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Calling former Subpostmasters, managers and Post Office employees…
Read More…: Calling former Subpostmasters, managers and Post Office employees…Professor Richard Moorhead will be known to some of you. He writes a well-regarded legal ethics blog (“Lawyer Watch“) and a free substack site dedicated to matters arising from the Post Office Horizon scandal. He is also a member of the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board. In addition to this Prof Moorhead has been running various research projects looking into the Horizon scandal. I have news of a new one. This, as it says below – is for any Subpostmaster, branch manager/assistant or Crown Office employee who was threatened with legal action or sued/prosecuted by the Post Office. The press release…
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Nothing personal, Mr Castleton. It’s just justice…
Read More…: Nothing personal, Mr Castleton. It’s just justice…Today, Stephen Dilley, a partner at Womble Bond Dickinson, gave evidence to the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry. Womble have a long and inglorious history with the Post Office, right up to acting for them (disastrously) in the Bates v Post Office group litigation. Back when they were known as Bond Pearce, Dilley helped the Post Office destroy former Bridlington Subpostmaster Lee Castleton at the High Court. Today, Lee Castleton, and his wife Lisa sat before Dilley at the Inquiry. Lee Castleton’s daughter, Millie-Jo, who is now in her twenties, has written to the Inquiry about her family’s experience at…
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Post Office auditor signed Court statement containing info she knew was false
Read More…: Post Office auditor signed Court statement containing info she knew was falseHelen Rose is a former Post Office auditor and investigator. Mrs Rose has no formal auditing qualifications or training, no training she can recall on the Post Office Horizon IT system and no formal training in investigation. She is also the author of the Helen Rose report, which provided some of the first concrete evidence that incomplete information was being used as the basis of Horizon prosecutions. More on that here. Today at the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry, Mrs Rose was asked about a witness statement she made during the trial of Lee Castleton, a Subpostmaster who was bankrupted…
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Govt offers “eligible” Postmasters £600,000 take-it-or-leave-it compensation
Read More…: Govt offers “eligible” Postmasters £600,000 take-it-or-leave-it compensationThe government has tried to break the compensation impasse for “eligible” Subpostmasters whose convictions have been quashed. The deal on the table is £600,000 to walk away. This is the transcript of the announcement and subsequent debate in parliament. The maximum number of people who qualify for the deal are the 86 Subpostmasters whose convictions have been quashed. I have asked if this includes Vipin Patel, Teju Adedayo and Parmod Kalia, three Subpostmasters whose convictions have been quashed, but who the Post Office/government is refusing to compensate because they believe Horizon evidence was not essential to their prosecutions. There is…
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Will Post Office execs continue to be given bonuses for their Inquiry work?
Read More…: Will Post Office execs continue to be given bonuses for their Inquiry work?Earlier this week I spotted a job advert for a Senior Legal Counsel at the Post Office, reporting to the Post Office’s Head of Legal specifically responsible for matters relating to the statutory Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry. The Post Office has recently been hauled over the coals by politicians for rewarding its Chief Executive and senior leaders tens of thousands of pounds in bonuses for their work on the Inquiry. This is an Inquiry set up, remember, to work out how and why the Post Office wrongly prosecuted hundreds of innocent Subpostmasters, many of whom are still fighting to…
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Racist ID codes. When did they leave the Met?
Read More…: Racist ID codes. When did they leave the Met?On 2 June 2023 I sent a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to the Metropolitan Police, London’s police force. I asked: “Could you tell me when the police stopped using the word “negroid” in its racial identification codes? Please can you supply me with documentation supporting this?” To give the Met’s FOI department some context, I wrote, as part of my request: The Post Office was using the term “negroid” in its IC codes in 2008: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/970116/response/2316334/attach/3/FOI2023%2000205%20Information%20Redacted.pdf?cookie_passthrough=1 [Subsequent to my 2nd June request we discovered the Post Office was using the term “negroid” in its investigation guidance in 2011 – as…
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Ed Henry KC: “You couldn’t contrive a more ridiculous state of affairs”
Read More…: Ed Henry KC: “You couldn’t contrive a more ridiculous state of affairs”In the course of preparing for a recent Sunday Times piece into the latest on the Post Office disaster, I spoke to a number of people. For reasons of space, many of their contributions were edited down to a couple of short quotes, or they simply didn’t make it into the piece at all. Nonetheless, what they had to say was fascinating and I remain grateful for their time. I have already published my exchanges with Horizon Compensation Advisory Board members Lord Arbuthnot (“I feel we are heading in the right direction“) and Professor Richard Moorhead (“Crass does not come…
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Prof Moorhead: “Crass does not come close”
Read More…: Prof Moorhead: “Crass does not come close”Following a Q&A with one member of the independent Horizon Compensation Advisory Board (Lord Arbuthnot) earlier this week, I am delighted to bring you another. Richard Moorhead is Professor of Legal Ethics at Exeter University and a respected industry blogger. He has taken a close professional interest in the legal failings which contributed to the Post Office Horizon scandal. You can read his dedicated substack column here. Prof Moorhead’s thoughtful and measured contributions brought him to the attention of the government, which led to his invitation to sit on the HCAB. In recent weeks we have had the Bonusgate revelations…
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Lord Arbuthnot: “I feel we are heading in the right direction”
Read More…: Lord Arbuthnot: “I feel we are heading in the right direction”Last week the Sunday Times asked me to write a piece about the Post Office scandal. The result can be read here. In the course of researching the article I picked up a lot of interesting material which, for reasons of space, didn’t make the final cut. Rather than let some good stuff go to waste, I am going to publish it on this website. We’ll start with an interview with Lord Arbuthnot. James Arbuthnot, formerly the MP for North East Hampshire, became the leading parliamentary campaigner for Subpostmasters back in 2010. He has continued to campaign from the House…
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Nick Read: The First Interview
Read More…: Nick Read: The First InterviewOn 20 June I was waiting outside Committee Room 6 at the Houses of Parliament, waiting to hear Post Office CEO Nick Read and his fellow execs grilled by Darren Jones MP and various members of the Business Select Committee. I was in the process of putting together Episode 12 of The Great Post Office Trial. My producer Robert and I had already bid for an interview with Mr Read, but we were cannoning towards our deadline and time was running out. The day before we had been told that despite initially positive soundings, the CEO was unlikely to be…
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