Speaker 1: Before we begin, please be aware this series contains discussions
Speaker 1: around infant deaths and other difficult topics. Please take care
Speaker 1: while listening. The moment my daughter was born, the doctors
Speaker 1: noticed strange markings on her skin. Within hours, someone gently
Speaker 1: explained she might have a rare genetic disorder. I remember
Speaker 1: sitting in the postpartum room, exhausted and terrified while my fragile,
Speaker 1: beautiful baby girl had dozens of wires taped to her scalp.
Speaker 1: I couldn't help her, I couldn't hold her. Like all
Speaker 1: first time parents, I had been expecting that cinematic moment,
Speaker 1: skin on skin, a warm little body settling into mine,
Speaker 1: the quiet breath of relief after months of waiting. Instead,
Speaker 1: I spent the next six month months in limbo, fearing
Speaker 1: she might never walk or talk, that she might go blind,
Speaker 1: that a tiny hidden defect in her heart might stop
Speaker 1: it altogether. When I became a mother, I knew I
Speaker 1: would sacrifice everything to help my child. But this was
Speaker 1: not a problem I could fix, and I was left
Speaker 1: with no choice but to trust. Trust the nurses lifting
Speaker 1: her from my arms, Trust the doctors who did test
Speaker 1: after test, Trust the specialist who spoke in a calm
Speaker 1: voice about a possibility that parts of her brain might
Speaker 1: be missing. Because in the Niku, trust isn't optional. It's
Speaker 1: the air you breathe. You hand over the most precious
Speaker 1: thing in your life to people you barely know, believing
Speaker 1: they will protect what you can't. That vulnerability defines the
Speaker 1: ex experience. It's overwhelming and it's necessary. And then, finally, mercifully,
Speaker 1: the doctors told us she had tested negative. That her brain,
Speaker 1: her heart, her eyes, they were just fine. I'll never
Speaker 1: forget that feeling, the world opening up again, the gratitude
Speaker 1: so heavy it almost knocked me off my feet. Most
Speaker 1: parents with a child in the nic you get that moment,
Speaker 1: But in twenty fifteen, at the Countess of Chester Hospital,
Speaker 1: some never did. The historic heart of Chester is like
Speaker 1: a time capsule, filled with everything you expect from a
Speaker 1: very old, very storied British city, cobbled streets, pubs dating
Speaker 1: back to medieval times, an imposing stone cathedral and an
Speaker 1: honest to goodness castle Tucked in one corner, all surrounded
Speaker 1: by a great, big, fortified wall. Right at the edge
Speaker 1: of Chester is the local hospital named after Princess Diana.
Speaker 1: It's called the Countess of Chester, which was one of
Speaker 1: the titles she got when she married King Charles.
Speaker 2: But the history of the site where.
Speaker 1: The hospital was built isn't, shall we say, quite as
Speaker 1: illustrious as the stuff in the old city center.
Speaker 3: The Countess of Chester originally was built on the site
Speaker 3: of a Victorian mental asylum.
Speaker 1: That's Michelle Warden. She used to work at the Countess
Speaker 1: of Chester as a neonatal nurse. She started a few
Speaker 1: years after Charles and Diana's royal visit.
Speaker 2: Speaking of which.
Speaker 1: The hospital built itself doesn't exactly live up to its
Speaker 1: regal name. It's, you know, a hospital. It looks like
Speaker 1: a hospital built in the seventies. You can probably picture it, unfussy, functional,
Speaker 1: lots of concrete. But this run of the mill building
Speaker 1: and what happened inside has for the past decade been
Speaker 1: at the center of the latest big chapter in the
Speaker 1: history of Chester. In fact, many believe that what happened
Speaker 1: here is one of the biggest things to have happened
Speaker 1: in the history of modern Britain. The country just hasn't
Speaker 1: settled on what that thing is. History is still being written.
Speaker 4: They clearly felt that she's one of Britain's most notorious.
Speaker 5: Killers what to do about a trial which, in my
Speaker 5: view is a clear mischaracter justice by a judicial system
Speaker 5: that could not manage.
Speaker 1: I'm Amanda not and from Vespucci and iHeart podcasts. This
Speaker 1: is doubt the case of Lucy Leppie episode two, The Countess.
