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    39 Post Office convictions quashed

    (There's probably a thread on it somewhere, but search failed to yield one)
    As it said in the title, a total of 39 convictions have been quashed, after the Post Office continued with actions against former sub-postmasters, despite knowing of potential flaws in in the Horizon software


    https://www.mirror.co.uk/money/break...-post-23967400

    Now prosecute the bastards who brought the cases and get them behind bars.

    (Start with the Chief Executive and work down from there.)

    #2
    I agree with Guy.

    Comment


      #3
      I hope they all get a big fat payout.

      https://twitter.com/Barristerblog/status/1385551884463837185

      Comment


        #4
        Their cheques will probably get "lost" in the post.

        Comment


          #5
          This was covered in Private Eye about 18 months ago and it's a total and utter disgrace and yes the Post Office executives should be charged. They knew that Horizon system was faulty, they knew that money could disappear off the system and they knew that innocent people were in prison, yet they still continued with prosecutions. This is a Hillsborough level cover-up and comes from the top down.

          Comment


            #6
            And , they've just rehired the people who put in place the dodgy system in the first place (and helped them cover it up).

            Comment


              #7
              An utterly scandalous story and how do you adequately compensate someone who's served jail time, lost their reputation, suffered ill health as a result or in at least 1 case, committed suicide?

              What amazes me is that there was no whistle blower early on or someone senior, thinking "this can't be right" when post masters with previously unblemished records suddenly appeared to be getting light fingered.

              Comment


                #8
                Paula Vennells CEO of the Post Office who knew that they had been withholding evidence favourable to the defence is an Anglican Priest

                She is a member of the Ethical Investment Advisory Group of the Church of England.

                Comment


                  #9
                  I was aware of this - obviously, it's huge - but a brief reading this afternoon of some of the decisions and what went on, has left me absolutely seething. I have even gone so far as to email the CoE to ask what they're going to be doing about it/her. Ethical advice, my arse.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    I work for the Irish Post Office, and there have been some right c*nuts among our management, but nothing that I know of like this, some of these fuckers have to see jail time.

                    Comment


                      #11
                      This is horrendous

                      https://twitter.com/stewart956/status/1385849035278491650?s=21

                      Comment


                        #12
                        Paula Vennells is no longer a member of the Ethical Investment Advisory Group of the Church of England. I hope she - and others - are prosecuted.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Originally posted by Nefertiti2 View Post
                          That's heartbreaking.

                          Comment


                            #14
                            As I've said elsewhere, I've worked in the Irish post office ( An Post) since the mid 1980s, first as a postman then on the counters and most recently in office work. In a small way, I can understand what they went through.

                            In the early 90s, I was working on the counters in a small post office, there were three of us and the boss, with a part timer on Thursday and Friday. One day,the boss called me off the counter into his office. Sitting at his desk was a woman from the internal cops, the Investigation Branch. The next 20 minutes were a nightmare, as she proceeded to interrogate me about missing funds in the office. All I can say is that the guilty party attempted to cover his tracks by planting the evidence on me and the part timer. Thankfully, the I.B knew who they were after, and were trying to find out if I was in on it. I managed to persuade them of my innocence, and the guilty bloke confessed. As I said, it's a small thing compared to what they went through, but being accused when you're innocent is a tough thing to experience.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              The Post Office has been accused of withholding thousands of documents from the inquiry into an IT scandal that led to more 700 unsafe convictions.

                              The Post Office IT inquiry resumed on Tuesday with a strongly worded row over the failure to disclosure more than 30,000 documents. Lawyers for the unfairly convicted operators accused the Post Office of continuing to deploy “malevolent” tactics to frustrate justice.

                              They also called for the inquiry to be adjourned until all the relevant documents were made available.
                              https://www.theguardian.com/business...candal-inquiry

                              Comment


                                #16
                                I'd followed this since I heard the BBC Podcast on it a couple of years' ago, and following Mr Bates vs the Post Office on ITV, this has gone stratospheric. It left me with a few questions which others might know the answers to.

                                Whilst much attention seems to fall on Paula Vennells (and rightly so), it seems to me that this is a common-or-garden case of what happens when you pursue corporate reputation management to the exclusion of everything else (of which there far too many examples in Britain). It's horribly easy to see how senior managers ask middle managers what's happening, and get told 'nothing to see here' and then those senior managers report that conclusion to their superiors on the Board and in government, and none of these people have the knowledge to gainsay that, nor the appetite to pursue it. The campaigners are thieves, who've managed to persuade gullible people that they have a case; eventually, the pressure outside the corporate body starts to tell, but they've spent so much time digging in that they can't contemplate turning around and saying 'we were lied to by a raft of middle managers' who they then instigate legal proceedings against.

                                What I'm not clear about is where the line between Post Office/Royal Mail and Fujitsu was under the terms of the contract. The line that the system was fine and no-one else had problems which people got when they called the helpline was the smoking gun here - but who ran the helpline? Why did they see their job to batter down the helpline callers and isolate them, rather than see this as really useful feedback on an IT system that had only just been switched on in earnest? Why didn't this information about people struggling with the system get passed onto the department that investigated fraud? What were the actual reasons why the postmasters who had problems had those problems, when lots of other people didn't seem to have them? And did the reverse of the balances being negative happen, where at the end of the day, there was more cash in the post office than there was supposed to be, and what happened to that?

