A leading barrister has called for the Lucy Letby case to be referred back to the Court of Appeal because her convictions are ‘almost certainly’ unsafe.
Adam King, who prosecuted the Just Stop Oil climate protesters, is the latest respected figure to raise questions about the case against Letby, who was convicted over two trials of killing seven babies and attempting to murder seven more.
Since the nurse lost her appeal last year, a mass of evidence undermining the prosecution’s case has been gathered by her new legal team, raising questions about the claim she was on duty for every suspicious incident and about the testimony of the main prosecution witness, Dewi Evans.
Doubts have also been raised about the tests which purported to show Letby used various techniques – including insulin poisoning and injecting air into veins – to murder already sickly babies.
Contradictory and incoherent notes written by Letby in post-arrest therapy sessions were also presented as a confession – even though she strongly denies murder.
Last month, Letby’s barrister Mark McDonald presented a 698-page report from 14 world-leading experts to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which deals with potential miscarriages of justice.
The report concluded that the babies died from poor care, prematurity and natural causes.
Mr King, who is representing Lucy Connolly, a 42-year-old mother appealing against a 31-month sentence for inciting racial hatred through a tweet sent after the Stockport murders, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘This is a rare instance of a case that needs to be considered by the Court of Appeal for a second time, and soon.
‘The ever-growing doubt about the Crown’s star expert’s reliability alone warrants that course. We’re almost certainly looking at an unsafe conviction.’
Since her conviction, dozens of doctors, nurses, statisticians, law experts and scientists have come forward to criticise the way in which evidence was presented to the jury.
They include Lord Sumption, a former judge at the Supreme Court, who said he believes Letby is ‘probably innocent’.