Speaker 2: Back in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 1: When you arrive at the Countess, that's how a lot
Speaker 1: of people refer to it. By the way, the Countess,
Speaker 1: one of the first things you'll see is a short,
Speaker 1: stocky building to your left. That was the women and
Speaker 1: Children's building.
Speaker 3: I mean, the women and Children's department. Hospital was designed for,
Speaker 3: as it says, women and children. So you've got a
Speaker 3: pediatric ward, you have in the natal ward, you have
Speaker 3: all the maternity.
Speaker 1: Michelle again, she spent so many years in this building,
Speaker 1: she could probably recite the layout in her sleep.
Speaker 3: You've got fetal medicine unit, anti natal, postnatal, guynecology, you've
Speaker 3: got operating theaters, infertility. Anything to do with women and
Speaker 3: children is within that building.
Speaker 1: But a lot has changed since Michelle first started working
Speaker 1: there in many important ways, some for the better and
Speaker 1: some for the worse.
Speaker 3: It wasn't until the mid nineteen nineties, with the development
Speaker 3: of a drug which helps to develop premature baby's lungs.
Speaker 3: That really revolutionized the care of these sick and premature babies.
Speaker 1: Though new drugs helped the infants breathe easier, the same
Speaker 1: couldn't be said for the facilities. By the time Michelle
Speaker 1: retired in two thousand and seven, the women and Children's
Speaker 1: building itself was coughing and spluttering.
Speaker 3: It was a lovely unit, but it was old, and
Speaker 3: with any old building, it had its problems which were
Speaker 3: always going on. I went to work on the unit
Speaker 3: in ninety ten, eighty eight, and where and tear was
Speaker 3: beginning to show. Even back then, problems with the plumbing,
Speaker 3: the sinks and the taps sometimes not working properly.
Speaker 1: The plumbing system had recycled the Victorian pipes in the
Speaker 1: foundation from the ground's mental asylum days, sewage would back
Speaker 1: up into the sinks. It would also leak from the
Speaker 1: pipes overhead onto the incubators. This was a chronically underfunded unit,
Speaker 1: and often the maintenance crew was forced to improvise. One
Speaker 1: maintenance worker described to the Telegraph newspaper a time he
Speaker 1: and his colleagues had to pad the ceiling tiles with
Speaker 1: diaper lining. A last ditch effort to stem the flow
Speaker 1: of literal shit from the pipes overhead. There was never
Speaker 1: enough time or money to put out all the fires.
Speaker 1: By the summer of twenty fifteen, the hospital had been
Speaker 1: begging the public for help, pleading for donations.
Speaker 6: She's raising money for the Countess of Chester. Does Baby
Speaker 6: Grow a pail launched to raise.
Speaker 4: Three million pounds to build a new neo natal special
Speaker 4: Baby Kay unit to provide.
Speaker 1: Everyone threw themselves into the effort, racing rubber duckies on
Speaker 1: the River Dee, charging down the streets of Chester in
Speaker 1: Santa costumes, and gamely taking part in goofy dance videos
Speaker 1: like the one with the pediatrician in charge of the unit,
Speaker 1: doctor Stephen Breery, shaking his hips to the tune of
Speaker 1: Twist and Shout and making heart shapes with his hands,
Speaker 1: all for the cause.
Speaker 6: On behalf of.
Speaker 7: The doctors and nurses that work in Chester on the
Speaker 7: neonatal unit.
Speaker 2: That's him. Doctor Breery would.
Speaker 7: Like to express my sinceres thanks be very kind donation.
Speaker 1: Soft spoken, self effacing, Doctor Breery had that pillar of
Speaker 1: the community vibe to him. But the real poster boy
Speaker 1: the pediatric team was doctor Breery's close friend doctor Rovi Jayram.
Speaker 1: He was thin and sprightly with a shock of curly
Speaker 1: black hair. The local papers called him the TV doctor and.
Speaker 3: Doctor Rabi Jerram is with us now because we're going
Speaker 3: to talk about this a little bit.
Speaker 8: Mind j If I'm a consultant pediatrician and I've worked
Speaker 8: for the NHS all.
