Mr Bates v's The Post Office

[GrannyMac]

Great post Cass. Thank goodness there are some people like you in our legal system!  

We watched the last three episodes of the docu drama last night, but have still to watch the documentary.  The sheer arrogance of those at the top whilst they were ruining lives was breathtaking!  

[klondike]

Those responsible need to be held up to forensic investigation and then criminal prosecution, otherwise the very cloth in which UK Society is clothed, is as nothing.

Fri 5 Jan 2024 22.54 GMT
The Post Office is under criminal investigation over "potential fraud offences" committed during the Horizon scandal, the Metropolitan police have confirmed for the first time.

Officers are "investigating potential fraud offences arising out of these prosecutions", for example "monies recovered from sub-postmasters [operators] as a result of prosecutions or civil actions", Scotland Yard said on Friday evening.

It is not clear whether the investigation relates to individual staff members or the Post Office as a corporate entity.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/05/post-office-criminal-investigation-potential-horizon-accounting-fraud

This was the bit I couldn't figure out from the documentary as I mentioned earlier "monies recovered from sub-postmasters [operators] as a result of prosecutions or civil actions". If there was no shortfall and the PO took their money how could that additional money have been accounted for by them?

I must get on and watch the docudrama.

[JBR]

I cannot understand why the courts did not award compensation to the victims in the order of not only every penny they were fined but in addition generous payments for the harm, imprisonment and ignominy suffered by them.

Even more importantly, why weren't the people in charge of the Post Office who assumed guilt of the sub-postmasters, especially the disgusting Vennels woman, punished appropriately?  Never mind losing her precious CBE, she should have been heavily fined and imprisoned, just as she indirectly imposed on the innocents.

I also heard nothing done to the Fujitsu people whose faulty equipment caused the problems in the first place.

Of course, I don't understand the workings of the courts.  Perhaps they themselves have legal limitations.  

[klondike]

I don't understand them either but it was a class action and not individual cases considered so I'm guessing that the proceeds are just divided between all of them and they would have to bring indvidual actions to get extra.

[JBR]

I don't understand them either but it was a class action and not individual cases considered so I'm guessing that the proceeds are just divided between all of them and they would have to bring indvidual actions to get extra.

So they should.

[Sheila]

I was reading that 50 more sub postmasters have come forward since the drama.  I feel so sorry for them.  It is a disgrace.

[Cassandra]

Fri 5 Jan 2024 22.54 GMT
The Post Office is under criminal investigation over "potential fraud offences" committed during the Horizon scandal, the Metropolitan police have confirmed for the first time.

Officers are "investigating potential fraud offences arising out of these prosecutions", for example "monies recovered from sub-postmasters [operators] as a result of prosecutions or civil actions", Scotland Yard said on Friday evening.

It is not clear whether the investigation relates to individual staff members or the Post Office as a corporate entity.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/jan/05/post-office-criminal-investigation-potential-horizon-accounting-fraud

This was the bit I couldn't figure out from the documentary as I mentioned earlier "monies recovered from sub-postmasters [operators] as a result of prosecutions or civil actions". If there was no shortfall and the PO took their money how could that additional money have been accounted for by them?

I must get on and watch the docudrama.

Quite simply, the Post Office declared it as profit. In that way Paula Vennels and her fellow miscreant Angela Van den Boegerd earnt their huge bonuses and the litigants lost their homes and in some cases their lives and very cognition. All created by the false accounting of Fujitsu, converting the excesses in liquidity that were gained within the 'system' from the sub post masters payments.

These sums were paid under duress and yes naked fear and were illegally prised from the accused 'defraudavi reddo quadruplum' money deemed incorrectly as losses via a team of Post Office internal lawyers, led by Jarnail Singh. They must have presumed that Fujitsu could prove their case. In reality no such evidence existed as the system was crook.

The corporate arrogance is stunning, Singh wrote internally in 2010 throughout the Post Office when the unfortunate Seema Misra was prosecuted. He congratulated everyone for defending so robustly the 'Attack on Horizon'. In reality he was the one in the wrong as he had no evidence to substantiate their claims of criminality we call it 'locus standi' - a place to stand.

