Post Office Corporate : Post Office apologises for serious failures in historical prosecutions

[POSTMAN]

http://corporate.postoffice.co.uk/secur ... ns-3093498

Quashing of historical convictions is significant milestone
Post Office stopped prosecutions many years ago
Fundamental reform of operations and culture implemented

The Post Office today sincerely apologises for serious failures in its historical conduct of prosecutions of postmasters, resulting in the Court of Appeal formally overturning convictions - that occurred between 2003 to 2013 - in uncontested appeals.

The Court quashed 39 convictions, referred by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) last year. The Post Office announced at the earliest opportunity, in October 2020, that it would not oppose 39 of these appeals. The Court upheld the safety of convictions in three cases.

Post Office Chairman Tim Parker said:

“The Post Office is extremely sorry for the impact on the lives of these postmasters and their families that was caused by historical failures.

“Post Office stopped prosecutions soon after its separation from Royal Mail a decade ago and has throughout this appeals process supported the overturning of the vast majority of convictions.

“We are contacting other postmasters and Post Office workers with criminal convictions from past private Post Office prosecutions that may be affected, to assist them to appeal should they wish. Post Office continues to reform its operations and culture to ensure such events can never happen again.

“The full ruling by the Court of Appeal judges published today is detailed, therefore Post Office will assess the Judgment carefully to understand what further action may be required.”

Post Office Chief Executive, Nick Read said:

“I am in no doubt about the human cost of the Post Office’s past failures and the deep pain that has been caused to people affected.

“Many of those postmasters involved have been fighting for justice for a considerable length of time and sadly there are some who are not here to see the outcome today and whose families have taken forward appeals in their memory. I am very moved by their courage.

“The quashing of historical convictions is a vital milestone in fully and properly addressing the past as I work to put right these wrongs as swiftly as possible and there must be compensation that reflects what has happened.

“In addition, since arriving at the Post Office 18 months ago, my focus has been on resetting the culture at the Post Office and forging a substantive partnership with our postmasters. We are determined that they must come first in everything we do because without them there is no Post Office. We must transform the Post Office so that it can continue to provide essential services in local communities across the UK.”

Fundamental reforms

Actions taken to reform the Post Office include:

Appointing two current postmasters as Non-Executive Directors to the Post Office Board to influence Post Office strategy and the implementation of programmes affecting postmasters.

Undertaking a programme of improvements to overhaul culture, practices and operating procedures throughout every part of the Post Office to forge an open and transparent relationship with postmasters.

Comprehensive improvements made from initial recruitment and training through to daily transaction accounting, including design changes made to transactions on the Horizon system, based on postmaster feedback.

Cases related to Horizon effectively ceased in 2013, although two cases featuring Horizon evidence were prosecuted in 2015.

Therefore, the Post Office is contacting other postmasters with historical criminal convictions between 1999 and 2015 that may be affected, to notify them of the outcome of these appeals and provide information in respect of how they could also appeal. This follows an extensive review by external criminal law specialists of cases dating back to the introduction of the Post Office’s computer system Horizon.

Note to editors:

On 11 December 2020 six former postmasters were formally acquitted in uncontested appeals at Southwark Crown Court, following referrals by the CCRC. These were historical convictions in magistrates’ courts which must be appealed to the Crown Courts.

Most of the referrals by the CCRC were to the Court of Appeal because they relate to convictions in the Crown Court.

Post Office has undertaken an extensive disclosure exercise, by external criminal law specialists Peters and Peters, to identify and disclose material which might affect the safety of historical convictions relating to Horizon.

Post Office no longer undertakes any private prosecutions.

[POSTMAN]

https://www.itv.com/news/2021-04-23/pos ... -of-appeal

Postmasters accused of theft by Post Office have convictions overturned | ITV News


Former subpostmasters Janet Skinner (left) and Tracy Felstead outside the Royal Courts of Justice in March ahead of their appeal. Credit: PA
Thirty-nine former sub-postmasters who were convicted of theft, fraud and false accounting due to the Post Office's defective Horizon accounting system have had their names cleared by the Court of Appeal.

The Post Office prosecutions "irreparably ruined" the lives of scores of sub-postmasters causing them to lose their jobs, homes and marriages, the Court of Appeal heard last month.

Announcing the court’s ruling, Lord Justice Holroyde said the Post Office "knew there were serious issues about the reliability of Horizon" and had a "clear duty to investigate" the system’s defects.

But the Post Office “consistently asserted that Horizon was robust and reliable”, and “effectively steamrolled over any sub-postmaster who sought to challenge its accuracy”, the judge added.

The Court of Appeal also allowed 39 of the appeals on the basis that their prosecutions were an "affront to the public conscience".