Speaker 1: My career, consultant is the most senior rank of doctor
Speaker 1: in the UK. You'll be hearing that word a lot
Speaker 1: in this series. Doctor Jayram was a consultant and just
Speaker 1: so we're all on the same page. NHS stands for
Speaker 1: National Health Service. It's the UK system of free healthcare
Speaker 1: for all. Making it to consultant level took a long
Speaker 1: time and a ton of work. But through all those
Speaker 1: sleep deprived years, doctor Jayram never forgot to nurture his
Speaker 1: first love, showbiz. He busked on the streets of Chester
Speaker 1: as a teen, shot his shot at the Edinburgh Fringe
Speaker 1: Festival in college, and became a mainstay of British game shows,
Speaker 1: all while coming up the ranks in medicine.
Speaker 3: This is your third appearance.
Speaker 1: It is yes, that's him on the weakest link. He
Speaker 1: actually won at one point.
Speaker 8: Anything else I indulge in the occasional karaoke.
Speaker 6: Puts your board down?
Speaker 5: What can you sing?
Speaker 8: I could do honky Tonk Women by the Rolling Stones
Speaker 8: in tribute to you.
Speaker 2: Well, I doubt whether you can, but you can try.
Speaker 3: Have you started it?
Speaker 8: I met a Jinsea barn queen in Memphis.
Speaker 4: She tried to take me upstairs.
Speaker 3: For a ride.
Speaker 1: In his downtime, Doctor Jayram played local gigs with his
Speaker 1: band The Diluted. Here they are at the Cavern, a
Speaker 1: live music spot in Liverpool where The Diluted were a
Speaker 1: regular attraction.
Speaker 3: He's actually got a good singing voice and he is
Speaker 3: very theatrical. I actually asked him why he didn't pursue
Speaker 3: a career in drama and he said, well, that's not
Speaker 3: what nice Indian boys do, is that? I mean? His
Speaker 3: father was a consultant, his brother is a very eminent
Speaker 3: consultant ophthalmologist in London.
Speaker 1: But doctor jerm found a way to make his medical
Speaker 1: career and his rockstar ambitions work for him. In the
Speaker 1: summer of twenty fifteen, he was co starring in a
Speaker 1: reality TV show called Born Naughty, where he and a
Speaker 1: fellow doctor met parents of badly behaved children and decided
Speaker 1: if a medical diagnosis was the answer to their problems.
Speaker 4: As a pediatrician and a GP.
Speaker 2: Dr Ravi and Dr Dawn often meet badly.
Speaker 5: Behave kids, but now they must crack some real hard nuts.
Speaker 1: He spent the early part of that summer criss crossing
Speaker 1: the country doing promo or his reality show, as well
Speaker 1: as other media work. He seemed to be everywhere except
Speaker 1: perhaps the understaffed neonatal unit at the Countess of Chester Hospital.
Speaker 2: But just as the.
Speaker 1: Future is looking bright, something terrible starts unfolding in the
Speaker 1: neonatal unit. It won't be long before the unit is
Speaker 1: demanding all of doctor jay Rum's attention. There will be
Speaker 1: little time left for show business. In the UK, not
Speaker 1: every nick you is the same. Neonatal units are graded
Speaker 1: level one through three, depending on what level of care
Speaker 1: they are equipped to provide. Jenny Harris, who spent years
Speaker 1: as a neonatal nurse in the NHS, helped me out
Speaker 1: understand what those levels actually mean.
Speaker 9: If your hospital has a Level one nionatal unit, that
Speaker 9: means that you can just care for babies that just
Speaker 9: need feeding and growing, maybe a little help with respiratory support,
Speaker 9: but only like minor respiratory support like oxygen.
Speaker 2: Then you have your level two unit.
Speaker 9: They can also take high dependency babies, so these are
Speaker 9: babies that need safe seapap, may need fluids, premature babies
Speaker 9: up to a certain gestation. And then your level three
Speaker 9: unit is the unit that does everything so special care,
Speaker 9: high dependency, all intensive care, babies, whatever they may need.
Speaker 9: And what they do is say there is a baby
Speaker 9: and a Level one unit that needs to go to
Speaker 9: a Level three, then in the transport team would go
Speaker 9: to that baby, stabilize the baby, and take it to
Speaker 9: the hospital that's more equipped to care for that baby.
Speaker 1: Jenny worked on the transfer team. She spent years moving
Speaker 1: tiny patients from one hospital to another, from one level
Speaker 1: of care to the next. The Countess of Chester was
Speaker 1: a Level two unit.
