Merged Concerns over baby killer ignored? / Nurse Lucy Letby killed babies in her care

[Vixen]

I can not tell what you mean by this post. However, I'm pretty sure a person can simultaneously believe the accused not guilty without deciding the victim(s) don't exist.

Normally, in the UK, the identity/identities of the victim/s of murder are released and people respect the victims' loved ones by not cynically championing their convicted killer as entertainment fodder for tabloid hacks' cack-filled columns. In this case, the judge ordered the identities of Letby's victims remain anonymous, because many of them have a surviving twin/triplet or sibling. Perhaps if the government consented to photos of some of Letby's victims being released, people might realise that this is not a victimless crime and the convicted perpetrator, Lucy Letby, is not the victim here.

As for believing the accused being not guilty, the highest crown court of criminal law found her guilty as charged on fifteen charges. There is zero evidence of a mistrial or a miscarriage. The justice system has been developed and refined over several centuries way back to Anglo-Saxon law. The idea that Nadine Dorries' feeling in her bones that Letby is innocent as a superior system is laughable.

 

[jeremyp]

Let me prefix this by saying I am not a medical expert, nor am I a legal expert, nor do I have access to all the evidence that was presented in the trial. My opinion on the guilt of Lucy Letby seems to change with every article I read about her case.

This reply is not about whether I think Letby is guilty or not (although I currently lean towards the verdict being unsafe) but about Vixen's arguments and those of others.

Normally, in the UK, the identity/identities of the victim/s of murder are released and people respect the victims' loved ones by not cynically championing their convicted killer as entertainment fodder for tabloid hacks' cack-filled columns. In this case, the judge ordered the identities of Letby's victims remain anonymous, because many of them have a surviving twin/triplet or sibling. Perhaps if the government consented to photos of some of Letby's victims being released, people might realise that this is not a victimless crime and the convicted perpetrator, Lucy Letby, is not the victim here.

The fallacy here is in assuming that the families of the victims being upset is a good reason for keeping an innocent person in prison. If Lucy Letby is innocent, she deserves to go free, no matter what the impact on the victims' families. As for respect: the best way to respect the victims is to find out the true reason for why they died.

As for believing the accused being not guilty, the highest crown court of criminal law found her guilty as charged on fifteen charges. There is zero evidence of a mistrial or a miscarriage.

I don't think that's the case. I think there's good reason for doubt over some of the evidence presented. This is just my opinion and it will probably change after I read the next article about Letby, but a lot of other more knowledgeable people seem to have doubts too. Therefore, your statement is, in my mind, just an opinion.

The justice system has been developed and refined over several centuries way back to Anglo-Saxon law.

Indeed it has and it still frequently gets things wrong. That is why there is an appeals process.

The idea that Nadine Dorries' feeling in her bones that Letby is innocent as a superior system is laughable.

It is not just Nadine Dorries though who thinks there are problems.

 

[Matthew Best]

Nadine Dorries on one side, Vixen on the other.

One of them has to be right, but extensive experience suggests that's impossible. It's a problem that I don't see a solution to.

Probably best if we ignore the names of the people advocating for one side or another and just concentrate on the issues.

 

[Matthew Best]

In that spirit, here's news that Letby has changed her legal team:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3d93kpkl83o

Her new barrister plans to take her case to the Criminal Cases Review Commission, whose Chairman was recently described as “unfit to fulfil her duties” by the Justice secretary, but who resisted calls to resign as a result of the failures in the Malkinson case.

 

[smartcooky]

So, like you fellow traveller, you're going to continue to ignore the excoriation of the case by scientists and physicians, and deny they exist.
Pathetic, but hardly unexpected.

Sigh. So you're going to ignore all the physicians and scientists because they don't suit your narrative?
And your dismissal of "mathematicians" is just idiotic. Who better to comment on the dubious use of statistics?

Rather, I'm NOT going to ignore the witnesses, including the scientists and physicians (some of whom were actually experts in paediatric care) who testified in the case, under direct and cross examination and under oath.

