Judge dismisses Letby's plea to suspend inquiry into murder of babies

The chair of the public inquiry into the murder of babies by Lucy Letby yesterday rejected calls to pause her investigation.

- Josh Halliday

Lady Justice Thirlwall had been urged by the jailed nurse and by former executives at the Countess of Chester hospital to wait until Letby's legal appeals were decided. Lawyers for Letby argued there was "compelling" evidence undermining the guilty verdicts so it would be wrong to continue with the inquiry.

However, in a ruling yesterday the senior appeal court judge said: "It is not the actions of Lucy Letby that I am scrutinising. It is the actions of all those who were in the hospital within the terms of reference whose actions I am reviewing: what they did at the time, in light of what they knew at the time and in light of what they should have known at the time."

Thirlwall, who has been examining the circumstances of the deaths and non-fatal collapses of babies since last September, has received evidence from hundreds of witnesses. Her report is due in November.