine published a 13,000-word investigative report that poses substantial questions about the evidence relied on in court.
It raises the possibility that Letby, vilified as the “angel of death” in the media after her conviction, may be the victim of a grave miscarriage of justice.
People have been blocked from reading the article online in the UK, where the contempt-of-court law is very strictly interpreted and enforced.
Letby is now on trial at Manchester Crown Court charged with one count of attempted murder of a further young baby girl, known as Child K, in February 2016. She denies the accusation.
Prosecutor Nick Johnson said the jury should not convict Letby because she had been found guilty in the other cases, but said it was significant evidence as to what her intention was at the time of the alleged offence she now faced.
“In a nutshell, we are saying that her status as a multiple murderer and attempted murderer is an important piece of evidence you can, if you wish, take into account when you are considering if we have proved … that she was attempting to murder (Child K),” Johnson said.
On Tuesday, the judge, James Goss, told the jury they must decide the case based on the evidence they would hear and nothing else. The trial is expected to last about four weeks.