Nurse Lucy Letby Killed 7 Newborns Under Her Care. Inside Her Life 3 Years After Her Controversial Sentencing

Lucy Letby received 15 life sentences in connection with the deaths of seven infants

NEED TO KNOW

• Lucy Letby was convicted in 2023 of murdering seven infants at a British hospital
• The former neonatal nurse was arrested after police accused her of giving the infants too much milk, air, insulin or fluid
• Letby is serving 15 life sentences at a high-security prison

Lucy Letby was working as a neonatal nurse at a British hospital when she was arrested for killing seven newborns.

In 2015, a senior doctor began to express concern over a higher number of unexplained infant deaths at the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester, England. Over the course of the next year, several other doctors and staff members also noticed a pattern.

The hospital noticed that Letby was the only staff member who was present for all of the infant deaths and she was fired in July 2016. Police began investigating the cases the following year.

Letby was arrested in 2020 and charged with murdering seven babies from 2015 to 2016 by giving the infants too much milk, air, insulin or fluid. A senior doctor later claimed that she likely killed and assaulted many more. 

“On reflection I think it’s likely that Letby didn’t start becoming a killer in June 2015, or didn’t start harming babies in June 2015,” consultant pediatrician Stephen Brearey said during a November 2024 public inquiry, per the BBC. “I think it’s likely that her actions prior to then, over a period of time changed what we perceived to be abnormal.”

She pleaded not guilty to all counts and was convicted in August 2023. The former nurse was ultimately handed 15 life sentences, which she started appealing the following month.

So, where is Lucy Letby now? Here’s everything to know about the British nurse convicted of killing multiple babies.  

Who is Lucy Letby?

Letby is a former neonatal nurse who worked at the Countess of Chester Hospital in England. She started her job in 2011, and up until January 2015, the deaths in her ward were statistically comparable to other hospitals. 

Between 2015 and 2016, prosecutor Nick Johnson claimed that there was a “significant rise” in deaths and “serious catastrophic collapses” among the babies in the ward. Consultants later alleged that those deaths were “not medically explicable and were the result of the actions of Lucy Letby.”

After being alerted to the nurse’s suspicious behavior, the Cheshire Constabulary started investigating the deaths in May 2017. Letby was arrested three times, once in 2018 and again in 2019, and was remanded in custody in 2020.  

What did Letby do?

Letby was accused of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill 10 more. Seven of the infants died as a result of excess milk, insulin, air or fluid. Some of the children allegedly survived multiple attacks before they died. 

“The collapses of all 17 children concerned were not ‘naturally occurring tragedies,’ ” Johnson told the jury during Letby’s trial in 2022, where she faced a total of 22 charges. “They were all the work, we say, of the woman in the dock, who we say was the constant, malevolent presence when things took a turn for the worse for these 17 children.”

Prosecutors argued that she overfed infants to the point of vomiting and injected air into some of their stomachs or bloodstreams. One of her surviving victims’ parents claimed that their child had “irreversible brain damage” and quadriplegic cerebral palsy due to being given excess milk and air. 

One former co-worker claimed that the former nurse told her off when she tried to assist her with a distressed infant. “I was shocked because you can’t have enough help in that situation,” Lisa Walker testified, per the BBC. “[I was] quite taken aback and shocked because it’s something you would not expect a nurse to say.”

The prosecution also presented conflicting handwritten notes investigators had found in Letby’s home, where she both seems to admit to the murders, writing that she “killed them on purpose,” and claim her innocence, noting that she hasn’t “done anything wrong.”

What was Letby’s sentence?

In August 2023, Letby was convicted of murdering seven infants and attempting to murder six others — 14 of her 22 counts.

The former neonatal nurse was given a total of 15 life sentences in July 2024, following a retrial over one child involved in her case. 

Is Letby appealing her case?

Letby started seeking permission to file an appeal against her convictions in September 2023, but the Court of Appeal in London rejected the bid in May 2024. 

The strength of Letby’s convictions has continued to be debated. During a February 2025 press conference held by her defense team, a group of top medical experts claimed to have found “significant new evidence” that the former nurse did not cause harm to any babies in her care.

Instead, they claimed that the infants died of “natural causes or errors in medical care,” The Guardian and BBC reported.  

That same month, Letby sent an application to the Criminal Cases Review Commission, an independent body that reviews potential miscarriages of justice.

In June 2025, three former senior staff members at Countess of Chester Hospital were arrested on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter as part of the Cheshire Constabulary’s ongoing investigation into the babies’ deaths. The investigation into the hospital remains ongoing.

In January 2026, after the Cheshire Police submitted evidence for nine more infant deaths they alleged were orchestrated by Letby, the Crown Prosecution Service declined to press any more charges against the former nurse, per the BBC.

Where is Letby now?

Letby has been incarcerated at HMP Low Newton in Durham, England, since her conviction in 2023.

According to The Guardian, the high-security prison is home to some of Britain’s most notable criminals, including Joanna Dennehy, the first woman in Britain to receive a life sentence.

Netflix’s February 2026 documentary, The Investigation of Lucy Letby, shed new light on her trial. Ahead of the premiere, Letby’s parents, Susan and John, alleged to The Guardian that they were not informed that some of the unseen footage in the documentary shows their longtime home.

“The previous programs made about Lucy, including Panorama and the almost nightly news showing her being brought out handcuffed in a blue tracksuit, are heartbreaking for us,” they said in a statement. “However, this Netflix documentary is on another level.”

The parents said they would “not watch it,” as it would “likely kill us if we did.”

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