Context
These are the sentencing remarks delivered by Mr Justice Goss in the Crown Court at Manchester on 21 August 2023, following the jury’s verdicts of 18 August 2023 in the original trial (case number T20217188). Lucy Letby was sentenced to a whole life order — only the fourth woman in UK history to receive one — for the murder of seven infants and the attempted murder of seven more. These remarks record the court’s findings as they stood on that date, on the evidence as it was then before the court.
Key passages
Sentenced in her absence. The remarks open by recording that “The defendant, Lucy Letby, has refused to attend court for this sentence hearing.” Mr Justice Goss said he would deliver them “as if she was present to hear them” and directed that she be provided with a transcript and with copies of the Victim Personal Statements read to the court. The version published by the judiciary is marked REDACTED VERSION.
The judge declined to find a motive. This is the passage most often overlooked. At paragraph 8 the judge said: “It is no part of my function to reach conclusions as to the underlying reason or reasons for your actions. Nor could I, for they are known only to you.” The remarks therefore describe methods and sequence, not cause. Where they characterise the offending they do so in the language of sentencing rather than of explanation: “There was pre-meditation, calculation and cunning in your actions”, and, at paragraph 20, “There was a deep malevolence bordering on sadism in your actions.”
The notes and the searches. The judge recorded that when the homes of Letby and her parents were searched, “confidential documents relating to babies, including handover and resuscitation sheets and notes and blood gas readings were found”. He described a piece of paper “with dense writing on both sides, setting out your thoughts and feelings”, found in the 2018 search, and quoted two phrases from it: “the world is better off without me” and “I am evil I did this”. He treated the retained paperwork as “morbid records of the dreadful events” rather than as clinical material kept by accident. The broader text of the same notes is addressed on our Post-it notes page.
Her own evidence, as the judge characterised it. He quoted her saying in evidence that “hurting a baby is completely against everything that being a nurse is”, and continued that she “also claimed you never did anything that was meant to hurt a baby and only ever did your best to care for them. That was but one of the many lies you were found to have told in this case.” On the escalation of concern he wrote that senior doctors began to “think the unthinkable” and that she was “identified as the common factor”.
Why a whole life order. The judge set out the statutory test under Schedule 21 to the Criminal Justice Act 2003, noting that for attempted murder “whole life sentences of imprisonment are reserved for wholly exceptional cases”. He found the aggravating features to include the damage done to colleagues, “betraying their trust and creating upset and suspicion, as well as eroding confidence in clinicians and nurses generally”. He concluded: “During the course of this trial you have coldly denied any responsibility for your wrongdoing and sought to attribute some fault to others. You have shown no remorse. There are no mitigating factors.” A whole life order was imposed on each of the seven murder and seven attempted-murder counts.
What to read alongside this
The remarks date from August 2023. In February 2025, a 14-member international panel of neonatologists led by Dr Shoo Lee concluded publicly that there was no medical evidence of deliberate harm in any of the cases reviewed. The remarks above must be read in the light of that later evidence, which is now before the Criminal Cases Review Commission. See our summary of the Panel press conference and the Evidence problems page for per-issue breakdowns.
The notes cited by the Judge are addressed in detail on our Post-it notes evidence page, which sets out the broader text of the same notes (including contradictory passages such as “I haven’t done anything wrong” and “WHY ME?”) that independent psychologists have characterised as stress-diary entries rather than forensic confessions.