What the Panel report is and is not
The Panel report is a post-conviction clinical review, not a verdict. It does not find Lucy Letby innocent or guilty. What it does is ask a narrower, more precise question: is there a clinically plausible natural-cause explanation for each of the medical events at the centre of each count? If the answer is yes for every count, that has profound implications for the safety of the convictions, because the prosecution’s case rested on the claim that there was no plausible natural cause.
The report is also not a response to the prosecution evidence. The Panel reviewed the clinical records, post-mortem findings, and published neonatal literature. They did not respond to prosecution expert witness testimony point-by-point. That distinction matters when you read individual case sections: the Panel is constructing an affirmative natural-cause case, not dismantling a specific witness.
How the Panel was convened
The Panel was convened by Dr Shoo Lee, a Canadian neonatologist and former President of the Canadian Paediatric Society, in late 2023. The 14 panel members are drawn from Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, and continental Europe. None had prior involvement in the Letby criminal proceedings. They were given access to the clinical records but not to the trial transcripts, so that their clinical assessments would not be anchored to the prosecution narrative.
The Panel operated by consensus: each case was reviewed independently by multiple members before the group reached a collective assessment. Where the Panel could not agree, that disagreement is recorded. The February 2025 report covers the 17 conviction counts. The June 2025 Additional Cases Report extends the review to a further 10 cases.
How the case-by-case reviews are structured
Each case section follows a consistent structure. It opens with the infant’s gestational age, birth weight, and key pre-existing clinical factors. It then summarises the acute clinical episode that formed the basis of the charge. The core of each section is the Panel’s differential-diagnosis analysis: a list of candidate natural causes, with the Panel’s assessment of how well each explains the recorded clinical picture. The section closes with the Panel’s collective conclusion.
When reading a case section, focus on two things: (1) what the Panel identifies as the most plausible natural-cause candidate, and (2) how complete the clinical record is. The Panel frequently notes that records are incomplete or that key tests were not performed, which limits certainty in both directions.
Common terminology you will encounter
The report uses clinical language throughout. A brief reference list of the terms that appear most often:
- Air embolism — the prosecution’s central mechanism theory. See the air-embolism evidence page and our line-by-line analysis for detail. The Panel addresses this mechanism in multiple case sections.
- DIC (disseminated intravascular coagulation) — a coagulation-system failure common in critically ill neonates that produces both clotting and haemorrhage. See our glossary entry.
- NEC (necrotising enterocolitis) — a severe gut condition affecting preterm infants. Listed in the glossary.
- Gestational age / corrected age — how far along in pregnancy the infant was at birth, expressed in weeks. Preterm is before 37 weeks; extremely preterm is before 28 weeks. Risk profiles differ sharply across these ranges.
- C-peptide / exogenous insulin — the biochemical markers at the centre of the Baby F and Baby L insulin-poisoning counts. The glossary explains the assay methodology.
For a fuller reference, the glossary covers all major clinical and legal terms used across this site.
How to read the headline findings
The Panel’s headline finding on each case is typically expressed as one of three conclusions: (a) there is a clear natural-cause explanation that the clinical record supports; (b) the clinical picture is consistent with natural causes but the records are insufficient to be certain; or (c) the Panel cannot exclude a deliberate act but does not find the evidence for one compelling. No case in the February 2025 report receives a conclusion that deliberate harm is the most likely explanation.
These conclusions are significant against the trial backdrop. The prosecution case was built on the premise that, for each count, natural causes could be excluded. The Panel’s consistent finding that they cannot be excluded — and often that they are affirmatively supported — directly addresses the foundation of the convictions.
What the Additional 10 Cases Report (June 2025) adds
The June 2025 report extends the Panel’s review to ten further cases not covered in February, including several counts on which the jury returned non-verdicts (Babies H, J, N, and Q) and cases from the earlier non-conviction COCH period. The additional cases allow the Panel to assess whether its natural-cause findings hold consistently outside the 17 conviction counts, and to address the triplet-set cases (Babies O, P, and Q) as a unified set.
The June report does not supersede the February report. Read both together, using the February report for the conviction counts and the June report for the additional context it provides.
Where to read the Panel report in full
The February 2025 Panel Summary Report is publicly available as a PDF:
International Expert Panel — Summary Report (PDF, lucyletbyinnocence.com)
The June 2025 Additional Cases Report had not yet been publicly released at the time of writing. Check the CCRC expert reports index for updated links as documents are published.
For the press conference that accompanied the February report, see the Shoo Lee February 2025 press conference transcript.