Guernsey Doctor Gave Evidence In Baby Killer Case

As Lucy Letby - the nurse who murdered seven babies - faces the rest of her life in prison, a Guernsey consultant paediatrician has commented on her involvement in the trial.

Dr Sandie Bohin was an expert witness for the prosecution during the case.

She gave evidence, wrote reports for the court and answered barristers' medical questions throughout the nine month long hearing at Manchester Crown Court.

She says her heart goes out to the families of the babies who died or were injured.

"These are families who thought they had very, very sadly lost their baby through natural causes and went through a grieving process for that, then years later the police knock on their door and say 'we don't think that's the case'. They have been through the most horrific and traumatic of times."

Letby, a 33-year-old neonatal nurse, was been found guilty of murdering seven babies at a hospital in Cheshire and attempting to kill six others over a one year period between 2015-2016.

Dr Bohin added that had hospital management acted more quickly on the concerns of doctors, lives could have been saved.

"If you suddenly get a change in what is normal for that unit, as a group of clinicians, you will ask questions as to why you think that may have happened and that's exactly what clinicians on that unit did.

At that stage, they didn't know what or who was responsible for it, they just knew that there was a problem that needed to be investigated.

They put their head above the parapet and flagged that to hospital management but were ignored for a period of time.

Once they had realised Lucy Letby was the common factor that needed further investigation, if things had been acted on at that stage, then the babies that came to harm after that could have been prevented.

I hope that things will change the way concerns from clinicians - whether they are medical or nursing or any other profession within the healthcare setting - are taken seriously by those in senior management rather than just rebuffed as these concerns were."

Letby refused to appear in court for her sentencing which families of the victims have called 'one final act of wickedness'.

Dr Bohin returned to her role as consultant paediatrician at the MSG in July 2023.