 

[Vixen]

Let me prefix this by saying I am not a medical expert, nor am I a legal expert, nor do I have access to all the evidence that was presented in the trial. My opinion on the guilt of Lucy Letby seems to change with every article I read about her case.

This reply is not about whether I think Letby is guilty or not (although I currently lean towards the verdict being unsafe) but about Vixen's arguments and those of others.


The fallacy here is in assuming that the families of the victims being upset is a good reason for keeping an innocent person in prison. If Lucy Letby is innocent, she deserves to go free, no matter what the impact on the victims' families. As for respect: the best way to respect the victims is to find out the true reason for why they died.


I don't think that's the case. I think there's good reason for doubt over some of the evidence presented. This is just my opinion and it will probably change after I read the next article about Letby, but a lot of other more knowledgeable people seem to have doubts too. Therefore, your statement is, in my mind, just an opinion.

Indeed it has and it still frequently gets things wrong. That is why there is an appeals process.



It is not just Nadine Dorries though who thinks there are problems.

But Letby is not innocent, she was found guilty by a court of law.

How would you feel if Ian Huntley's friends and family started flooding the media with articles on how Huntley must be innocent because no-one can prove the two girls didn't die accidentally; no defence expert was invited to court to say so, but they have now written a couple of articles for the DM and PE claiming it is a 'miscarriage of justice' that this was not properly looked at. Do you think this type of grasping at straws campaigning outside of official channels is respectful or considerate to the families of Holly and Jessica? Letby is not innocent because some tabloid columnist says so, or some 'expert' in the Netherlands or the USA who didn't even follow the trial but just took the word of Dr Gill or Lucy Letby's overbearing father. Letby is guilty because she was found guilty in a criminal court of law.

If you do not accept the rule of law, just say so, stating your reasons. Why would you need to 'read an article'?

 

[Vixen]

In that spirit, here's news that Letby has changed her legal team:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c3d93kpkl83o

Her new barrister plans to take her case to the Criminal Cases Review Commission, whose Chairman was recently described as “unfit to fulfil her duties” by the Justice secretary, but who resisted calls to resign as a result of the failures in the Malkinson case.

Not sure what Malkinson has to do with it; his was a case of the police withholding exculpatory evidence.

It is good that Letby is taking it to the correct legal channel.

Her barrister throughout the trials and appeals was Ben Myers KC. But Mark McDonald, a specialist barrister in appeals and miscarriages of justice, told the BBC's File on 4 that he was now representing the serial killer.1 hour ago

Lucy Letby replaces her legal team with 'appeals ... - Daily Mail

Daily Mail
https://www.d'[/quote]

It'll be interesting to see if there are any points of law or procedure that could potentially overturn the verdicts, should a case review be accepted.

Bear in mind the police are currently investigating other cases involving Letby, so there won't be a resolution any time soon.

 

[Matthew Best]

But Letby is not innocent, she was found guilty by a court of law.

So were the Guildford 4.

 

[gabeygoat]

But Letby is not innocent, she was found guilty by a court of law.


If you do not accept the rule of law, just say so, stating your reasons. Why would you need to 'read an article'?

Surely, you realize innocent people have been found guilty in courts of law all over the place?

I have no strong opinion on her guilt or innocence as I haven't been following closely.

 

[smartcooky]

So were the Guildford 4.

Seriously?



In the Guildford Four, Maguire Seven and Birmingham Six cases, the Police deliberately withheld exculpatory evidence to intentionally frame those people for bombings while they already knew other groups of people (actual IRA members) had admitted to carrying out those bombings.... and you are going to compare that with the Letby case?

 

[Matthew Best]

They were found guilty by a court of law, weren't they?

 

[smartcooky]

They were found guilty by a court of law, weren't they?

So were Ian Brady, Myra Hindley, Peter Sutcliffe, Harold Shipman, Mary Ann Cotton, Dennis Nilsen, Stephen Port, Johanna Dennehy, Stephen Griffiths, Benjamin Geen, Mark Martin, Steve Wright, and Levi Bellfield.

Do you believe they were all wrongfully convicted too?

 

[catsmate]

Sigh.

The writer of the blog relies very heavily on Nadine Dorries and Peter Hitchins.

