Bombshell Lucy Letby documentary revelations - jaw-dropping report to grieving parents' fury

Is Lucy Letby evil? That's the question immediately posed in tonight's Channel 4 documentary, which examines whether the nurse's convictions are a result of justice or the total opposite.

The former British neonatal nurse, who has always maintained her innocence, is serving a whole life order for the murders of seven infants and the attempted murders of seven others between June 2015 and June 2016.

Dr Dewi Evans, the prosecution's expert witness, has no doubt in his mind that Letby is guilty. "Is she evil? Yes, she’s evil," he says. "And I have no idea why anyone thinks she’s anything but guilty. She’s not innocent… I’m astonished with what her current barrister is doing. It’s absolutely disgraceful."

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While her barrister Mark McDonald is of the complete opposite opinion. "Our criminal justice system has failed, fundamentally failed," he insists. "Behind these children are parents that are suffering, and what they will want at the end of the day is the truth."

So what is the truth? We delve into all of the revelations from the documentary - from discrepancies in reports and furious claims to parents' shock at Letby's unsettling reaction to a question about their baby's death...

Baby O pathology report

Lucy Letby was convicted of the murder of Baby O, the first of two triplets, after returning from a holiday in Ibiza in June 2016. The child had been deemed a "perfect" healthy baby at the time and had been due to go home before he collapsed suddenly. A postmortem X-ray found that he had a higher than normal amount of gas in his body. The belief was that Letby had killed him by injecting air into his nasogastric tube.

At the request of barrister McDonald, consultant neonatologists Dr Neil Aiton and Dr Silvena Dimitrova put together a report on Baby O. Their overall conclusion was that there were justifiable medical explanations which led to the collapse of Baby O.

"The first signs of a change happened around about midnight," Dr Aiton explains. "We can see in those charts changes in temperature, changes in heart rate and some gradual increase in abdominal distention that was noticed by the nursing staff. He had two medical reviews and neither picked up on the changes that happened overnight."

Asked if that was surprising, he replies: "I think that’s not desirable - it should have been picked up. It was then at 2.40am that there was the emergency call."

Quizzed on why the child didn't respond to resuscitation, Dr Aiton continues: "I was instantly struck by these high ventilator pressures during the resuscitation - meant that the lungs weren’t pushing right on the diaphragm. At a late point in the resuscitation, one of the consultants that was there decided to put a needle into the abdomen to decompress it."

Dr Dimitrova insists that that is "absolutely not" the cause of action she would have taken.

"The most likely consequence of that [is] that as you put the needle in, there would be some bleeding and you would cause damage to the liver," Dr Aiton continues.

However, Dr Dewi Evans stands by his findings, saying: "There were incredible abnormalities of the liver - so severe that they’re what you’d see in what you’d get in a road traffic accident. I concluded that this baby suffered trauma to the liver, but as well as that, this baby was the victim of air being injected into the blood stream."

The needle theory had also already been examined during the trial, with the prosecution pathologist concluding that there was no evidence that a needle had pierced Baby O's liver while he was alive. A paediatric pathologist speaking to the BBC also agreed with the finding, saying: "These injuries weren't caused by a needle. They were in different parts of the liver and there was no sign of any needle injury on the liver."

Baby C's cause of death

The findings surrounding Baby C's death has been contested by those supporting Letby. The baby was born seven weeks premature at 1lb 12oz but was said to have been in good condition.

When his alarm sounded, Letby was seen standing over his monitor, despite not being his designated nurse. He was found to have died June 14, 2015 as a result of air being injected into his stomach.

However, the defence have argued that the attack happened on June 12th, when an X-ray was done on the baby. Letby was not working on this day.

Letby's barrister McDonald claimed that Dr Evans had "remarkably changed his mind" on the cause of death of Baby C in a new report. Dr Evans last year told BBC File on Four that Baby C likely died due to a "a combination of air and milk" pumped via nasogastric tube into the stomach. In court, Dr Evans had only mentioned air.

Speaking in the documentary, Dr Evans says: "I did not change my view after the trial, I amended my report while giving evidence in the trial."

