How evil Lucy Letby formed sinister relationships with families of babies she murdered
KILLER nurse Lucy Letby formed sinister relationships with the grieving families of the babies she murdered – telling one distraught mum “Trust me, I’m a nurse”.
The killer, 33, took locks of hair from her victims and even stalked their parents on Facebook.
She made a memory box for the heartbroken mum and dad of a little boy she killed just 90 minutes after starting her first shift back from a hen party.
She injected air into Baby A’s tiny body on June 8, 2015, before trying to murder his twin sister the next day.
Letby put together “keepsakes” for the baby’s parents, which included a lock of hair, photographs, as well as hand and footprints.
The nurse even feigned heartbreak in sick messages sent to a colleague, telling her: “Both (Baby A and Baby B) baptised together.
“Camera given and photographs taken. Hand and footprints and a lock of hair taken.”
The colleague later told Letby – after she’d finished her shift – that the parents took the memory box home with them.
Letby responded: “Oh good. Hoped they would find comfort.”
Her internet history revealed that she had carried out repeated Facebook searches on Baby A’s heartbroken mother – the first of them the morning after his death.
During Letby’s trial police intelligence analyst Claire Hocknell told the jury Letby had carried out similar searches on numerous other parents.
Letby wrote a sympathy card to the grieving parents of one child who she tried to kill four times.
Baby I died October 23, 2015, after Letby injected air into her tiny 2lb 2oz body.
The card said: “There are no words to make this time any easier.
“It was a real privilege (sic) to care for (Child I) and get to know you as a family – a family who always put (Child I) first and did everything possible for her.
“She will always be a part of your lives and we will never forget her.
“Thinking of you today and always – sorry I cannot be there to say goodbye.
“Lots of love Lucy x”
During her trial, the jury heard how Letby had won the trust of the families she targeted.
The mum of Baby E recalled leaving her son with her, adding: “I trusted her completely.”
The woman had found her five-day-old child in extreme distress but was reassured enough to walk away and return to the postnatal ward.
Giving evidence at Manchester crown court, she said: “I could hear my son crying, and it was like nothing I’d heard before.
“It was more a scream than a cry – a sound that shouldn’t come from a tiny baby. It was horrendous.
“I walked over to the incubator to see blood coming out of his mouth.
“I was panicking because I felt like there was something wrong”.
Letby, who was in sole charge of Baby E, remained at a workstation to the side of his incubator as the mother tried to calm him and persuaded her to go back to the postnatal ward.
She’d told her: “Trust me, I’m a nurse.”
Asked by Nick Johnson, KC, prosecuting, why she did as Letby had told her, she replied: “Because she was in authority and she knew better than me – and I trusted her completely.
“The rules were ‘Go back upstairs and if there’s a problem I’ll call you’.
That was Lucy Letby. I followed the rules.”
Mr Johnson KC said that the baby’s mum had interrupted Letby as she was attacking the child, adding: “She did not realise it at the time.”
After murdering the newborn, Letby had then asked the mother whether she’d like to bathe him.
The mum said: “I was just broken and I couldn’t, so Lucy Letby bathed him in front of me.”