Was British nurse Lucy Letby wrongly convicted of mass murder?

In 2023, neonatal nurse Lucy Letby was convicted of murdering seven newborn babies and attempting to murder seven others while working at a hospital in the English city of Chester.

New Zealand filmmaker and producer Charlotte Purdy's research into the case was the springboard for the highly successful Channel 4 documentary Lucy Letby, Murder or Mistake. She hopes it will help drive an appeal for Letby, which, if successful, would have "huge" implications for England's National Health Service and the police.

"It'll bring the house down because it will show the flaws in the justice system that can lead to an innocent nurse being in prison," she tells RNZ's Jim Mora.

After hearing Letby's friends describe the former neonatal nurse as a kind, caring person, Purdy became curious about whether the 33-year-old was, in fact, guilty of murdering and attempting to murder babies at the Countess of Chester Hospital in 2015 and 2016.

Two years ago, she started researching the Letby case and put together a documentary proposal suggesting there might have been a miscarriage of justice.

Before the New Yorker questioned the evidence against Letby in a May 2024 article, many UK television networks rejected the documentary, Purdy says, but eventually Channel 4 signed up to make Lucy Letby, Murder or Mistake, on which she is credited as an associate producer.

Although she personally believes in Letby's innocence, Channel 4's documentary is "determinately even-handed", Purdy says.

"They chose to approach it with balance, whereas my initial proposal was to really go all in and show why this case is so problematic… I didn't go on to be really involved in the making of it because I was really coming from the angle that she could be innocent."

Letby, who'd had a difficult birth herself, was very grateful to the nurses who would have helped to save her life, Purdy says.

With close friends, including other nurses at the Countess of Chester Hospital, she liked salsa dancing and a glass of wine, and worked extra shifts to pay off the mortgage on her first home.

Judge James Goss's 2023 ruling that in 2015 Letby embarked on a "cruel, calculated and cynical campaign of child murder" was readily accepted by the UK press, Purdy says. But to the New Zealand filmmaker, the media coverage seemed "a bit hysterical".

"The vast range of ways that she was claimed to have murdered the babies… It actually reminded me of the Peter Ellis case and the Satanic Panic days."

Letby is currently serving 15 whole-life sentences for seven babies' deaths, but Purdy says 14 world-class neonatal experts have concluded the deaths actually resulted from "the precariousness of prematurity" coupled with the "tragic incompetence of a failing baby unit at the Countess of Chester Hospital".

"Many people in the UK now believe the justice system, the police and the NHS have failed, and a young woman is in prison as a result of that.

"It's my opinion and that of hundreds of other experts from around the world that this case is really built on a house of cards."

Letby's only hope of getting out of prison is via fresh evidence being presented to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC). Her lawyers do have new evidence, Purdy says, and the public pressure for an appeal is now "intense".

"I think that she will get another chance of an appeal. Internationally, all eyes are on Great Britain to sort this out and with some haste.

"It'll bring the house down because it will show the flaws in the justice system that can lead to an innocent nurse being in prison. The implications for the NHS, for the police, I think it's going to be huge. I really do."

Lucy Letby, Murder or Mistake will air in New Zealand within the next 12 months, Purdy says.