                                Comment


                                  #17
                                  The Panorama documentary from 2022 is well worth a watch and does address some of the points you've raised iirc.

                                  Comment


                                    #18
                                    The Paula Vennells CBE is a distraction and nothing more. Of course the award should be rescinded but the fact that she has it in the first place is just one of thousands of examples as to why the honours system is a sham. Taking it away from her might make a few people think justice is being done but will have no effect on the actual case.
                                    Likewise the finger pointing at Ed Davey is merely convenient scapegoating for the Tories and their media backers to draw attention away from their almost complete failure to address the issue. Davey played his part but would have been kept completely in the dark by Post Office management whose continuous line was that their system was entirely infallible. It would seem that the only MP that comes out of this with any credit would appear to be James Arbuthnot.
                                    The Tories now are being absolutely shameless with their sudden all out support for the sub-postmasters. They've had their entire time in power to look at this and try to understand it and yet just like any other scandal, failure of responsibility and miscarriage of Justice they prevaricate and delay to reduce the amount of compensation they pay out. It's only since the publicity and national outcry has occurred following a TV drama that it has suddenly become their cause celebre in an effort to appear like they give a shit. They don't, and nobody should believe otherwise.
                                    Last edited by Sean of the Shed; 09-01-2024, 09:45.

                                    Comment


                                      #19
                                      Originally posted by Sean of the Shed View Post
                                      It's only since the publicity and national outcry has occurred following a TV drama that it has suddenly become their cause celebre in an effort to appear like they give a shit.
                                      Yeah, obviously this situation isn't about me, but still, as a journo arguably the most depressing and infuriating thing has been how for all the great reporting that was done years ago, not to mention a wave of overturned convictions in the last few years, it wasn't until there was a TV show (not even a documentary!) that the government even started talking about doing anything meaningful (in a positive direction).

                                      Comment


                                        #20
                                        Agree with first paragraph Sean of the Shed

                                        Comment


                                          #21
                                          Originally posted by NHH View Post
                                          I'd followed this since I heard the BBC Podcast on it a couple of years' ago, and following Mr Bates vs the Post Office on ITV, this has gone stratospheric. It left me with a few questions which others might know the answers to.

                                          Whilst much attention seems to fall on Paula Vennells (and rightly so), it seems to me that this is a common-or-garden case of what happens when you pursue corporate reputation management to the exclusion of everything else (of which there far too many examples in Britain). It's horribly easy to see how senior managers ask middle managers what's happening, and get told 'nothing to see here' and then those senior managers report that conclusion to their superiors on the Board and in government, and none of these people have the knowledge to gainsay that, nor the appetite to pursue it. The campaigners are thieves, who've managed to persuade gullible people that they have a case; eventually, the pressure outside the corporate body starts to tell, but they've spent so much time digging in that they can't contemplate turning around and saying 'we were lied to by a raft of middle managers' who they then instigate legal proceedings against.

                                          What I'm not clear about is where the line between Post Office/Royal Mail and Fujitsu was under the terms of the contract. The line that the system was fine and no-one else had problems which people got when they called the helpline was the smoking gun here - but who ran the helpline? Why did they see their job to batter down the helpline callers and isolate them, rather than see this as really useful feedback on an IT system that had only just been switched on in earnest? Why didn't this information about people struggling with the system get passed onto the department that investigated fraud? What were the actual reasons why the postmasters who had problems had those problems, when lots of other people didn't seem to have them? And did the reverse of the balances being negative happen, where at the end of the day, there was more cash in the post office than there was supposed to be, and what happened to that?
                                          I have talked about the problems with Government outsourcing of IT on here for well over a decade, thee type of failures in the supply chain do not surprise me one bit.

                                          Normally, they usually end up with millions wasted rather than people committing suicide or going to jail.

                                          The biggest issue from my experience (i have not looked at this particular case to see if this matches up) is the government department not managing the customer properly. In the private sector, there would have a more robust testing phase with real end users and their feedback would be listened to. Also there would be an in house change and release management structure to make sure the application is fit for purpose.

                                          And I say this as someone who has worked for the supplier numerous times in the past (as recently as this time last year).

                                          Comment


                                            #22
                                            Horizon was the cheapest option. It finished bottom in 7 of the 9 categories. One of the developers in the Panorama program has said it was littered with bugs and needed completely rewriting.

                                            And I'll be shocked if bungs weren't paid. Fujitsu are in the news at the moment for doing so.

                                            Comment


                                              #23
                                              Give the contract to Tactical Genius

                                              Comment


                                                #24
                                                She's returning the gong. Now that distraction is over time to focus on the nearly 1,000 miscarriages of justice.

                                                Comment


                                                  #25
                                                  A gong that she was nominated for, 10 years after the scandal was first highlighted. It won't, of course, but should lead to a widespread review of the whole corrupt honours system.

                                                  Comment

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