No, they didn't. This is utterly obvious.

I wonder if he even followed the trial but prefers to rely instead on the gutter press.

Perhaps you could read the piece?

The trial is over.

A fact, a palpable fact! Thanks fully that' not the end of the matter.

A panel of experienced judges found no grounds for appeal.

Did you bother to read the appeal judgement?

I now look forward to the Public Inquiry into the NHS bosses who tried to cover up for Letby and who threatened the careers of a dozen concerned doctors.

Bollocks. The NHS management doesn't want to address the shortcomings in the hospital.

The conspiracy theorists will run and run until Letby pops her clogs in prison.

Right.... From someone who wittered on about Sunk and battery fires.

It is quite disgusting really. I saw the names of Letby's victims on a Court Listing sheet and I can assure you they were all real people with real families, who had their whole lives cruelly snatched away from them.

What has this Appeal to Emotion got to do with anything?

But people prefer to mischievously pretend there was a miscarriage of justice for the murderer and abuser of little vulnerable and helpless children.

Oh the hypocrisy....

 

[catsmate]

Relies heavily?

Here's what he says about Hitchens:

"(The one notable, and commendable, exception that I am aware of in the national press is the Daily Mail columnist Peter Hitchens, who used his column to express worries about the safety of the Letby verdicts right from the start.)"

And Dorries?

"Former ministers David Davis and Nadine Dorries have both made ‘interventions’ expressing concern about the prosecution."

If these two brief mentions count as "relying heavily" in your world view, no wonder you never get anything right. You are incapable of reading and making sense out of what you read.

I suspect that, like certain other people, Vixen is desperately attempting to avoid thinking about the experts (such as Alan Wayne Jones, Shoo Lee
Sandie Bohin, John O’Quigley, Richard Gill, Svilena Dimitrova, John Ashton and Roger Norwich amongt others) who've shown issues with the evidence.

Ashton especially, the person who exposed the Morecambe Bay scandal, is scathing about their being any evidence for a serial killer.

You don’t need a serial killer to account for what happened at Chester. Disasters, and this was a disaster, generally happen as a result of the convergence of a number of factors … We’re talking in Chester about system failure – it was a hospital that was not well run, that had ambitions beyond its capability, that had problems with clinical governance and environmental problems.

The arguments about Lucy Letby herself boil down to the fact that circumstantial evidence, and statistical and expert witness evidence that I believe was seriously flawed, were presented to the court.

But I'm sure Vixen and co will be along to tell us why we should be concerned. Or at least to call him a socialist who should be ignored.

 

[catsmate]

So were Ian Brady, Myra Hindley, Peter Sutcliffe, Harold Shipman, Mary Ann Cotton, Dennis Nilsen, Stephen Port, Johanna Dennehy, Stephen Griffiths, Benjamin Geen, Mark Martin, Steve Wright, and Levi Bellfield.

Do you believe they were all wrongfully convicted too?

UK courts also condemned:

• Alan Wayne Jones
• Shoo Lee
• Sandie Bohin
• John O’Quigley
• Richard Gill,
• Svilena Dimitrova
• John Ashton,
• Roger Norwich
• Paul Michael Hill
• Gerry" Conlon
• Paddy Armstrong
• Carole Richardson
• Stephen Downing
• Liam Holden
• Hugh Callaghan
• Patrick Joseph Hill
• Gerard Hunter
• Richard McIlkenny
• William Power
• John Walker
• Judith Ward
• Anne Maguire
• Patrick Maguire Sr.
• Patrick Maguire Jr.
• Vincent Maguire
• Sean Smyth
• Patrick O'Neill
• Patrick Conlon
• Patrick Molloy
• James Robinson
• Michael Hickey
• Vincent Hickey
• Jessie McTavish
• Terry Pinfold
• Harry MacKenney
• Stefan Kiszko
• Robert Brown
• Anthony Steel
• Paul Blackburn
• Michael Shirley
• Sean Hodgson
• Thomas Campbell
• Joseph Steele
• Michael O'Brien
• Darren Hall
• Ellis Sherwood
• Steven Miller
• Yusef Abdullahi
• Tony Paris
• Barry George
• Sam Hallam
• John Corcoran
• Angela Cannings
• Siôn Jenkins
• Donna Anthony
• Sally Clark
• Jonathan Jones

who were later cleared. So don't hide behind the facade of the supposed infallibility of British justice.