Its called fraud in this instance, nothing less and within the 'discovery' of the eventual and overdue prosecution process, the moles evidence and revelations therein proved 'false accounting' was rampant.

As a rancid comparison, the Met are now examining possible War Crimes in Israel, but didn't investigate the biggest case of crookery right on their doorsteps. No wonder their under 'special measures' currently.

[klondike]

I think I read that there is government compensation for postmasters if they get convictions overturned

[Cassandra]

I cannot understand why the courts did not award compensation to the victims in the order of not only every penny they were fined but in addition generous payments for the harm, imprisonment and ignominy suffered by them.

Even more importantly, why weren't the people in charge of the Post Office who assumed guilt of the sub-postmasters, especially the disgusting Vennels woman, punished appropriately?  Never mind losing her precious CBE, she should have been heavily fined and imprisoned, just as she indirectly imposed on the innocents.

I also heard nothing done to the Fujitsu people whose faulty equipment caused the problems in the first place.

Of course, I don't understand the workings of the courts.  Perhaps they themselves have legal limitations. 

In cases such as these as I explained in my long post the 'procedure' progresses along a torturous path of many individual hearings. I then said as in my experience the 'Defence' then 'collapsed' the action and the whole thing resorted to an argument for compensation. Originally (2019) the abstemious P.O. defendant offered £43 million which boiled down to £12 million nett or under £20k, for each litigant (550). As in my experience, the appellants were by this time battered and weary of ongoing legal actions taking over their lives. It's like being a cancer patient and anxiously scanning the Specialists face for updates on the progress of the filthy thing that eats you from inside - each time you await the judgements.

Shamed by the piddling amount nett that these ever increasing litigants were to receive it became apparent they were also ineligible for the Historical Shortfall Scheme that was created to compensate others who were affected by Post Office and Horizon.

The scheme that was rolled out in the unique position of these postmasters to make sure they would have access to compensation on the same basis as other postmasters, who were so badly wronged by the actions of Post Office and the said Horizon system.

You must remember also that different judges have individual 'mind sets' on certain subjects and who you get can have substantive effects on the overall case as it progresses. Specifically the Defendant (P.O.) tried to get a Judge to recuse himself (pull out)  because he ruled that "Van den Bogerd did not always give frank evidence and that she sought to mislead him, and that the Post Office acted in a way which was oppressive, unfair and with an excess of secrecy."

The Post Office suggested (unsuccessfully) that he was biased against the organisation.

This move is not unusual, the same stunt was pulled on our case too. Frequently delays for quite felonious reasonings will 'appear' for delay at the start by either side(s) counsels wanting to dodge, or achieve a certain judge's availability, (sic) because of his beliefs etc. As I've said here before when I first started on the circuit, it became known quickly from my sentencing that I was not the beak to get arrayed before if the case involved cruelty to animals!

Most judges want the parties involved to settle as the process of giving costs can be long and pithy to adjudicate and consequently expensive. Over here in my new Country 'Plea Bargains' determine over 80% of disputes, so the courts are not involved in decision making. Price Andrew's case offering £12 million rightly or wrongly represents how this alternative line of action unfolds. Very often its just a simple equation of opinion as to wether it's just cheaper to pay up than to invoke a court's unknown decision?

For the 'Postmasters' in March 2023 a new compensation scheme (replacing that of 2019) was suggested by Post Office Minister Kevin Hollinrake, who stated:

"The trailblazing postmasters who exposed the Horizon scandal were instrumental in securing justice for all of those affected". "We will keep fighting for the postmasters and their families, and it is right that they will now receive full and fair compensation for the pain and suffering caused by this scandal."

No shit Sherlock!

[klondike]

Price Andrew's case offering £12 million rightly or wrongly represents how this alternative line of action unfolds.

Really can't blame Andrew for not wanting to sweat out the outcome of a full hearing. 

