A public inquiry heard there were ‘lots of rumours’ circulating around the ward where killer nurse Lucy Letby worked
Child killer Lucy Letby rejected the advances of a consultant who “made it clear he had an interest in her”, an inquiry has been told. The alleged pass was just one of “lots of rumours” circulating after Letby was removed from the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit in July 2016 after a series of sudden and unexplained deaths and collapses of babies.
The new 34-year-old was put on clerical duties after all seven paediatric consultants told hospital leaders they feared the nurse was deliberately harming infants. The nurse went on to complain to the health trust about her removal and a grievance hearing later concluded no evidence of any wrongdoing had been provided.
Letby never returned to duties in the neonatal unit but remained employed at the hospital until her arrest in July 2018, more than a year after Cheshire Police were called in to investigate. The independent chairwoman of the grievance hearing, which took place in December 2016, later told officers she had felt at the time that Letby was the victim of a “witch hunt”.
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Annette Weatherley told police: “The consultants are doing their own kind of investigation whatever it was they were doing, whether they liked or disliked her, there were lots of rumours around. They decided it was her, she was the baby killer. They were openly talking about her as the baby killer. They went to the Trust and they said ‘she is the baby killer, we don’t want her on the unit’.”
Ms Weatherley claimed one of the rumours circulating was that advances had been made to Letby by a consultant, the Thirlwall Inquiry was told. Ms Weatherley told detectives: “I can’t remember who said it but there was a rumour… a consultant had made it clear he had an interest in her and she had rebuffed it.”
The officer asked: “What, physically?” Ms Weatherley replied: “Yes physically. It was someone that told me that, I can’t remember who it was when I was there but there was a rumour.”
The inquiry has heard previously that Letby denied to a nursing manager that either neonatal clinical lead Dr Stephen Brearey or children’s services lead Dr Ravi Jayaram had ever made a pass at her.
Karen Rees, the then head of nursing in urgent care, said she had queried whether there was a “personal motive” to the concerns expressed about Letby by both consultants. She said: “I asked her if either of them had ever made a pass at her. She replied ‘absolutely not’.”
Sue Eardley, who headed a Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH) review into the increased mortality on the neonatal unit, accepted she should have told hospital bosses to call in the police after hearing the consultants’ concerns about Letby. Her reviewers spoke to Dr Brearey and Dr Jayaram in early September 2016 as part of an independent external probe requested by the hospital.
Both consultants explained they were worried about the way in which the collapses had occurred and that they were were sudden and unexplained. They had noted the association with Letby’s presence and had even gone as far as to conduct research as to how she might have murdered children, the inquiry heard
The RCPCH reviewers also interviewed Letby to “get her perspective”, her nursing colleagues “who were extremely supportive” and medical director Ian Harvey and director of nursing Alison Kelly, said Ms Eardley. The review team subsequently went on to recommend a further investigation and a detailed case note review of the baby deaths after it failed to identify any explanation for the increase in mortality.
Peter Skelton KC, representing some of the families of Letby’s victims, asked: “Did you pick up at the beginning before you went there that Ian Harvey’s view was that the consultants were misplaced in their concerns, that somehow they had got this wrong and that he needed help to demonstrate that?”
Ms Eardley replied: “I think that’s a good summary of our perceptions at the time, yes.”
Mr Skelton said: “You were being used to some extent in a way which wasn’t appropriate for an independent review?” Ms Eardley said: “With hindsight, yes.”
Mr Skelton said: “Well in fact based on what Mr Harvey told you, he wanted to use the Royal College to disprove the consultants’ concerns without addressing them directly?” Ms Eardley said: “He wanted to see if there was any other factor that could possibly have been a cause.”
She went on: “There were some concerns about the transport service, there were some concerns that being a level 2 unit was perhaps overextending in terms of its capability to look after the very, very premature infants. Those were the factors we were looking at – whether the staff and the expertise was appropriate, whether the transport came on time, whether the consultant cover was sufficient.”
Mr Skelton said: “But you couldn’t determine whether those factors in fact led to an increase in mortality, that was beyond the scope of your review and indeed objectively implausible?” Ms Eardley said: “Yes in the end the review concluded that those factors weren’t accounting for that increase in mortality specifically.”
Mr Skelton said: “And I think although you did make a very clear finding about the under-staffing of the unit – number one that’s a common problem with district general hospital neonatal units, this was not unique to Chester? ” Ms Eardley replied: “Correct.”
Mr Skelton said: “And number two, it didn’t cause the increase in mortality?” Ms Eardley said: “We couldn’t find a correlation.”
Mr Skelton said: “So what did Ian Harvey and Alison Kelly think had caused this increase, if anything?” Ms Eardley said: “I don’t know what they thought was causing it. I think they wanted us to disprove that it was nurse Letby.”
Mr Skelton told Ms Eardley that Dr Brearey had stated to the inquiry he was critical of the RCPCH for not helping him and his colleagues when they needed it. He said: “He explained everything he had to you with Dr Jayaram, he tried to go to those that should have helped him – his bosses, the executives – and it hadn’t worked so they were running out of options. Arguably they should have called the police but that’s a matter for him – but do you see why he felt let down by the college?”
Ms Eardley said: “I completely accept they both had a horrible time, particularly having seen the documents that I have seen from this inquiry and the conversations that happened within the management team and how hard they strived to get this situation resolved quickly. I can only apologise for the fact that we weren’t able to support them as they had asked.”
Letby, 34, from Hereford, is serving 15 whole-life orders after she was convicted at Manchester Crown Court of murdering seven infants and attempting to murder seven others, with two attempts on one of her victims, between June 2015 and June 2016. The inquiry is expected to sit until early 2025, with findings published by late autumn of that year.
