UK:Nurse Lucy Letby to be sentenced for murdering seven babies

Letby – who deliberately injected babies with air, force fed others milk and poisoned two of the infants with insulin between June 2015 and June 2016 – refused to appear in the dock as the latest verdicts were read out on Friday.

They had been delivered over several hearings, but could not be reported until all the verdicts were returned.

Letby, originally of Hereford, broke down in tears as the first guilty verdicts were read out by the jury’s foreman on 8 August after 76 hours of deliberations.

She cried with her head bowed as the second set of guilty verdicts were returned on 11 August.

The refusal to attend court last week has led to renewed calls for a new law to compel convicted criminals to attend court for sentencing hearings.

Letby’s expected absence from the dock is the latest in a series of high-profile trials where convicted murderers have refused to turn up, including the killers of Zara Aleena in London and nine-year-old Olivia Pratt-Korbel in Liverpool.

Former prison governor Prof Ian Acheson told the BBC judges should have the power to compel criminals into the courtroom “to be sentenced in front of the people they have harmed”.

Earlier this year, the government said it was committed to introducing legislation to ensure criminals are made to appear in the dock for sentencing.

Former justice secretary Sir Robert Buckland backed the government’s announcement, saying defendants should face tougher consequences if they refuse to appear in the dock, such as receiving longer sentences.

Facilitating “better ways in which defendants really have nowhere to hide” when it comes to listening or seeing the court “even if they’re in the cell” is another option for the government to explore, Sir Robert added.

“We use television, video links all the time when it comes to defendants who might be on a live link from the prison, for a procedural hearing or even a sentence hearing,” he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.

He said this would avoid “disruptive behaviour” that would “cause upset to the victims and the wider public”.