A crime and police expert says police will be investigating if there is a case for a corporate manslaughter charge for the Countess of Chester Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.
Speaking live on ‘Breakfast with Eamonn and Isabel’ on GB News, commentator Danny Shaw said the police would be “looking at all possibilities now about whether there are other individuals that might bear responsibility for missing the signs for refusing to act on warnings” over the Lucy Letby case.
But Shaw said he felt the decision of a potential manslaughter charge “really is a little bit of a way down the track.”
He told GB News: “Whether they have potential manslaughter charges against them or whether the hospital as an institution has a corporate manslaughter charge” was “ultimately a decision for the police,” he said.
“It seems to me that they’ve done an incredibly meticulous and careful and thorough investigation,” he said.
“And I think it’s a lot more complicated.”
“The person that bears the ultimate responsibility for this is Lucy Letby.
“Whether there are other individuals, that really requires a lot of careful, considerate consideration, but I’m sure the police will look at that.”
Corporate Manslaughter is an offence created to ensure that companies and other organisations can be held properly accountable for very serious failings resulting in death.
“That’s another reason where I think the inquiry must be a statutory inquiry which means that it would have the full powers to compel witnesses to give evidence and to order the disclosure of documents,” Shaw added.
“We’ve seen this before, where the government sets up or tries to set up an inquiry without those powers and then it is forced to do so further down the track, because it knows that the way it’s been set up, isn’t really sufficient to get to the truth.
“And I think this is another example. It must be a full public inquiry or inquiry led by a judge with all the powers that that brings.”
