While appearances can be deceptive, footage of Lucy Letby’s arrest seemed to reflect a completely befuddled ‘girl next door’ confounded by the sudden influx of paramilitaries into her home.

Yes, some murderous psychos are obviously expert actors, just as ‘you can tell are manifestly guilty just by looking at them’.

And that’s why I won’t get stuck in a confirmation bias hell hole.

I’d focus on all the evidence. Every time a baby died unexpectedly, she was present.

Undoubtedly guilty.

But, wait a minute.

Far from there being swathes of overwhelming evidence on offer, there was apparently a very selective use of data where deaths and other major incidents were disregarded when Letby wasn’t on shift.

Confirmation bias, anyone?

The ‘Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy’ — shooting from the hip and circling the closest group of holes to suggest that a target has been hit appears to have been a fundamental plank of the prosecution case.

That’s one way how results are retrofitted into becoming ‘facts’. It’s the power of hindsight coupled with warped goals.

And there’s more.

Documentation from Letby’s psychotherapy session actions was also dug up and shoehorned into the context of the apparent murders. Encouraged to document her innermost thoughts during a therapy session, the cops scooped it up and represented these as her reactions to what she’d done in a context of their choosing.

You can’t get better than a quick-fit fit-up.

I’m now waiting for my door to be put through at any moment because I once took part in a role play for a job where I had to choose somebody to sacrifice for the benefit of the group.

Let’s just hope that somebody close to me doesn’t cark it unexpectedly as I will have already coughed to a murder twenty-five years ago. And one I had coldly rationalised, too.

Stay with me because it doesn’t end there.

Some of these murders may not even have been murders. Yes, the cops really have knocked the ball right out of the park on this one.

In a week when we are reminded that they still can’t nick anybody over Grenfell after more than seven years, and cumulative cop criminality and crass, crap conduct in current affairs appeared to reach an all-time low, they still continue to plumb the depths.

It was alleged that some victims had had air injected into a peripheral vein. Medical experts are now suggesting that the evidence does not point to this mode of death.

Give me strength.

It isn’t just about shoddy coppering, though.

Amazingly – and this one does beggar belief – Letby’s legal team never called any expert witnesses in her defence.

Holy cow.

Essentially, any critical comparisons between evidence and any established benchmarks could not be made.

That must have been some defence.

And now, to the crux of the matter and the underlying force behind this case.

A larger number of deaths than expected in any situation needs to be probed. Deaths of the most vulnerable will rightly be seen as the most heinous as this strikes at the heart of what a moral society should seek to achieve.

Babies touch hearts, and somebody has to pay.

And this is where the legal process is most vulnerable because those burdened with the responsibility to crack such cases are weighing up not just the evidence.

They are subject to a subconscious pull between allowing a grotesque spectre of an unidentified monster remaining on the loose and the risk of one innocent person going down.

We’re back to my role play again.

It’s a shame that up to now, the police and courts haven’t overly fussed about the latter.

Sometimes it’s just more expedient to sacrifice somebody for the greater good and tie everything up as ‘job done’ with a victory for the good guys.

Drawn by the lure of safety from a monster and the achievement of justice for all to see, the system takes the path of least resistance.

It’s the difference between a right result and the right result.

Thankfully, those with a backbone  are not going to let it be with Letby.