Nurse Lucy Letby tells jury she considered suicide over baby murder allegations

A nurse accused of multiple murders and attempted murders of babies has told a jury she had not harmed any children.

Seven months on from the start of her trial at Manchester Crown Court, Lucy Letby, 33, entered the witness box on Tuesday to give evidence.

She is alleged to have murdered five boys and two girls, and attempted to murder another five boys and five girls, between June 2015 and June 2016.

The prosecution says Letby was a "constant malevolent presence" in their care at the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital.

It is said she used various means to target the infants, including injections of air into their system and insulin poisoning.

Letby, wearing a black top and black trousers, walked from the dock and across the courtroom to answer the allegations as her defence case started.

Several rows behind, her parents, John Letby, 76, and Susan Letby, 62, looked on – as did family members of the alleged victims on the other side of the public gallery.

Her barrister, Ben Myers KC, asked her: "Over the period of 2015 and 2016 we are looking at the babies on this indictment, could you put a figure on the number of babies you cared for in that period?"

Letby said: "It would be hundreds."

Mr Myers said: "Did you care for them?"

Letby said: "Yes."

Asked if she ever wanted to hurt any of them, she said: "No, that’s completely against being what a nurse is."

She said she studied her nursing degree at the University of Chester and was the "first person in her family to go to university".

During her studies she went on numerous work placements, she said, with the majority at the Countess of Chester Hospital, either on the children’s ward or the neo-natal unit.

Letby said she qualified as a Band 5 nurse in September 2011.

She said she was "devastated" when she was removed from clinical duties.

She added: "Because I have always prided myself on being very competent and, potentially, I was not competent, it really affected me and I was taken away from the job I loved.

"It was life-changing, in that moment I was taken away from the support system I had on the unit, I was put in a role I did not enjoy and I had to pretend it was voluntary. It made me question everything about myself."

Letby said she was first informed she was being blamed for the deaths of babies in a letter from the Royal College of Nursing in September 2016.

Mr Myers asked how this made her feel.

Letby replied: "It was sickening. I just could not believe it. It was devastating. I don't think you could be accused of anything worse than that."

Letby said she felt very isolated and her mental health deteriorated. She said she was prescribed anti-depressants by her GP, which she is still taking.

Mr Myers asked: "How bad did the negative feelings get?"

Letby replied: "There were times when I did not want to live. I thought of killing myself."

Mr Myers said: "Had you done anything wrong?"

Letby replied: "No."

Mr Myers said: "Then why did you think of killing yourself?"

Letby replied: "Because of what was being inferred."

Then Mr Myers asked how she felt to have her job as a nurse taken away from her and to be accused of killing babies.

Letby replied: "My job was my life. My whole world was stopped."

Mr Myers asked: "If you think back to when you were a young woman, you were 25, 26, before you were being blamed for what happened, are you the same person?"

Letby replied: "Everything has completely changed. Everything about me and my life, the hopes I had for the future, everything has gone."

Letby told the court about the three times she was arrested by police on suspicion of murder and attempted murder of babies.

She described her arrests as "traumatising" and "the scariest thing I have ever been through", and said she had now been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Mr Myers then took Letby through some handwritten notes found at her home after her arrest.

Letby said writing her thoughts down was something she had done all her life.

Asked to explain why she had written 'Not good enough' at the top of one note, Letby said: "That's the overwhelming feeling I had about myself at that point, because the way people had made me feel.

"I thought I had been incompetent or done something wrong. It's just me processing thoughts."

Mr Myers continued to take Lucy Letby through a Post-it note recovered at her home in Chester following her arrest in July 2018.

Manchester Crown Court has heard she thought she had written the note two years earlier when she was removed from the neonatal unit at the Countess of Chester.

Mr Myers asked: "You said in the note 'I have not done anything wrong'. Why did you write that?"

Letby replied: "Because I was made to feel I had done something wrong, so potentially I had been incompetent in some way."