Lord Justice Holroyde, sitting with Mr Justice Picken and Mrs Justice Farbey, said: "Post Office Limited’s failures of investigation and disclosure were so egregious as to make the prosecution of any of the ‘Horizon cases’ an affront to the conscience of the court.”

However, three of the former subpostmasters – Wendy Cousins, Stanley Fell and Neelam Hussain – had their appeals dismissed by the court.

Lord Justice Holroyde said the Court of Appeal had concluded that, in those three cases, "the reliability of Horizon data was not essential to the prosecution case and that the convictions are safe".

Lawyers representing 42 former sub-postmasters said evidence of serious defects in the Horizon system was "concealed from the courts, prosecutors and defence", in order to protect the Post Office "at all costs".

Some of the sub-postmasters have since died, "having gone to their graves" with convictions against their name, while "some took their own lives", the Court of Appeal was told.

Rubbina Shaheen, 56, was jailed in November 2010 and ultimately had to sell her home and was forced to live in a van.

She told the PA news agency: "It made me feel very small, that I was a criminal when the judge said it, which I never was and I knew I hadn’t done it."

She served three months in prison, telling PA: "It was terrible, really. I tried to keep my head down, keep out of everybody’s way so I could do my time and just get out."

“It would be nice to have a written apology off (the Post Office) and then everybody who dealt with our cases, who did this to us, to be put into the dock and pay for it,” she added.



Grandmother Jo Hamilton, 63, who was given a 12-month supervision order, said: "I think this is the biggest miscarriage of justice.

"You think of the Birmingham Six and the Guildford Four – but there are hundreds of us.

"I was 45 when this started. It’s taken up nearly a third of my life. You think it’s never going to end.”

Mrs Hamilton said she admitted false accounting after being accused of stealing £36 000 when she ran a post office in South Warnborough, Hampshire.

“I was given a 12-month supervision order and have a criminal record,” she said.

“But I did nothing wrong. I told them about the problem but they said I was the only one.”

At the hearing at the Royal Courts of Justice in London on Friday, the Post Office conceded that 39 of the 42 appellants’ appeals should be allowed, on the basis that “they did not or could not have a fair trial”.

But it opposed 35 of those 39 cases on a second ground of appeal, which is that the prosecutions were "an affront to justice" but theses were allowed by the Court of Appeal.

The Post Office has previously said it will not seek retrials of any of the appellants if their convictions are overturned.

In a statement after the ruling, Post Office chairman Tim Parker said: “The Post Office is extremely sorry for the impact on the lives of these postmasters and their families that was caused by historical failures.

“Post Office stopped prosecutions soon after its separation from Royal Mail a decade ago and has throughout this appeals process supported the overturning of the vast majority of convictions."

At the hearing in March, Sam Stein QC – representing five of the former sub-postmasters – said the Post Office’s failure to investigate and disclose serious problems with Horizon was “the longest and most extensive affront to the justice system in living memory”.

He said the Post Office “has turned itself into the nation’s most untrustworthy brand” by attempting to “protect” Horizon from concerns about its reliability.

He also argued that the Post Office’s “lack of disclosure within criminal cases perverted the legal process”, with many defendants pleading guilty “without exculpatory facts being known or explored”.

Mr Stein told the court: “The fall from grace by the Post Office cannot be ignored.

“It has gone from valued friend to devalued villain.

“Those responsible within the Post Office had the duty to maintain not only the high standards of those responsible for any prosecution, but also to maintain the high faith and trust we had for the Post Office.

“Instead, the Post Office failed in its simplest of duties – to act honestly and reliably.”


Tim Moloney QC, representing the majority of the former sub-postmasters, said the Post Office’s failure to investigate the reliability of Horizon was “shameful and culpable”.

He added: “Those failures are rendered all the more egregious … by the inability of the defendants to make their own investigations of the reasons for the apparent discrepancies.”

Mr Moloney told the court there was “an institutional imperative of acquitting Horizon and convicted sub-postmasters … in order to protect Horizon and to protect their own commercial reputation”.

The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) referred the cases of 42 former sub-postmasters to the Court of Appeal last year, following a landmark High Court case against the Post Office.

The Post Office ultimately settled the civil claim brought by more than 550 claimants for £57.75 million, without admitting liability, in December 2019.

Mr Justice Fraser found Horizon contained “bugs, errors and defects” and that there was a “material risk” shortfalls in branch accounts were caused by the system.

As a result of the High Court’s findings, the CCRC referred the 42 former subpostmasters’ convictions to the Court of Appeal.

[Pompey Boy]

So what use is an apology, particularly to those people who have died?

No one comes out of this with any credit - Royal Mail PLC, the Police, the CPS, the judges/juries who convicted these people and of course Fujitsu.

Not being a legal person I wouldn't know where to start, but some people need to be held to account about this.

[NWpostie]

Apologies are cheap, financial compensation speaks lounder.