Lucy Letby has right to attend convictions appeal hearing

The killer nurse was sentenced to 14 whole life orders after she was convicted of the murders of seven babies and the attempted murders of six others.

Lucy Letby (Cheshire Constabulary/PA) (PA Media)

Child serial killer Lucy Letby will have the right to attend her appeal against her convictions via video link if given the green light to challenge them at the Court of Appeal at the end of April.

Lawyers for Letby will ask senior judges for permission to bring an appeal against all her convictions at the hearing in London provisionally listed to start on April 22.

A judiciary spokesperson said on Wednesday: “The court has directed that it will hear Lucy Letby’s renewed application for leave to appeal and, if leave to appeal is granted, the substantive appeal, at the same hearing.

“The hearing is provisionally listed for three days: April 22, 23 and 25 2024.

“The applicant would be entitled to attend a hearing of the substantive appeal via video link and may ask the court’s permission to attend the renewed application.”

The nurse, 34, had an initial application to take forward her challenge refused by a single judge without a hearing in January.

But she is able to renew her efforts before a panel of three judges at the hearing in April.

If judges again decline to give permission or reject her challenge, it will mark the end of the appeal process for Letby.

In August 2023, Letby, of Hereford, was sentenced to 14 whole life orders after she was convicted of the murders of seven babies and the attempted murders of six others, with two attempts on one of her victims.

Letby refused to come up from her cell and attend her sentencing.

The offences took place at the Countess of Chester Hospital’s neonatal unit, where Letby worked as a nurse, between June 2015 and June 2016.

The jury in Letby’s trial at Manchester Crown Court was unable to reach verdicts on six counts of attempted murder in relation to five children.

She will face a retrial at the same court in June on a single count that she attempted to murder a baby girl, known as Child K, in February 2016.

A court order prohibits reporting of the identities of the surviving and dead children who were the subject of the allegations.