Speaker 9: My favorite was going to the Level ones and the
Speaker 9: Level twos because they were so cozy, quiet. They're all
Speaker 9: decorated nice, and you know, got pictures on the walls
Speaker 9: and selling knitted stuff and a little trolley, like it's
Speaker 9: just so lovely. You just go in and it's just, yeah,
Speaker 9: it just seems more homely.
Speaker 1: For the parents. The nick Yu is both terrifying and miraculous.
Speaker 1: It's where the smallest lives fight their biggest battles. A
Speaker 1: place of constant fear, yes, but also of hope. The
Speaker 1: Unit of the Countess in summer twenty fifteen, like many
Speaker 1: across the UK, is worn and cozy. It cares for
Speaker 1: premature babies, babies who struggle to breathe, to feed, to grow,
Speaker 1: and it isn't known for high death rates. From twenty
Speaker 1: eleven to twenty fourteen, two or three babies died there
Speaker 1: each year. On paper it was unremarkable. It's early June
Speaker 1: and a set of twins has just been born. They're premature, tiny,
Speaker 1: but breathing. Their mother has a rare autoimmune condition which
Speaker 1: made her pregnancy risky. At seven months, her twins are
Speaker 1: born by sea section and whisked away to the neonatal unit.
Speaker 1: Here's Michelle again, the nurse that worked at the Countess.
Speaker 3: They were supposed to be born in London and the
Speaker 3: mum had antiphosphilipid syndrome, so they delivered her inesca.
Speaker 1: The twins are placed in adjoining cots, tubes for feeding,
Speaker 1: wires for monitoring in place of their mother's heartbeat, They
Speaker 1: now hear something else. Monitors footsteps hushed voices, the unfamiliar
Speaker 1: rhythms of the neonatal unit take over. Unlike many American hospitals,
Speaker 1: where parents can stay around the clock, UK neonatal units
Speaker 1: are often more nurse led, parents come and go, care
Speaker 1: continues through the night, and like so many parents in
Speaker 1: a neonatal ward, the twins' parents were most likely offered
Speaker 1: gentle reassurance, the kind meant to steady you when everything
Speaker 1: feels uncertain.
Speaker 2: They just need a little more time. They're in the
Speaker 2: best place.
Speaker 1: I remember hearing a version of that myself when my
Speaker 1: daughter was in hospital. We have our best people on it.
Speaker 1: You're doing great. No promises, no guarantees, just something soft
Speaker 1: enough to hold onto. But when nothing feels certain, you
Speaker 1: hold onto hope and trust. But for the parents of
Speaker 1: these twins, that trust became heavy the moment the alarm sounded.
Speaker 1: Something is wrong. Their baby boy's condition has deteriorated. Suddenly,
Speaker 1: hours later, they're holding him, but not in the way
Speaker 1: they had hoped. In a later victim impact statement, his
Speaker 1: parents would describe how quote, we never got to hold
Speaker 1: our little boy while he was alive. Doctor Jayram was
Speaker 1: there that night. There was no clear answer he could
Speaker 1: give the parents. Years later, during his testimony during Lucy
Speaker 1: let Be's trial, doctor Jayram would recall the awful conversation
Speaker 1: he had to have with the parents that night. It
Speaker 1: was a difficult situation, he'd say, when the first thing
Speaker 1: you have to tell a family is that number one,
Speaker 1: I'm not sure what's going on, and number two, I
Speaker 1: don't think we're going to be able to bring him back.
Speaker 1: With their daughters still in intensive care, the parents were
Speaker 1: forced to do the impossible to grieve one child while
Speaker 1: hoping for.
Speaker 2: The other baby.
Speaker 1: A's nurse, Lucy let Be makes them a memory box,
Speaker 1: a lock of hair, a footprint, a tiny knitted Years later,
Speaker 1: in a court of law, these mementos would take on
Speaker 1: a very different meaning. One day later, the alarm sounds again.
Speaker 1: This time their daughter, the surviving twin, has collapsed. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: the doctors intervene in time. Neonatal medicine is a world
Speaker 1: built on watchfulness. Doctors and nurses are used to things
Speaker 1: changing suddenly, to alarms, to emergencies, to living in a
Speaker 1: constant state of readiness. Because these babies are fragile, unbelievably fragile.
Speaker 2: Here's Jenny again.
Speaker 9: There's so many things that can go wrong with preterm babies.
Speaker 3: This so sensitive.
