The former NHS neonatal nurse, 33, has become the fourth woman in Britain to be handed a whole-life order, which is used for only the most horrendous crimes.
Evil child serial killer Lucy Letby is set to die behind bars after fooling her friends and family into believing she was just an ordinary young woman.
The former NHS neonatal nurse, 33, has become the fourth woman in Britain to be handed a whole-life order, which is used for only the most horrendous crimes.
Her campaign of terror on innocent babies in her care took place between June 2015 and June 2016 at the Countess of Chester Hospital, where she deliberately harmed them.
Her twisted actions included injecting infants with air and insulin or overfeeding them with milk. She was escorted out of her child-like bedroom in handcuffs five years ago and put into the back of a police car.
This was followed by a lengthy 10-month trial in which she was found guilty of murdering seven babies and attempting to kill six others.
While she has spent time in four prisons so far, nothing will have prepared her for her new lifelong sentence as a Category A prisoner with a target on her head, the Mirror reports.
The average life sentence is 16.5 years, but 'whole-lifers' cannot escape as the Parole Board will never review their case. Letby will likely start her sentence in either HMP Bronzefield in Surrey, where she's already served time, or at HMP Low Newton, in Durham.
Bronzefield is the largest women's prison in Europe, where Rose West spent time before being transferred. Current inmates include Shauna Hoare, who was found guilty of manslaughter for the killing of Becky Watts in 2015; and the al-Qaeda fanatic Roshonara Choudhry, who stabbed Labour MP Stephen Timms in 2010.
Meanwhile, Low Newton, a maximum security prison, has housed female killers Joanna Dennehy, Rose West, Bernadette McNeilly, and the mother of tragic tot Baby P, Tracey Connelly.
The prison just outside of Durham is next door to the so-called "Monster Mansion" HMP Frankland, which holds Ian Huntley, Wayne Couzens and Levi Belfield.
A former inmate of Bronzefield, Sophie Campell, claimed her time at the women's prison was so disturbing that she was compelled to write a memoir about it, Breakfast At Bronzefield. The woman, who was convicted for grievous bodily harm of a police officer, said violence was commonplace within the jail's walls.
Releasing her story in 2020, she said: "I couldn't believe how offenders were treated by the officers. You wonder how they got away with a lot of it - neglecting inmates in their cells, depriving them of their meals, not giving them much-needed medical attention, or being too rough during searches."
She added: "As well as same-sex relationships thriving in Bronzefield, some female prisoners were engaging in sexual favours with the officers to get drugs or food, and that was a real shock for me. It's so horrible how normalised it is, often gossiped and giggled about.
"Violence is everywhere. It puts you on edge. You have to be alert as a situation can escalate rapidly. That's why you learn to adopt a new code of conduct inside."
She also spoke of witnessing a woman having boiling hot water thrown over her face during her first few weeks, adding: "It rattles you. You know it could be you - say the wrong thing, or look at the wrong person and you could be burned and blistered and never offered medical treatment."
Experts say that Letby will have 'restricted status' for an inmate, which is considered the female equivalent of Category A - meaning she is the highest-risk threat to the public.
It is said she will be on suicide watch for some months and it will be a while before she is integrated with other prisoners. She will start off her whole life sentence living in the hospital wing of the prison while they assess her mental and physical health, and as a way of protecting her safety from other inmates.
Eventually, she'll be moved into her own cell. This is a routine procedure for every inmate found guilty of murder, on the assumption that anyone who faces decades in prison will contemplate taking their own life.
It will take place in a number of forms - from CCTV cameras watching Letby to direct supervision from officers, noting her moves every 10 minutes.
"She'll be what's known as a 'restricted status' prisoner," Mark Leech, a prisons expert and editor of The Prison Oracle website told the Telegraph. "She'll be on suicide watch and it will be some time before she gets to mingle with the main prison population - at least six months."
She may also receive extra care and attention at HMP Low Newton, which boasts the 'Primrose Project' - designed to treat women with "dangerous and severe personality disorders". It is the only prison in the UK with such a unit. While Letby will be considered a threat to herself, she will be a possible target for others for the rest of her life.
Professor Yvonne Jewkes, professor of criminology at the University of Bath, says Letby will have a price on her head. "At best, she'll be subjected to extreme bullying and intimidation. At worst, she might be in quite considerable physical danger," she told the Telegraph.
For that reason, it'll be a lonely ride for Letby, who will have very little human contact. "She'll associate mostly with prison officers, her key worker in the prison and one or two cleaners, but much of that interaction will be through the hatch in her cell door," Leech added.
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She'll be spending at least 22 hours a day inside her single cell - approximately 1.8 metres wide by three metres in length. Inside the cell, Lucy, who will be forced to wear a prison uniform of grey joggers and a sweater, will have a single bed, a storage unit, a chair, and a toilet.
Due to her confinement, it's likely she will be encouraged by staff to be mentally stimulated to avoid extreme stress, anger, and frustration. Her life of solitude will be filled with reading stories about others - she will be able to read newspapers, books, and watch TV, but not much else. And for an hour a day, she will be able to exercise, walking the prison grounds.
Lucy will, however, be able to speak to her family and receive visits, which will be vetted by police, though they will be few and far between. A convicted prisoner is usually allowed at least two 1-hour visits every four weeks.
Her parents, Susan and John, from Chester, were there at Manchester Crown Court for each day of her 10-month trial, so it's likely they will keep returning to check in on their daughter. Letby won't be able to receive emails directly, but she can receive messages through the Email a Prisoner service.
They're printed out and delivered by prison staff, with each email costing 40p from Letby's prison cash card. There is no limit on the number of letters she can send and receive however, although most are checked by prison staff.
When it comes to phone calls, she will only be able to speak to those named on her friends and family list. And as this needs to be checked by security, it'll take a few days following her arrival for her to be able to make a call.
In time, it is expected that she would be integrated into groups, such as reading clubs or cooking classes, like Rose West, who is said to have become a star baker. It is thought that the professionals will want to keep her busy, and even encourage her to do an Open University degree.
Her diet will now be dictated by the chef's selection of hot meals and lunches, with an Independent Monitoring Board report, published in 2021, saying that Low Newton provided food that was "nutritious, well cooked and of good variety". Later in life, it is expected for Letby to be moved to a lower-security prison to see out her final days before her death behind bars
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