PETER HITCHENS: The Lucy Letby case has begun to stink like a neglected fridge in a student house
PETER HITCHENS: The Lucy Letby case has begun to stink like a neglected fridge in a student house
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Why do government officials hold briefings for the media? In my experience (more than half a century of reporting) they do so in the hope of influencing the way certain issues are reported. Well, who can blame them? They want to stay in power and get their way.
Access to the powerful makes reporters feel important, and they don’t want to lose it by upsetting their contacts. I think it would be better if the public knew this was going on. So I was shocked when I learned recently that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and the Cheshire Police had given a top-level briefing to journalists before the trial of Lucy Letby. It was held on Monday October 3, 2022 at Manchester Magistrates’ Court, a week before the main trial.
It was attended by around 30 journalists. It was given by three senior officers of Cheshire Police, and two senior prosecutors from the CPS. So it happened on Crown premises, maintained, heated and lit at your expense. It was delivered by five busy Crown servants, whose salaries are paid by you.
I am told that ‘they talked through the background to the case and what could be expected throughout the trial, answering questions from journalists throughout’. But when I requested a transcript or recording, which I would have thought must exist, I was told that none is available.
There was no hard evidence against the defendant, and there still isn’t, Peter Hitchens writes
I was also told by the CPS that ‘briefings are not used in any way to influence coverage’. I would say that’s a matter of opinion.
Isn’t the mere act of offering such a briefing, with its unusual access to senior officials, likely to influence those there? They want to keep such access.
Reporters attend trials under strict rules, and their accounts of what happens in court are supposed to be fair, accurate and contemporaneous. It is up to barristers and witnesses to get their messages across in court. I really can’t see any need for a briefing.
But now the College of Policing has said such events are OK. It advises they are ‘most commonly used in very high-profile, sensitive or complex trials where briefing will help the media to report a case accurately’. Accurately? Really? You report a case accurately by taking an accurate note of what is said and by recounting it faithfully and without bias or distortion. How would a briefing by only one side in the trial help you do that?
Once again, I am struck by just what a strange event this was. Apart from the rare trials of traitors or spies, I have never heard of large numbers of prosecution witnesses being granted anonymity. As John Sweeney pointed out in the Daily Mail yesterday, this meant the jury had no idea of key facts about one of those witnesses.
From the start, the presumption of innocence – which is supposed to guard us all from an overmighty state – barely operated in practice, Peter Hitchens writes
Then there was no hard evidence against the defendant, and there still isn’t. Key evidence in her favour was never called. She was held in custody for an astonishing 23 months before her trial. Police dug up her garden in conditions of total publicity after the first of her three arrests. From the start, the presumption of innocence – which is supposed to guard us all from an overmighty state – barely operated in practice.
Since her conviction the State has steamrollered any objections and the Government has weighed in heavily on the side of the prosecution. The Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has called the campaign for her case to be reopened ‘crass and insensitive’ and insisted that ‘we should continue to regard her as a convicted killer’, a striking departure from the general rule that ministers leave justice to judges. The police weirdly made a self-congratulatory video about their investigation.
On top of that, a gigantic and expensive inquiry has been proceeding, in which Ms Letby’s guilt – though much questioned by experts – is treated as a certainty. When her lawyer tried to represent her at this inquiry, he was refused.
And now there are suggestions that she will be prosecuted for further alleged offences, even though her sentence – that she must die in prison – cannot possibly be increased. The only significant effect of such prosecutions would be to silence, perhaps for years, any further discussion about the safety of the verdict against her.
What if she is, as she says, innocent? How would it then be bearable for her to be treated as she is being treated? This case has begun to stink, like a neglected fridge in a student flat.
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