Speaker 9: Even change in their nappy can cause them to have
Speaker 9: a bleed on their brain. People just don't realize how
Speaker 9: sensitive these babies are. That's very rare, but it can happen.
Speaker 2: Most days.
Speaker 1: They managed to pull babies back from the edge, and
Speaker 1: then there are the days that stay with them forever.
Speaker 1: What happened during those forty eight hours left the nurses
Speaker 1: and doctors on the unit in shock. Of course, these
Speaker 1: twins had names, but because the courts ruled that none
Speaker 1: of the names of the babies in this case could
Speaker 1: ever be made public, they came to be known as
Speaker 1: Baby A and Baby B. One day, the UK justice
Speaker 1: system would officially recognize Baby A as the first known
Speaker 1: victim of a serial killer nurse.
Speaker 2: Now, I want to be careful here.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me to truly grasp what these parents
Speaker 1: lived through, although I myself have experienced what it's like
Speaker 1: to have a newborn in the hospital. To then be
Speaker 1: told that the person you trusted with your baby's life
Speaker 1: may have been the one who took it. It's unimaginable
Speaker 1: and yet, regardless of where the truth ultimately lies, this
Speaker 1: is the reality these parents have been living inside. When
Speaker 1: I spoke to doctor Phil Hammond, you may remember from
Speaker 1: episode one we discussed the power of grief, how it
Speaker 1: forces one to search for answers and for the parents.
Speaker 2: In this case, the.
Speaker 10: Parents' supportive by the laws is still absolutely convinced of
Speaker 10: her guilt because they've spent so much of their life
Speaker 10: invested in this. Imagine the emotion of the verdict to
Speaker 10: all that stuff.
Speaker 1: Tragically, four days after baby B collapses, Baby C dies
Speaker 1: a boy, and eight days after that a baby girl
Speaker 1: Baby D. Three deaths and one unexplained collapse in two weeks.
Speaker 1: Even on a unit where the babies are compromised, this
Speaker 1: was unusual. The staff tended to see three baby deaths
Speaker 1: a year.
Speaker 2: Three and two weeks was a crisis.
Speaker 1: By the end of that summer, the NIKU at the
Speaker 1: Countess would be forever changed. There were more collapses, more funerals.
Speaker 1: Parents brought in balloons for milestones, only to leave with condolences,
Speaker 1: and quietly a question began to swirl amongst the staff,
Speaker 1: why is this happening?
Speaker 4: So I remember within the hospital, within the our team
Speaker 4: at handover, it was a regular topic of conversation.
Speaker 1: These are the words of doctor Rachel Lamby read by
Speaker 1: an actor. They are from transcripts of her testifying at
Speaker 1: a public inquiry which was set up right after Lucy
Speaker 1: Leppi's conviction. This inquiry had a very specific mandate to
Speaker 1: figure out if let Be the serial killer could have
Speaker 1: been stopped sooner. Back in twenty fifteen, doctor Lamby was
Speaker 1: still a doctor in training. In England, doctors in training
Speaker 1: are referred to as registrars or junior doctors. Doctor Lambey
Speaker 1: was one of the first people on the scene when
Speaker 1: Baby A's alarm went off. She was there the next
Speaker 1: night too, when his twin sister, Baby Be collapsed. By
Speaker 1: the time Baby C and D die, everyone is on
Speaker 1: high alert. Here's an actor again reading a section of
Speaker 1: testimony from doctor Lamby during the inquiry.
Speaker 4: I remember, on more than one occasion almost a heart
Speaker 4: sink feeling of Oh gosh, what's going to happen today?
Speaker 1: In this moment of crisis, a fissure begins to form.
Speaker 1: Amongst the staff. On one side are the registrars and
Speaker 1: the nurses. They're looking to the senior doctors in charge,
Speaker 1: the consultants for answers.
Speaker 2: On the other.
Speaker 1: Side are the consultants. There are seven of them together.
Speaker 1: They're responsible for all of the children who pass through
Speaker 1: the building, from the most premature of babies to the
Speaker 1: seventeen year old with a broken leg. Doctor jayram leads
Speaker 1: the pediatric department and doctor Breary the neonatal unit.
Speaker 2: The consultants don't have.
Speaker 1: Any answers for the sudden spate of baby deaths, but
Speaker 1: they also don't want the rest of the staff to
Speaker 1: think they don't have this under control.
Speaker 11: Dear aw Rachel Lambi came to see me this morning.
