From the Guardian · · 3m
The Letby question nobody was allowed to ask
Two years and £18m of public inquiry, built on a conviction a growing crowd of experts says is wrong.
In brief
Two years and £18m of public inquiry, built on a conviction a growing crowd of experts says is wrong. An inquiry that assumes guilt cannot test guilt, so the £18m report leaves the central question about the Letby case untouched. Originally reported by the Guardian.
A warning published first
Two months before the Thirlwall inquiry opened, Chris Henley KC reported on the wrongful rape conviction of Andrew Malkinson, and asked the legal establishment to admit the courts get things wrong.
“entirely innocent defendants will sometimes be convicted”
Built on an assumption
Health secretary Steve Barclay set up the inquiry in 2023 on the basis that Letby was guilty of murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven more at the Countess of Chester.
The brief was management
Thirlwall's terms of reference pointed at the hospital's managers and whether their actions and culture contributed to the failure to protect babies from Letby. Guilt was the starting point, not a question.
Twenty-four experts asked for a pause
They wrote to Wes Streeting after Labour won in 2024, urging him to pause the inquiry or widen its terms to examine a possible miscarriage of justice. He did not.
Dismissed as noise
Opening in September 2024, Thirlwall called the criticism a huge outpouring of comment and all of this noise that had distressed bereaved parents.
“It's not for me to set about reviewing the convictions. The court of appeal has done that.”
The central finding
Her 822-page report criticises a prolonged delay by senior managers in calling the police after the triplets, babies O and P, died in June 2016.
Three babies who might have lived
Because the report treats Letby's guilt as fact, it concludes three babies might not have died had managers acted faster. A devastating verdict resting entirely on the conviction standing.
No murders, say the experts
A large international group led by Canadian neonatologist Dr Shoo Lee concluded there were no murders, only vulnerable premature babies and poor care. Lee says the prosecution misrepresented his own research.
Nobody found deliberate harm
Three Alder Hey pathologists found no sign of deliberate harm and confirmed it on review. Dr Jane Hawdon found none either, only many areas of sub-optimal care.
A unit stretched too thin
The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health found too few consultants and just two ward rounds a week for very vulnerable babies. Managers downgraded the unit rather than staff it.
The question left hanging
Why did Cheshire police, the CPS and their expert witnesses reach a conclusion so different from every expert who read the same medical evidence? The CCRC is still weighing Letby's application.
“Miscarriages of justice disfigure the lives of all connected to the case and make the public generally less safe.”
At a glance
An inquiry that assumes guilt cannot test guilt, so the £18m report leaves the central question about the Letby case untouched.
