Navigating Expert Evidence in High-Profile Legal Cases

Ken Macdonald KC and Tim Owen KC explore the latest developments in the case of Lucy Letby, as her new barrister holds a second press conference revealing the conclusion of 14 experts that every baby died either as a result of natural causes or because of medical neglect. 

Do these new medical opinions ‘demolish’ the evidence of the prosecution experts, as her new barrister claims? Or, as some allege, has this new analysis taken place in a vacuum, ignoring  all the circumstantial evidence presented to the jury confirming the Crown’s expert testimony that these infants were deliberately harmed, and that their attacker was  Lucy Letby?

Ken and Tim also consider the stance of the CCRC in the face of what will certainly be a robust prosecution response to this new material, and look at the approach likely to be taken by the Court of Appeal if the case is referred back to it by the CCRC.

Finally the discussion turns to the increasingly concerted attacks from within government on Richard Hermer, the Attorney General. What does this obviously coordinated campaign of hostile briefing tell us about the relationship between a new Labour administration led by a former human rights barrister, and the law?