Sarah Vine admitted she always had ‘doubts’ about the conviction of murderous nurse Lucy Letby during a speech on the Mail’s chat show The Reaction.
Vine told viewers she had reservations about convicting the 34-year-old, who was found guilty of murdering seven children and attempting to murder seven others, because the evidence was largely “circumstantial.”
Presenter Peter Hitchens, appearing alongside the mother-of-two, admitted the trial was “riddled with assumptions about what could have happened” and disputed statistical claims.
Hitchens questioned whether it was possible that the babies’ deaths “were not the result of murder,” adding that the supposed methods Letby used to kill them were “fundamentally hypothetical.”
The Reaction hosts discussed the Letby case as pundits and media once again questioned her innocence. This came just weeks after she was found guilty in a retrial of attempted murder of a seventh baby, Baby K.
Lucy Letby, 34, was convicted last year of murdering seven premature babies and attempting to kill six others at the English hospital where she worked. This photo was taken in 2012, three years before Letby’s killing spree began
Speaking about the case, Vine said: ‘Okay, this week there’s been a whole upsurge in the Lucy Letby case. You’re fascinating about this. Tell me what you think.’
‘I mean, I actually asked the question back in September, because it just didn’t look good to me. And the more I looked at it, the worse it felt.
‘Fascinatingly, during the long period of silence that followed the second trial, Rachel Aviv of The New Yorker wrote this astonishing article.
‘Now I must urge you to read it. For if you had doubts before, you will have much greater doubts later.
Vine added: ‘I’ve always had doubts because I’ve always thought the evidence was quite circumstantial.’
Hitchens continued: ‘The problem is that the story is completely circumstantial and full of assumptions about what might have happened.
Letby is Britain’s most prolific child killer. She is pictured here in 2013, before her killing spree began, holding a baby’s clothing item while working as a nurse in an English hospital
Notes found by police when Letby was arrested in 2018 included this one, in which she scribbled in all caps: ‘I AM BAD, I DID THIS’
In another note found by police in 2018, Letby had scribbled a jumble of words, with phrases such as “love,” “i can’t do this anymore” and “help me” written on it
‘And also statistical claims that real statisticians, including the Royal Society of Statisticians, have shown to be highly questionable and probably wrong.
‘I think there is a case for the Criminal Cases Review Commission to take up the matter and ask the Court of Appeal to reopen the case, because the Court of Appeal has already refused to refer the case for review.
‘When I read the Court of Appeal’s ruling, I thought: I don’t know exactly why they are so keen to avoid an appeal or why that would be a good idea.
‘If the case is so controversial, why not appeal? What could be the argument against it?’
Later in the episode, Vine and Hitchens discuss the King’s speech at the reopening of parliament on Wednesday, in which Labour introduced a flurry of bills.
Amid the usual pomp and circumstance, the King said ministers would press ahead with controversial class war plans to levy VAT on private school fees, in what Hitchens called a “hateful attack on private schools”.
King Charles III and Queen Camilla arrive to deliver the Royal Address at the State Opening of Parliament on Wednesday
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Conservative leader Rishi Sunak lead MPs through the Central Lobby of the Palace of Westminster ahead of the State Opening of Parliament
Hitchens said: ‘It’s interesting that they’re so keen to do this, because it will raise very little money and it will make very little difference to public education. But it will make life incredibly difficult for so many people who can barely afford an independent education, and who can’t afford it now.
“The rich won’t be bothered by it because they don’t care.”
Vine added: “No, they just keep going.”
Hitchens continued: ‘It’s just a pure act of spite against independent education and it gives a very good picture of what sort of government this really is.’
Vine said: ‘Especially to middle-class people, I think, because as you say, the rich will just have one less holiday. And that’s fine.’