Speaker 1: This is how one of the consultants, doctor John Gibbs,
Speaker 1: begins an email to the six others the day after
Speaker 1: Babyde's death. Here's an actor reading what he wrote.
Speaker 11: The registrars are very concerned about the recent neonatal deaths
Speaker 11: and collapses. Rachel also said that all the neonatal nurses
Speaker 11: are very worried. They feel we ought to be doing something.
Speaker 11: Although I've mentioned we are looking into this, I'm not
Speaker 11: sure exactly how this is being done. I think a
Speaker 11: meeting would be useful, even if we have no answers.
Speaker 1: In an effort to put the others at ease, Doctor
Speaker 1: Breerry says that he and the head of the neonatal
Speaker 1: nursing team have carefully gone over the details of the
Speaker 1: three recent deaths to see if there's anything connecting them.
Speaker 1: But as he would tell the BBC years later, there.
Speaker 7: Was nothing in common that we could pin this three
Speaker 7: deaths on.
Speaker 1: Well, maybe there is one thing. Doctor Breery has gone
Speaker 1: through the work schedule for the nurses and notices one
Speaker 1: nurse who has been on duty when all three babies died.
Speaker 7: Stuffing analysis did identify that lucy let Be was on
Speaker 7: shift for those three episodes.
Speaker 1: A pattern starts to emerge. In August, a fourth baby dies,
Speaker 1: lucy let Be was his nurse. In September, lucy let
Speaker 1: Be is on duty when one of two babies die.
Speaker 1: In October, another baby, lucy let Be is on duty again,
Speaker 1: in December another and again lucy let Be was there
Speaker 1: eight deaths by the end of the year, lucy let
Speaker 1: Be is present for seven. For or Breery, what could
Speaker 1: be dismissed at first as mere correlation is hardening into
Speaker 1: a strong basis for suspicion.
Speaker 5: I'd like to speak to the families. Sorry, Sorry for
Speaker 5: my part in not being able to protect your babies.
Speaker 5: I tried my best, and I acknowledged that at times
Speaker 5: my best was not good enough.
Speaker 1: That's an actor reading from transcripts of doctor Breery testifying
Speaker 1: at the inquiry about a year and a half ago.
Speaker 1: He looks much older now, older perhaps than you might
Speaker 1: expect the rosy cheeked doctor in the light hearted fundraising
Speaker 1: videos to be. The toll of the last ten years
Speaker 1: is clearly visible in his appearance. Doctor Breery was the
Speaker 1: first of the consultants to notice a correlation between Lucy
Speaker 1: let Bey's workshifts and the deaths of babies. The way
Speaker 1: he says he remembers it, it had actually been the
Speaker 1: head of the neonatal Nurses, Arian Powell, who had pointed
Speaker 1: the correlation out to him, and that his instinctive reaction
Speaker 1: had been to say, oh, no, not Lucy, not nice Lucy.
Speaker 2: He was asked about this at the inquiry.
Speaker 6: Well, your mind jumped to something to say, oh, no,
Speaker 6: didn't it?
Speaker 5: Yes? What did it jump to the concern that there
Speaker 5: might be somebody harming babies?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: As the number of deaths kept climbing and Lucy let
Speaker 1: Be kept being there when they happened, the association, as
Speaker 1: he would take to calling it, would come to dominate
Speaker 1: doctor Breery's mind. It would also put him at loggerheads
Speaker 1: with the nursing leader, who he had said had originally
Speaker 1: pointed out the association to him, and who.
Speaker 2: Was Lucy let Be's boss.
Speaker 1: To the nursing leader, Arian Powell, the correlation with let
Speaker 1: Be's shifts told them nothing about why these babies had died.
Speaker 1: In an email to doctor Breery after yet another death,
Speaker 1: she wrote, it is unfortunate that she was on. However,
Speaker 1: each cause of death was different. Some were poorly prior
Speaker 1: to their arrival on the unit.
Speaker 4: There was no evidence there.
Speaker 6: Your evidence was the commonality well, dead children.
Speaker 4: Yes.
Speaker 1: As more and more babies die, there are more meetings
Speaker 1: and more reviews by Breery and Powell. These discussions grow
Speaker 1: to include others, the nursing manager for the whole hospital,
Speaker 1: a neonatologist from a top hospital in Liverpool who is
Speaker 1: friends with doctor Breery, but always with Breery and Powell
Speaker 1: arguing from opposite ends, which Powell was grilled about at
Speaker 1: the inquiry.