Dr Phil Hammond, an NHS doctor for 35 years who has also worked as an investigative journalist for Private Eye, is highly critical of Dr Evans' findings. He says: "It wasn't until he was on the witness stand, despite it not appearing in any of his reports, that he suddenly said, 'I think the baby could have also had air injected into a vein.'"

While McDonald claims: "He just made it up as he went along. The greatest case in point is Baby C."

The jury were reminded in the prosecution's closing speech that Lucy Letby wasn't on duty on June 12th.

Dr Evans was supported in court by at least seven medical experts.

'What Lucy Letby did when we thought our baby was dying was 'not normal''

A mum and dad whose baby son nearly died while in the care of Letby recall their unsettling experience with the nurse, revealing that they feel a doctor's decision ultimately saved their son.

The parents, who wish to remain anonymous, welcomed their newborn at Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015. He was born full-term and healthy, however he was later taken away and they were told he needed some help breathing.

"We were obviously worried," the dad says. "We were there for a couple of hours or something.."

"It seemed to last forever, didn’t it," the mum says. "Then a nurse came in with the box - I didn’t really see her, I just saw the box and I just burst into tears. I remember saying to her, ‘Oh my god, is he dead?’ And she just laughed, she was just laughing when we thought the worst had happened. And she said no, we just give these boxes out to all the parents of babies who have been really poorly.

"When she offered to take us to go and see him, Dr Brearey was there and he just explained that he didn’t know what was really the issue. Three times he had been resuscitated - they couldn’t explain why. I was very upset, I was frightened."

The dad says that he was "confused" as it "didn't make any sense".

"Dr Brearey told us he felt that with his condition, our son would be better cared for if he was sent to Liverpool Women’s Hospital," the heartbroken mum says.

"Personally, I feel like if he’d stayed at Chester, he would have died," the dad added.

The baby's mum continues: "That decision is what saved him, I think. We’ll always be grateful to that doctor, won’t we? Away from Chester, he picked up very quickly and we were sent back home again. It was only when we saw her face in the newspaper later on that we recognised her straight away. The nurse who gave us the box was Lucy Letby."

Ten years later, the parents still have the box that Letby - who is serving a life sentence with a whole life order after being found guilty of seven counts each of murder and attempted murder in 2023 - gave them that day. Among the contents includes a baby hat, a blanket and a notepad.

They are convinced that her actions that day were "not normal", though said that there was no "concrete evidence" to suggest she had anything to do with their son suddenly becoming ill.

While their son recovered, they explained that he sadly began to suffer with "serious issues" from the age of five.

"He is delayed at school by about two years from where he should be, he still can’t write very well and he’s had really bad seizures where they’ve not stopped for 15, 20 minutes. The first one was horrific, wasn’t it," they say. "This weekend he said to me, I wish I was normal, I wish I was normal’... he just wants to be like everyone else."

Opening up about their son's reaction to seeing Letby on TV, they recalled him saying: "That’s the naughty nurse that tried to kill me!"

Lucy Letby's 'repeated pattern' of box 'gift' to grieving parents

Further speaking about the unusual box 'gift' that Letby had given them, the mum explains that the police told her it appeared to be a "repeated pattern" and that the nurse had given the box to other parents.

"The police, when I told them about the box, said that it was something that was brought up quite a lot in the children that they'd been investigating and it was definitely a repeated pattern," she says. "The police told us that we were one of 17 others being investigated at that time and the main trigger for the investigation was children who had been resuscitated and where doctors didn't really understand what was wrong.

"The police told us there wasn't enough evidence to take it to court at the time but that they'd leave it there in case anything else came up in the future."

The dad adds: "That's why we can't get rid of the box, because it was strong evidence in itself. We've put it away, but I don't think we can get rid of the box."

Dr Evans' claims support for Letby comes from 'metropolitan elite'

Dr Evans, the prosecution's expert witness, lashes out at the support for Letby, claiming it largely comes from the "metropolitan elite". He also speaks about the social media abuse he has suffered as a result of testifying for the prosecution.

"What is astonishing is the noise from people who feel that they can make outrageous comments through scientific papers such as Private Eye," he says. "The most hysterical support for Lucy Letby has come from the metropolitan elite, or who I call are the world’s most entitled."

He continues: "I’ve had to put up with a lot of social media abuse. That should not happen - it certainly should not happen to someone who’s played a part in convicting one of England's worst female serial killers. These people seem to be making things up and I think that's because this case did not involve the metropolitan elite.

