Honestly this looks like one of those statistical murder convictions. Random chance means that every few years, somewhere in the world, some medical professional will be present at a series of unusual deaths. They end up in prison even though there’s no other evidence.
I’m trying to find out what the actual evidence against Letby was, but so far I can only find one scribbled post it note written during a mental breakdown after being arrested. Which, she could have just been writing down things people were saying about her.
Random chance means that every few years, somewhere in the world, some medical professional will be present at a series of unusual deaths. They end up in prison even though there’s no other evidence.
This seems totally plausible, but I’ve never heard of it happening I don’t think. Do you have any cases you can point out? I’m having trouble finding a decent search term.
I’m trying to find out what the actual evidence against Letby was.
So am I, now, after reading your comment. I found this which gives the list:
Her ‘presence’ around the time of each collapse (how many infant deaths happened during her employment for which she was NOT present?)
she stole documents from the hospital, including a small number of documents with the names of babies she killed (probably a crime in itself, but fewer than 9% of the documents she had taken related to the babies in any way, so this could well be a bad habit)
The post-it note (written after arrest, could well be nothing more than the frantic thoughts of someone in terror)
The fact that it’s extremely difficult to prove she injected air (seems to work both ways)
So far, I’m not convinced. None of that evidence seems solid enough. Its worrying, not just because an innocent person may have just lost everything, but also because if there’s a systemic failure then creating a scapegoat is a surefire way to ensure it continues to happen.
That said, I know only what’s been reported, I wasn’t there and I don’t know everything. I want to believe the justice system is working properly and the people in full possession of the facts (judge, jury, barristers) made the right decision. I’m a little bit less inclined that way at the moment after hearing about the recent exoneration of Andrew Malkinson.
I can’t find it now either, but I’ve read about a German doctor convicted as a serial killer solely because she was present at the deaths of too many patients. In that case she was present at the death of every patient for like 3 months, which sounds like strong evidence against her. Until you think about it and realize that if she murdered them, that means no one died of natural causes for 3 months. Also in that case the number of deaths on the ward actually went up after she was arrested.
Similar but not to do with doctors, Sally Clarke was wrongly convicted of killing her children, purely because both of them had died of SIDS. The prosecution said SIDS is rare and so it happening twice was impossible. What’s worrying about that case is, everyone now says the miscarriage of justice was that the prosecutor incorrectly calculated the chances of two children dying of SIDS, when the actual fallacy was using the statistics as evidence at all. 1 in 73 million is the chance that one specific child will die of SIDS. The chance that any child will die of SIDS is 100%! 200 die in the UK every year! You can’t just go around arresting every parent on the basis that they were unlucky!
What’s really missing in everything I’ve seen is an actual statistical analysis. Everything I’ve seen is just “She was present at 20 deaths, when her colleagues were only present at 10”. Yeah, but how unlikely is that? How many nurses per year will be in exactly the same situation in the UK, or in the world? How unusual was the number of deaths in that hospital while there was supposedly a serial killer operating, versus a normal year?
Its frustrating that most people seem to just see that she was present at 20 cases and terminate their thinking at that. To me, that’s not enough proof to convict. I wonder, for example, how many infants died at places she worked, where she wasn’t present? An analysis by someone with all the numbers, of the probability of this happening, would be really crucial, I think. Are there any other nurses in the UK who have been on shift for a similar number of infant deaths in a similar timespan? Should we try them for murder too?
I’m not sure about this because I’m too busy to dig into it properly and the information isn’t available readily, but I think the injection of insulin is provable, i.e. you can tell post mortem that an insulin injection was given, which is murder
She was the only person that was present at every single incident, over 20 of them. The next most present staff were only at about 10 of the incidents. The Guardian has some articles on it all of you want to read more about the evidence and the trial.
I get where you’re coming from, for me the most damning evidence was looking at the number of deaths while she was working vs background rate, as well as how that rate changed after she was moved away from a ward or eventually suspended.
She’d have to be almost impossibly unlucky to fall victim to stats like this.
Sure, the chances of her specifically being that unlucky are astronomical. But the chances that somebody out of the 9 billion people on earth will be that unlucky are pretty good.
Honestly this looks like one of those statistical murder convictions. Random chance means that every few years, somewhere in the world, some medical professional will be present at a series of unusual deaths. They end up in prison even though there’s no other evidence.
I’m trying to find out what the actual evidence against Letby was, but so far I can only find one scribbled post it note written during a mental breakdown after being arrested. Which, she could have just been writing down things people were saying about her.
This seems totally plausible, but I’ve never heard of it happening I don’t think. Do you have any cases you can point out? I’m having trouble finding a decent search term.
So am I, now, after reading your comment. I found this which gives the list:
So far, I’m not convinced. None of that evidence seems solid enough. Its worrying, not just because an innocent person may have just lost everything, but also because if there’s a systemic failure then creating a scapegoat is a surefire way to ensure it continues to happen.
That said, I know only what’s been reported, I wasn’t there and I don’t know everything. I want to believe the justice system is working properly and the people in full possession of the facts (judge, jury, barristers) made the right decision. I’m a little bit less inclined that way at the moment after hearing about the recent exoneration of Andrew Malkinson.
I can’t find it now either, but I’ve read about a German doctor convicted as a serial killer solely because she was present at the deaths of too many patients. In that case she was present at the death of every patient for like 3 months, which sounds like strong evidence against her. Until you think about it and realize that if she murdered them, that means no one died of natural causes for 3 months. Also in that case the number of deaths on the ward actually went up after she was arrested.
Similar but not to do with doctors, Sally Clarke was wrongly convicted of killing her children, purely because both of them had died of SIDS. The prosecution said SIDS is rare and so it happening twice was impossible. What’s worrying about that case is, everyone now says the miscarriage of justice was that the prosecutor incorrectly calculated the chances of two children dying of SIDS, when the actual fallacy was using the statistics as evidence at all. 1 in 73 million is the chance that one specific child will die of SIDS. The chance that any child will die of SIDS is 100%! 200 die in the UK every year! You can’t just go around arresting every parent on the basis that they were unlucky!
What’s really missing in everything I’ve seen is an actual statistical analysis. Everything I’ve seen is just “She was present at 20 deaths, when her colleagues were only present at 10”. Yeah, but how unlikely is that? How many nurses per year will be in exactly the same situation in the UK, or in the world? How unusual was the number of deaths in that hospital while there was supposedly a serial killer operating, versus a normal year?
Its frustrating that most people seem to just see that she was present at 20 cases and terminate their thinking at that. To me, that’s not enough proof to convict. I wonder, for example, how many infants died at places she worked, where she wasn’t present? An analysis by someone with all the numbers, of the probability of this happening, would be really crucial, I think. Are there any other nurses in the UK who have been on shift for a similar number of infant deaths in a similar timespan? Should we try them for murder too?
I’m not sure about this because I’m too busy to dig into it properly and the information isn’t available readily, but I think the injection of insulin is provable, i.e. you can tell post mortem that an insulin injection was given, which is murder
She was the only person that was present at every single incident, over 20 of them. The next most present staff were only at about 10 of the incidents. The Guardian has some articles on it all of you want to read more about the evidence and the trial.
I get where you’re coming from, for me the most damning evidence was looking at the number of deaths while she was working vs background rate, as well as how that rate changed after she was moved away from a ward or eventually suspended.
She’d have to be almost impossibly unlucky to fall victim to stats like this.
Sure, the chances of her specifically being that unlucky are astronomical. But the chances that somebody out of the 9 billion people on earth will be that unlucky are pretty good.