Context
Lorenzo Mansutti, a plumber who had worked at the Countess of Chester Hospital, was called by the defence at the original trial to testify about the documented plumbing and sewage failures on the neonatal unit during 2015–2016. He is one of the few witnesses whose evidence specifically addresses the infrastructure context around the cluster.
What he told the jury
Mr Mansutti gave evidence about specific incidents of sewage back-up on the unit, recurring plumbing failures, and the pattern of call-outs he had attended during the cluster period. His evidence establishes that the unit had ongoing infrastructure problems of the kind routinely associated with infection and environmental contamination risk — a context that the prosecution’s narrative largely did not address.
Why this matters
The Panel’s case-by-case medical review concludes every deterioration is explicable by natural causes or sub-optimal clinical care. “Sub-optimal clinical care” on a unit with documented sewage and plumbing failures is not an abstract category — it is what Mr Mansutti’s evidence describes in detail. See our evidence page on unit conditions and the new sewage-and-plumbing evidence page.