Lucy Letby tells jury the death of twin baby boy came as a ‘complete shock’ to her

The fatal collapse of a twin baby boy came as ‘a complete shock’ to neonatal nurse Lucy Letby, she told a jury today.

Letby, 33, originally from Hereford, is on trial for allegedly murdering seven babies at the Countess of Chester Hospital and attempting to murder a further ten. The charges relate to a period between June 2015 and June 2016. 

She denies them all.

During her second day in the witness box, Letby said: ‘It felt like we walked through the door into this awful situation. That was the first time I’d met (Baby) A and his parents. It was a huge shock’.

As the infant’s designated nurse it later fell to her to lead the process of copying the baby’s hands and feet for a memory box. His parents asked for his twin sister’s prints to be taken at the same time.

Letby’s barrister, Ben Myers KC, asked whether Baby A’s death on June 8, 2015, had affected her.

‘Yes, it did,’ she replied. 

Mr Myers went on: ‘It’s alleged that you did this. Did you?’

‘No’, said the nurse.

Her barrister then asked what it felt like to be the subject of such an allegation.

She replied: ‘It’s awful. I wasn’t even supposed to be working that night. It was such a shock to walk into that situation’.

The jury at Manchester Crown Court has heard that Baby A collapsed shortly after Letby and a nursing colleague, Melanie Taylor, had connected him to a line feeding him a solution containing 10 per cent glucose.

She said that when an alarm sounded she noticed the infant’s limbs turn white and his torso and abdomen become pale. 

‘He was apnoeic,’ she told Mr Myers. ‘He wasn’t breathing at that point’.

A crash call went out but despite efforts to resuscitate him Baby A died shortly before 9pm.

Letby recalled that the following morning a nursing friend on the unit sent her a WhatsApp message to say: ‘You did amazing. So proud of you…You did fab xxxx’.

Moments later she said she hoped the alleged killer hadn’t found the compliment patronising.

Letby replied: ‘It’s not patronising at all. Appreciate you saying that and thanks for letting me do it but supporting me so well’.

The defendant, who is accused of killing Baby A with an injection of air, said she frequently swapped messages with colleagues in the aftermath of incidents on the unit.

‘It was my main form of support, living alone and there being no formal support in place at work. It’s something we would all do. We were all regularly in touch with each other outside work’.

Letby acknowledged carrying out three Facebook searches on Baby A’s mother in the days after his death.

‘It was just curiosity,’ she told Mr Myers.

‘To walk into the unit that morning and to have not met the parents…I wanted to see the people behind the awful event that had happened. They were on my mind’.

She added: ‘It’s a common pattern of behaviour for me. If I think of somebody I would look them up. (Baby) A and (Baby) B were on my mind at that time. I would usually look for multiple people over a short period of time’.

Letby also told the jury she could not recall the build-up to Baby B’s collapse ‘with any clarity’.

She was with a nursing colleague in Nursery 1 when the infant became ‘quite mottled’ and ‘dark’ all over.

Asked whether she had seen such mottling before, she said it was not unusual but it was a concern in light of Baby A’s death the night before.

Letby, who is alleged to have injected Baby B with air, said she was asked to get the unit camera to take a picture of the mottling.

She returned ‘very quickly’ from the manager’s office, but by then Baby B’s colour had returned to normal and there was no mottling to photograph.

The jury has been told that Baby C – whose mother is a GP – was born on June 10 and died four days later.

Letby told the court she had no recollection of the events leading up to his fatal collapse. It had been a ‘normal’ shift, she added, and she had ‘no memory:’ of what happened until his collapse.

This had been ‘a significant event’.

She recalled being called over by her nursing colleague Sophie Ellis. Having looked at the baby, she asked Miss Ellis to put out a crash call. ‘I just remember he was apnoeic and needed respiratory support.

The nurse insisted that despite what Miss Ellis had said in a police statement she had no recollection of being in Nursery 1 prior to Baby C’s collapse. She did not recall being next to his cot when the alarm sounded.

Mr Myers reminded Letby about WhatsApp messages she had swapped with nursery assistant Jennifer Jones-Key in the days after Baby C’s death.

At one point she told her: ‘I just keep thinking about Mon. Feel like I need to be in (Nursery) 1’.

Ms Jones-Key replies: ‘You need a break from full-on ITU. You have to let it go or it will eat you up. I know not easy and will need time’.

Letby refers to her time at Liverpool Women’s Hospital, telling her colleague: ‘I lost a baby one day’.

She went on to explain how that experience had helped her realise the importance of returning to a particular nursery following a tragedy.

Mr Myers asked whether anything in her WhatsApp conversation with Ms Jones-Key had made her want to attack any child.

Letby replied: ‘No’.

Mr Myers: ‘The loss of a baby…is that something you wanted to happen?’

Letby: ‘Not at all, no’.

The alleged killer was asked for her thoughts on ‘what the parents have gone through’. She replied: ‘It’s unimaginable’.

The trial continues.