Lucy Letby: 5 key details from trial of alleged baby killer nurse that emerged on Tuesday

Nurse Lucy Letby is on trial accused of the murder of seven babies and the attempted murder of 10 others.

Letby, 32, of Arran Avenue, Hereford, denies murdering five boys and two girls, and attempting to murder another five boys and five girls between June 2015 and June 2016.

At the time, she worked in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester.

Letby’s trial continued for a second day at Manchester Crown Court on Tuesday, with the prosecution going through details of some of the children allegedly killed by the nurse.

Here are the key developments regarding the alleged victims from Tuesday.

Child C

The court heard Letby allegedly murdered a five-day-old boy, child C, just days after claims she killed another baby.

Letby allegedly injected air into the stomach of the tiny, premature child through a nose tube, causing his breathing and heart to stop.

She was working the nightshift on 13 June 2015 and into the next day, looking after a baby, with child C in the care of another nurse, the court heard.

Child C’s nurse was at a nursing station when the baby’s monitor sounded an alarm at about 11.15pm, the court was told.

When she got to his room, Letby was stood by his incubator – the third time in the space of a week after a baby had collapsed, showing the defendant’s alleged “constant malevolent presence”, jurors were told.

Despite several hours of resuscitation attempts, child C was pronounced dead at 5.58am on 14 June.

Child D

It is alleged that Letby also murdered child D with an injection of air into the baby’s bloodstream.

The child responded well to treatment in the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit until she deteriorated and collapsed three times in the early hours of 22 June 2015, the court heard.

During the second collapse, the youngster was “distressed and crying”.

The child’s monitor alarm sounded on the third collapse and she could not be revived.

The court heard Letby sent “many messages” to friends in the wake of child D’s death and the preceding deaths and collapses, one message referring to “an element of fate”.

Johnson told the jury: “We say, tragically for (child D) her bad luck or fate was the fact that Lucy Letby was working in the neonatal unit that night.”

Child E and F

Letby was interrupted by the mother of one of her alleged victims as she attacked her son, the court heard.

The mother had gone to visit her prematurely born twin sons, child E and child F, at Countess of Chester Hospital on the evening of 3 August 2015 and found E “distressed” and bleeding from the mouth, the court heard.

Johnson said Letby tried to reassure the mother, telling her a registrar would review the youngster’s condition and she should leave the unit.

“‘Trust me, I’m a nurse’. That’s what she told (the mother),” Johnson said. “We suggest she was fobbed off by Lucy Letby.

“We say that she interrupted Lucy Letby who was attacking (child E), although she did not realise it at the time.”

Child E went on to suffer significant blood loss later in the evening, with a treating registrar saying he had never encountered such a large bleed in a small baby.

Following child E’s death in the early hours of 4 August 2015, it is alleged Letby made “fraudulent” nursing notes that were “false, misleading and designed to cover her tracks”.

And the day after allegedly murdering child E, Letby is accused of trying to kill his twin brother, child F, using poison for the first time, it is claimed, by injecting a fluid bag with insulin.

She went on to show a “very unusual interest” in the twins’ family, Johnson said, with social media searches on them two days after the youngster’s death and again on numerous occasions, including on Christmas Day.

Child G

Letby is also accused of trying to murder child G on three separate occasions in September 2015.

The youngster was born “exceptionally premature” up to four months earlier at a different hospital and weighed just 1lb 2oz.

Transferred to the Countess of Chester’s neonatal unit, she was “doing well” – reaching 6 September, a “significant date” of 100 days passing since the youngster’s birth – and such milestones were marked by the nurses putting up a banner and making a cake.

But in the early hours of the following day, the Crown says Letby fed an excessive amount of milk to child G through a nasogastric tube and also, prosecutors claim, injected air.

She collapsed and stopped breathing but survived and recovered at another hospital.

The jury was told there were two further attempts by Letby to kill the child on her return to the Chester hospital.

One occasion involved a monitor being switched off before being “discovered” by Letby, the court heard.

Child G was left “severely disabled”.

The trial continues.