Britain’s worst child murderer is only the fourth female defendant in our history facing a whole life sentence
www.telegraph.co.uk
19 Aug 2023
Five years have passed since Lucy Letby was first arrested at her home in Chester. Police banged on the door at 6am on a July morning in 2018, leading the killer nurse away in handcuffs as her father looked on.
Letby was remanded in custody after her third arrest in November 2020 and has been locked up ever since, spending a total of 1,012 days in four different prisons.
Penal experts predict that, due to the heinous nature of her crimes –
Letby was found guilty this week of murdering seven newborns and attempting to murder six others at the Countess of Chester Hospital between 2015 and 2016 – she will spend the rest of her life behind bars.
Unlike other prisoners serving life sentences, however, Letby is expected to be given a “whole life order” – making her only the fourth female defendant in British history to have no hope of parole.
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She joins the ranks of
Rose West, serial killer
Joanna Dennehy and the late Moors murderer
Myra Hindley, all notorious for their depraved, remorseless acts.
Whole life orders, explains Tom Nicholson, a leading criminal barrister at Two Harcourt Buildings, are extremely rare, especially among women.
“While an ordinary life sentence comes with a minimum term the prisoner must serve before they can be considered for release, a whole life order is different,” he said. “It means that they will never be released or considered for release, by order of the court.
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According to Ministry of Justice statistics, there are currently around 70 whole-life prisoners in this country, among them Milly Dowler killer
Levi Bellfield,
Michael Adebolajo, the man who murdered British soldier Lee Rigby,
Mark Bridger, who abducted and murdered five-year-old April Jones, and
Wayne Couzens, the ex-police officer who kidnapped, raped and killed Sarah Everard in 2021.
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“She’ll be what’s known as a ‘restricted status’ prisoner: the female equivalent of Category A,” he explained. “She’ll be on suicide watch and it will be some time before she gets to mingle with the main prison population – at least six months.”
Initially, he explained, Letby will be kept in the hospital wing of the prison – to assess her mental and physical health, as well as her safety from other prisoners – before being moved to a cell on her own.
“Her life for much of the next few years is going to be a lonely one. She’ll associate mostly with prison officers, her key worker in the prison and one or two cleaners – but much of that interaction will be through the hatch in her cell door.
“She won’t be able to do much, other than read newspapers or books and watch TV. She’ll get one hour of exercise by herself each day. She will be able to phone her family and receive visits from them, but the police will have to vet them first.”
Though Letby’s parents, Susan and John, attended every day of her nine-month trial at Manchester Crown Court, HMP Bronzefield is 212 miles – almost a four-hour drive – from the family home in Chester, making regular visits difficult.
Prof Jewkes said the main focus for the next few years will be Letby’s safety. “She may well have a price on her head. At best, she’ll be subjected to extreme bullying and intimidation. At worst, she might be in quite considerable physical danger.
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