[JBR]

Thank you, Cassandra for further explaining the system, which I'm afraid I failed to understand earlier.
It also appears that Vennels (who most people seem to criticise) was certainly not alone in condemning and punishing the innocent postmasters.  It seems that Singh was at least as bad and, being a lawyer, should come in for serious punishment, though I'm sure he'd manage to wriggle out of it.

These words:
"Again I cannot emphasise how shocking this case is. In British legal history it has broken all records concerning contract and common law and just civil decency. Over here my brother American lawyers and Judiciaries are totally shocked not only at the level of the top-down flagrant lying, but at the disdainful levels of compensation being considered"
stood out when I read them.  I had always thought, and assumed, that the British legal system was beyond reproach, but now I see just how corrupt it can be.

Not only that, but having heard recently of the number of over-lenient sentences presently being handed down, supposedly due to prison overcrowding, I can only imagine that crime generally in this country is being actively encouraged!  What on earth is so wrong with 'six to a cell'?!

[dextrous63]

Why should a cell be big enough for 6 inmates?

[JBR]

Why should a cell be big enough for 6 inmates?

Why not?  Bunk beds, crammed together if necessary, and they would also make use of all the 'mod cons' they have like training rooms, etc.
Bear in mind that these are criminals, some of whom have robbed, injured or even killed innocent people.
Do you think they deserve four-star treatment?

And for good measure, personally I'd turn off all their heating and hot water too...

er, oh sorry Dex.  I've just remembered your post 'elsewhere'!  🤣🤣🤣

[dextrous63]

Ignoring your somewhat vicious observation about the current lack of warmth chez moi, I think you misunderstood my point.  There is no need for a prisoner to have any more space other than for a narrow bed, a toilet, a sink and a small table.  No need for the fella to be large enough to be able to squeeze any more in.  Cheaper to police, cheaper to heat, etc.  

[Cassandra]

Thank you, Cassandra for further explaining the system, which I'm afraid I failed to understand earlier.
It also appears that Vennels (who most people seem to criticise) was certainly not alone in condemning and punishing the innocent postmasters.  It seems that Singh was at least as bad and, being a lawyer, should come in for serious punishment, though I'm sure he'd manage to wriggle out of it.

Thank you too. I believe Fujitsu are deeply complicit, here by associative displacement. For the menial sums involved in first instance value terms, their commercial hubris in it's overall ignorance, is the really disturbing point though. For the sake of apologising and then working with the Postmasters to sort out the bugs and glitches they took the high ground, they have now trashed The Post Office's image, perhaps terminally, certainly enough to bankrupt it. Fujitsu should be rocked too just like 'Toshiba' before them.  Sadly for so many, the young things back then would have viewed Sub Post Masters as virtual cretins, the bottom of the social pile in comparison to their 'software' degrees. How dare they challenge 'Miss Lettice Dalrymple' with her 2:2 in computer science, her Apple phone, leased Renault Clio and maxed out Credit cards!

Were I a shareholder I'd be getting out now, lest they have extended this arrogance elsewhere in decision making attracting vast compensation as an outcome.

Vennels and Van den Bogard, to me were all too familiar examples of how management speak clones seem to impress sub standard board members today. The woman at Nat West in the 'Farage' saga is yet another example of this egotistical trend. The old saying 'The bigger they come ... etc' is all too often true in Court. I've trounced a few 'captains' of Industry in my time, through their falsely held reliance of expecting everyone to just agree with them, too used to absolute control - a "Yes man syndrome" failure. I've also been sworn and spat at 'You bastard' etc. in accompaniment afterwards, by FTSE Chairmen and CEO's as they leave to face a very different future from that to when they'd entered a short time before, swaggering with derisive and swollen self opinion.

Unfortunately to a man and woman, they all ended up a whole lot richer after contractual payouts and insurance payoffs!  One who ended up in genuine tears in the dock, did apologise fulsomely to the Court and afterwards to me in a letter I have to this day, but he was unique to my career experience.