Speaker 6: Lety was protected because she occupied an intersection between two things.
Speaker 6: She was a nurse who was being criticized by the doctors,
Speaker 6: and she was a nurse who you liked, and that's
Speaker 6: why she was protected, isn't it?
Speaker 4: I think ill mistaken liking with actually supporting your staff.
Speaker 1: Powell points to other factors. Several of the babies had
Speaker 1: unsurvivable birth defects. Many others had serious worsening infections.
Speaker 2: By the time they died.
Speaker 1: All but one of the babies had autopsies, none of
Speaker 1: which flagged anything suspicious.
Speaker 2: In those meeting rooms.
Speaker 1: Two stories kept colliding, and for a long time the
Speaker 1: discussions continued. But then in June twenty sixteen, just over
Speaker 1: a year since the death of Baby A, a set
Speaker 1: of triplet brothers are born at the Countess. They've been
Speaker 1: naturally conceived and are identical, sharing the same placenta, an
Speaker 1: incredibly rare thing, the kind of thing that only happens
Speaker 1: once every two hundred million births. The triplets are born
Speaker 1: at thirty three weeks by c section and sent straight
Speaker 1: to the neonatal unit. Their parents are told not to worry,
Speaker 1: the babies just need some time to grow. But on
Speaker 1: the brother's second day of life, their parents are confronted
Speaker 1: with a scene of total chaos. One of the triplets
Speaker 1: is having a very serious medical crisis.
Speaker 2: His stomach is swollen.
Speaker 1: His dad would later say during his testimony in court
Speaker 1: that it was like et stomach, like a pot belly.
Speaker 1: The doctors tell the parents that they don't know what's
Speaker 1: going on, but they are trying their best to save him.
Speaker 1: At one point, the dad would recall it was like
Speaker 1: they were trying anything. The doctors aren't able to save him,
Speaker 1: and the baby boy dies. The next day, the second
Speaker 1: of the triplets die in a scene so similar and
Speaker 1: chaotic to the day before that the mother during the
Speaker 1: trial would later describe it as deja vus. She would
Speaker 1: remember a young doctor quote googling what to do. In
Speaker 1: two days, two of their babies have died. The parents
Speaker 1: plead to have their surviving son transferred to a different
Speaker 1: hospital for doctor Breary.
Speaker 2: It was obvious what had happened.
Speaker 1: Lucy Letby had murdered both boys. She'd been on duty
Speaker 1: both days and been put in charge of both babies.
Speaker 1: Doctor Breery would later tell the police about the way
Speaker 1: Lucy let Be had smiled and said hello to him
Speaker 1: the morning before the first triplet had died. He would
Speaker 1: wonder out loud if she'd been taunting him. After these
Speaker 1: two deaths, the management knew they had to make changes.
Speaker 1: There was no more discussion to be had.
Speaker 4: After this incident.
Speaker 6: After the deaths of Owen p Yes murders, we now know.
Speaker 1: They agreed to get let Be off the unit. She
Speaker 1: shipped off to a back office in another department at
Speaker 1: the hospital and given an excuse to cover up the
Speaker 1: real reason for the move that all the neonatal nurses
Speaker 1: would be moved out for a period of time and
Speaker 1: she was just the first one up. So the consultants
Speaker 1: get what they want, Lucy let Be off the unit,
Speaker 1: But the hospital executives aren't finished. They too are concerned
Speaker 1: about the spike and baby deaths, but think the explanation
Speaker 1: lies elsewhere. They see an overburdened unit and believe they
Speaker 1: should hit the pause button on taking in so many babies,
Speaker 1: especially ones that are so vulnerable. The managers agree to
Speaker 1: remove let Be on the condition that the unit also
Speaker 1: be downgraded.
Speaker 3: They downgraded the unit to a Level one, which was
Speaker 3: in June twenty sixteen. A Level one unit is basically
Speaker 3: just special care, so you're not taking any sick babies
Speaker 3: at all. You do, of course, always still get sick
Speaker 3: babies because you can't predict what's coming into the maternity doors.
Speaker 1: But the sickest babies and the ones who are especially
Speaker 1: premature would now be transferred to bigger, more specialized hospitals
Speaker 1: straight after birth.