 

[smartcooky]

UK courts also condemned:

• Alan Wayne Jones
• Shoo Lee
• Sandie Bohin
• John O’Quigley
• Richard Gill,
• Svilena Dimitrova
• John Ashton,
• Roger Norwich
• Paul Michael Hill
• Gerry" Conlon
• Paddy Armstrong
• Carole Richardson
• Stephen Downing
• Liam Holden
• Hugh Callaghan
• Patrick Joseph Hill
• Gerard Hunter
• Richard McIlkenny
• William Power
• John Walker
• Judith Ward
• Anne Maguire
• Patrick Maguire Sr.
• Patrick Maguire Jr.
• Vincent Maguire
• Sean Smyth
• Patrick O'Neill
• Patrick Conlon
• Patrick Molloy
• James Robinson
• Michael Hickey
• Vincent Hickey
• Jessie McTavish
• Terry Pinfold
• Harry MacKenney
• Stefan Kiszko
• Robert Brown
• Anthony Steel
• Paul Blackburn
• Michael Shirley
• Sean Hodgson
• Thomas Campbell
• Joseph Steele
• Michael O'Brien
• Darren Hall
• Ellis Sherwood
• Steven Miller
• Yusef Abdullahi
• Tony Paris
• Barry George
• Sam Hallam
• John Corcoran
• Angela Cannings
• Siôn Jenkins
• Donna Anthony
• Sally Clark
• Jonathan Jones

who were later cleared.

Thanks for helping me to illustrate the point I was making.

 

[Elaedith]

Utter rubbish

Firstly, there is a colossal difference being between a therapist telling you to write down your thoughts, and one telling you to write down admissions to killing people. Any therapist telling their patient the latter needs to have their practicing certificate yanked immediately.

Secondly, even if what this article says is true it does not make the fact that she wrote down "I killed them on purpose because I’m not good enough to care for them and I am a horrible evil person" and "I am evil I did this" simply go away. These were admissions of guilt - there is no way to handwave them away.

‎

That is nonsense. The letters were already dubious evidence because they contain both apparent admissions and denials of guilt and both cannot be true. If they were prompted by a therapist's instructions they are almost worthless as evidence and the contradictory statements would be explained by contradictory thoughts related to emotional states. Feelings of guilt are common for people under investigation and the statement indicate confusion (e.g. 'I killed them on purpose because I'm not good enough' makes no sense). False confessions to crimes are not that uncommon and it is possible for people to make false admissions because they actually come to believe, as a result of suggestion, that they committed an offence (either they believe they have no memory of it or they create a false memory). It is certainly plausible, even likely, that somebody would have temporary and confused feelings of guilt going through their head as the result of being suspected in a lengthy investigation, even if they are innocent.

 

[Roboramma]

In a Bayesian sense, being convicted in a court of law is certainly evidence of guilt. But we all already know that.

When you're having a discussion about the possible miscarriage of justice, bringing up the fact that someone was convicted in a court of law isn't adding any new information.

And acting like it demonstrates guilt, which is what Vixen's statement was doing, is just wrong.

 

[Elaedith]

In a Bayesian sense, being convicted in a court of law is certainly evidence of guilt. But we all already know that.

When you're having a discussion about the possible miscarriage of justice, bringing up the fact that someone was convicted in a court of law isn't adding any new information.

And acting like it demonstrates guilt, which is what Vixen's statement was doing, is just wrong.

It's odd, this circular reasoning always comes up when discussing potential miscarriages of justice. People act as though citing the fact that somebody was convicted (which we already know) is evidence that the conviction is sound.

 

[Roboramma]

It's odd, this circular reasoning always comes up when discussing potential miscarriages of justice. People act as though citing the fact that somebody was convicted (which we already know) is evidence that the conviction is sound.

Yes, and thank you for putting the point much more clearly than I did.