Mr Myers said: "In what type of state were you in when you wrote that note?"

Letby said: "Not good at all. Through that period my mental health was poor."

Mr Myers asked: "How well did you cope with the situation you were in?"

Letby replied: "I did my best but it was difficult in the circumstances with the isolation I felt."

Referring to the Post-it note, Mr Myers said to Lucy Letby: "You wrote 'I killed them on purpose because I’m not good enough'.

"Had you done something intentionally to harm or kill them?"

Letby replied: "No."

Mr Myers said: "Why did you think you may not be good enough?"

The defendant said: "Because that was the suggestion throughout … that I had been removed from the unit, that I had done something wrong. That was what was being insinuated to me."

Mr Myers said: "You wrote 'I am evil I did this'. Why?"

Letby said: "Because I felt at the time I had done something wrong and I thought I’m such an awful, evil person … that I had made mistakes and not known."

Mr Myers asked: "What did you thought you had done?"

Letby said: "That somehow I had been incompetent and I had done something wrong to affect these babies. I felt I must be responsible in some way.”

Lucy Letby also wrote "why me" on the Post-it note, Manchester Crown Court heard.

Asked to explain those words by her barrister Ben Myers KC, the defendant said: "Because I didn’t understand why it was happening to me. I thought I had always been competent and done my best."

Mr Myers said: "How were you coping with the situation you were in at the time you wrote this note?"

Letby said: "Looking back now, I was really struggling. This was a way of me expressing what I was not able to say to anyone.

"It’s what I do regularly, it can be on any piece of paper."

Mr Myers asked Letby how it made her feel when he spoke earlier of her 6am arrest in July 2018 and the "banging of doors and things".

Letby said: "It’s uncomfortable for me."

Mr Myers said: "And looking at the note?"

Letby said: "I am a very private person and I didn’t think my note would ever be read."

Letby was also questioned about her searches for people on Facebook, some of which related to the parents of babies she allegedly murdered or tried to kill.

Mr Myers asked if there was anything sinister in looking up on Facebook the parents of babeis who she is accused of harming.

Mr Myers said: "Because, you understand, that's the suggestion that's being made, you understand? It's babies you have hurt. Is that what it's about?"

Letby responded: "It's not."

Mr Myers then continued questioning her, saying: "Why are you searching?"

To which Letby said: "They're just people that have crossed my mind in that time. It's general curiosity that I look at a lot of people."

"Hurt them or do something to them?" asked Mr Myers.

"No," replied Letby.

"I'm always on my phone."

Turning to the charges against Lucy Letby, her barrister Ben Myers KC said to her: “You understand the allegations are of murder and of attempted murder?”

Letby said: “Yes.”

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever tried to kill any baby you cared for?”

“No,” replied the defendant.

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever intentionally harmed or tried to intentionally harm any babies as alleged.”

Letby said: “No, never.”

Ben Myers KC, defending, asked Lucy Letby: “Have you ever introduced air intravenously or forced air down a nasogastric tube?”

Letby replied: “No I haven’t.”

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever done that with the intention of killing a baby?” “No,” said the defendant. Mr Myers went on: “Or any other reason for that matter?” “No,” repeated Letby.

Her barrister asked: “Have you ever overfed a baby with the intention of killing him or her?” Letby said: “No, never.”

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever done that to a baby for any other reason?” “No,” said Letby.

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever used insulin with the intention of killing a baby or harming him in some other way?” “No,” said Letby.

Mr Myers said: “Have you ever committed a physical assault on a baby in your care with the intention of killing them or hurting them?” The defendant replied: “No.”

Mr Myers asked: “What did you want to do with the babies you were looking after?” 

Letby said: “To care for them. To do my best for them. To help them.”

The trial was adjourned until Friday.

A court order prohibits reporting of the identities of surviving and deceased children allegedly attacked by Letby, and prohibits identifying parents or witnesses connected with the children.

Letby, from Hereford, denies all the allegations.