Letby inquiry: Hospital boss 'missed opportunity' to keep babies safe
by LIZ HULL · Mail OnlineA hospital boss admitted she 'missed an opportunity' to keep babies safe after doctors raised concerns Lucy Letby was killing them, an inquiry has heard.
Alison Kelly was the director of nursing at the Countess of Chester Hospital when the nurse attacked and murdered babies on the neonatal unit, between June 2015 and June 2016.
Ms Kelly agreed she failed to ask if Letby would be on duty over the weekend after the deaths of two triplets, who Letby killed on consecutive shifts, in June 2016.
The 34-year-old was allowed to work the next day and was accused of attempting to murder another baby boy, although the jury at her trial failed to reach a verdict in his case.
She was subsequently convicted of murdering seven babies and trying to kill seven more over a 13-month killing spree.
Ms Kelly claimed doctors were 'quite blasé' about the allegations, but denied that she didn't take them seriously or that she simply didn't believe them.
She agreed it was 'not unheard of' for a nurse to deliberately harm patients but said that it was 'not in the forefront of my mind'.
'I found it difficult to comprehend,' she said. 'As a director of nursing I was in charge of over nearly 1,000 nurses and midwives, the last thing on my mind would be a nurse deliberately harming children, babies or adults.'
She added: 'I recognise I didn't ask the specific question, 'is Letby working tomorrow'? On reflection I could have done something differently and maybe that was a missed opportunity.'
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Nicholas de la Poer, counsel for the Thirlwall Inquiry, said: 'So your actions did not include keeping babies safe?'
She replied: 'That's difficult to hear, but maybe I should have done something differently at that time.'
Mrs Kelly said she relied on Eirian Powell, the head of the neo-natal unit who was steadfast in her backing of Letby, for assurances and she had 'no clear answers' from the doctors who couldn't 'articulate' why they believed the nurse was harming children.
Letby was eventually moved off the unit in July 2016 into an administrative role, but hospital bosses opted to commission a series of reviews into the increased mortality rate and police were not called in to investigate until May 2017.
Explaining why police were not contacted in the summer of 2016, Ms Kelly said: 'I think we had a general conversation about the fact that we all personally needed to know and understand what was actually going on in our organisation so that we could clearly articulate to the police what the problems were.
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She also denied that a 'culture of fear' developed in the hospital because senior managers backed Letby and sided with nurses over the doctors.
Ms Kelly said: 'I would not say a culture of fear. I think there were challenges with the relationships, I think the trust had broken down and I think on reflection we could have done more to support the clinicians , certainly in a pastoral perspective.
'There was lots of engagement, it was just tense at times, which is why we gained advice from external agencies and the police eventually.'
Letby, 34, from Hereford, is serving 15 whole-life orders after she was convicted of being the UK's worst child serial killer at Manchester Crown Court in August last year. (2023)
The inquiry, sitting at Liverpool Town Hall before Lady Justice Thirlwall, is expected to sit until early 2025, with findings published by late autumn of that year.