CHESTER — Cheshire Police arrested a senior healthcare executive from the Countess of Chester Hospital on suspicion of perverting the course of justice on Wednesday. The person was held and then bailed following a search of a property, as part of a wider investigation into senior leadership at the hospital.

The arrest forms part of Operation Duet, an ongoing inquiry by Cheshire Police into corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter at the hospital. The person arrested is one of three hospital bosses arrested and bailed in 2025 on suspicion of gross negligence manslaughter. Cheshire Police have not disclosed the age or gender of the person arrested, nor the location of the property that was searched.

"Searches at the property have now concluded," Cheshire Police said. "Both the corporate manslaughter and gross negligence manslaughter elements of the investigation are continuing and there are no set timescales for these."

The force began its corporate manslaughter investigation into senior leaders at the hospital to determine whether any criminality took place concerning the response to the increased levels of fatalities. The investigation includes any grossly negligent action or inaction of individuals. Operation Duet was widened in March 2025 to include gross negligence manslaughter.

The inquiry began after the conviction of nurse Lucy Letby in 2023 for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder seven others in the hospital's neonatal unit between 2015 and 2016. Letby was sentenced to life in prison in October 2023.