Speaker 3: It's really frustrating for me when I hear people saying, well,
Speaker 3: after that they took Lucy off, there was no more deaths. Well,
Speaker 3: that's true, but there was no more sick babies either.
Speaker 1: On top of this, management invites the medical body responsible
Speaker 1: for all pediatric care in the United Kingdom to come
Speaker 1: in and investigate. These are not easy compromises for the doctors.
Speaker 1: Downgrading the unit would be a hit to their reputation
Speaker 1: and they worry they will lose skills. They also feel
Speaker 1: they already had an answer for why so many babies
Speaker 1: are dying in their unit. Lucy let Be was murdering them.
Speaker 1: This didn't need more medical reviews, it needed the police.
Speaker 1: Despite the consultants' allegations that Lucy let Be was on
Speaker 1: shift for each death, the review finds those beliefs to
Speaker 1: be based on gut feelings. The report states that quote,
Speaker 1: there was there's no other evidence or history to link
Speaker 1: nurse l to the deaths, and her colleagues had expressed
Speaker 1: no concerns about her practice. This was a subjective view,
Speaker 1: with no other evidence or reports of clinical concerns about
Speaker 1: the nurse beyond the simple correlation end quote. Rather than
Speaker 1: supporting the doctor's suspicions, the final report points out other
Speaker 1: issues that needed to be dealt with on the understaffed, underfunded,
Speaker 1: and overwhelmed unit. For the consultants, things seemed to go
Speaker 1: from bad to worse. Lucy let Be eventually finds out
Speaker 1: why she's been suddenly removed from the unit because the
Speaker 1: consultants thought she was murdering babies. She files a grievance
Speaker 1: saying the hospital has not been honest about the reason
Speaker 1: for her redeployment and that the doctors had bullied and
Speaker 1: harassed her. She wins that grievance, the doctors are forced
Speaker 1: to apologize to her. They are told that she will
Speaker 1: be coming back. That is more than they can accept.
Speaker 1: The same month that Lucy let Be is set to return,
Speaker 1: doctor Jayram asks for a meeting with the head of HR,
Speaker 1: and in that meeting he tells her a hair raising
Speaker 1: tail that changed everything.
Speaker 8: That is a night that is etched on my memory
Speaker 8: and will be in my nightmares forever.
Speaker 1: This is doctor Jayram on ITV news, describing how he
Speaker 1: had once walked in on Lucy let Be trying to
Speaker 1: murder a baby.
Speaker 8: Part of me was saying, you better go in and
Speaker 8: just check it. Everything's okay, because you know what's happened
Speaker 8: before when Lucy's been on duty.
Speaker 1: It had happened a year earlier, but doctor Jayream hadn't
Speaker 1: told anybody in management until now. Lucy let Be was
Speaker 1: standing over a baby and the baby was struggling to breathe.
Speaker 1: As the baby was gasping for air, Lucy let Be
Speaker 1: was doing nothing to help.
Speaker 11: What was she doing there?
Speaker 8: What she was just standing there?
Speaker 1: This scene right out of a horror movie is finally
Speaker 1: enough to get the police involved.
Speaker 6: Lucy.
Speaker 7: Step.
Speaker 8: What was clear at that point was that Lucy let
Speaker 8: Be was the consistent in all that.
Speaker 4: She was the thread running through them all.
Speaker 1: That's next time on Doubt The Case of Lucy let Be.
Speaker 1: Doubt the Case of Lucy let Be is brought to
Speaker 1: you by Vespucci, iHeart Podcasts and Knox Robinson Productions. I've
Speaker 1: been your host Amanda knock Es. This episode was written
Speaker 1: by Joe Meek, Clucy De Olivera and Natalia Rodriguez The
Speaker 1: co producers were Clusy To Olivera and Lucy Ditchmond. Senior
Speaker 1: producer is Natalia Rodriguez. Audio mixed by Tom Biddle. The
Speaker 1: theme music was written by Tom Biddle, story editing by
Speaker 1: Kathleen Goldhar. Legal advice was provided by Jack Browning. The
Speaker 1: producers at iHeart Podcasts are Chandler Mays and Katrina Norville.
Speaker 1: The executive producers were Joe Meek, Amanda Knox, Christopher Robinson,
Speaker 1: Daniel Turkin, and Johnny Galvin.
Speaker 2: Thank you for listening.