"The barristers were from Liverpool, the court case was in Manchester, the expert witnesses were from west Wales and the Channel Islands. I think they can't cope with that. I think they've been blindsided.

"I mean, what do these clever people think led to the deaths of these babies? They're blind to evidence, they're blind to objectivity and she will be in the news for decades to come and it will sell newspapers and it will create headlines and that's just the way it is."

Letby's barrister hits back at fame claims

McDonald refuses to apologise in the documentary for speaking out - while furiously denying that he's taking on Letby's case to become famous.

He says: "I don't apologise for speaking out about this, but don't mistake that for a lack of compassion for the parents that have lost their children.

"I'm doing what I'm doing to make sure the general public know that there is a major problem in this case. I'm not doing it because I want to be on telly - it's not about me! It's never about me! It's about a woman who's serving life in prison."

Babies F & L poisoning

Baby F and Baby L's cases are considered to have been crucial to Letby's conviction. The nurse was found guilty of killing Baby F less than 24 hours after murdering his twin brother by lacing his feeding bag with insulin. A blood sample later confirmed that he had very low C-peptide levels and "extremely high" insulin levels, ultimately proving that he had been injected with insulin.

Letby was also found guilty of the attempted murder of Baby L by injecting insulin into a dextrose bag.

The blood tests hadn't been disputed in court, with Letby herself admitting in court that someone on the ward must have poisoned them with insulin, but categorically said that it wasn't her.

Quizzed by McDonald on the findings, Dr Neil Aiton claimed that the reliability that was attributed to the insulin test was invalid.

"We came across reference to some reports by Dr Wark, the biochemist from Guildford who administers the quality control testing for all of the labs," Dr Aiton explains. "Dr Wark in court provided two pairs of results of quality control, one pair for Baby F and one pair for Baby L. And the second report, a test that was done just a few weeks after Baby L's test shows that the insulin result came out as 962 - the target level for that result was 108. So it was around 800% higher.

"So the jury was repeatedly told by the prosecution that there is no other way that this result could indicate anything else other than exogenous insulin. But here we have a quality control test that is showing the same result that the two test results, Baby F and Baby L, showed - a fictitiously high insulin level. The reliability that was attributed to this test is invalid. This is not an opinion, this is a fact."

He goes on to say that when Dr Wark was questioned in court, she presented the first of those tests that was done "and then the subject was changed".

Dr Aiton claims that that that was a significant piece of information the the jury was not told about. "What it shows is what the jury were told was not correct," he concludes. "These results cannot be safely relied upon."

'Serious and systemic issues on the neonatal unit'

Letby's barrister accuses the neonatal unit she worked on as having "serious and systemic failings" which ultimately led to the the increased death rate of babies. He also suggests that Letby was one of the loudest voices pointing out such failings.

He says: "I've now got four reports, and they're very compelling. What each of the cases expends is serious and systemic failings on the unit. There were people coming forward, raising issues about this neonatal unit. Probably one of the loudest voices of those was Lucy Letby. She's now the one serving life in prison."

Parents' heartbreak over Lucy Letby appeals

Letby's appeals have taken a toll on parents struggling to move on the deaths or harm caused to their babies at Countess of Chester Hospital.

The anonymous parents speaking in the documentary open up about the effect it's had on them.

"There are a lot of nasty comments online from people who just think it's a TV drama and forget that it's real people and that it affects their lives," the mum says. "It's bad enough for us but at least we've still got him. The parents that have lost their children... if it triggers such a visceral reaction in me, I can't even begin to imagine how they must feel."

"Our son is always going to know and she'll always probably be in and out of the news," the mum continued. "And I don't know when he's older how that's going to make him feel or what effect that has on him. But it is one of the biggest cases in the world and people do have a right to know what had happened. There's always going to be two sides to it, isn't there?"

While the dad said he reckons she's "100% guilty", the mum said: "I veer from being guilty to not guilty depending on how I feel that day because I definitely feel something went on at the hospital, but then I find it so hard to believe somebody could actually do something like that. But obviously, we'll never know the whole truth."

*Lucy Letby: Murder or Mistake airs tonight at 9pm on Channel 4

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