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Why Post Office rejected Horizon review five years before witch-hunt endedMore than 700 sub-postmasters were wrongly prosecuted by the organisation for false accounting, theft and fraud between 1999 and 2015.However, internal emails show Post Office lawyers talked about investigating issues with the Horizon software as far back as 2010, but did not take action over fears it would undermine prosecutions.It was eventually found that the software which flagged shortfalls was faulty.The organisation’s head of criminal law stressed to colleagues the “consequences” of such a move would include pausing current and future prosecutions – an action which would attract “adverse publicity”.Months later, an internal review commissioned by the Post Office stated that it was important to be “crystal clear” that any investigation launched into Horizon would “need to be disclosed in court”.However, the Post Office did not divulge this information and continued to prosecute sub-postmasters and sub-postmistress – including a sub-postmistress who was sentenced to 15 months in prison while pregnant.Politicians branded the latest revelations as “dreadful” and accused the Post Office of “blocking justice”.
Post Office used threat of jail to persuade accused to keep quiet about Horizon failingsInvestigator Stephen Bradshaw admits lawyers offered lesser charges as part of company’s efforts to protect its court casesAn investigator accused of acting like a “mafia gangster” when securing false convictions against post office operators has admitted softer charges were offered in exchange for silence over the culpability of the Horizon IT system.In several instances, the accused were told they could avoid a jail sentence if they kept quiet about the accounting system’s faults, as part of an aggressive strategy by the Post Office to protect their cases as they pursued them in the courts.
Ski resort on Mt. Pelion of central Greece in full operationThe ski resort of Agriolefkes on Mount Pelion is to open on Friday, January 12, after the recent snowfall that covered all the pistes, ANA reports."Kentavron Oros", the firm managing the ski resort, announced that "we will open on Friday, 12 January, taking into account the excellent quantity and quality of the snow.
Bear from Ukrainian zoo who survived Russian invasion rehomed in ScotlandA black bear who survived the war in Ukraine has successfully been rehomed at a zoo in Scotland.Five Sisters Zoo in West Calder, West Lothian, has rescued and rehomed an Asiatic black bear named Yampil from the village of Yampil in Ukraine.Ukrainian soldiers discovered an abandoned zoo in the village when they arrived in July 2022, five months after the Russian invasion.Out of nearly 200 animals at the zoo, Yampil the bear was one of the few animals to survive the invasion.Countless animals were left behind, forced to fight for survival amid Russian attacks and cold weather.
Annie Nightingale: Trailblazing Radio 1 DJ diesRadio 1 DJ Annie Nightingale, the station's first female presenter, who went on to become its longest-serving host, has died at the age of 83.
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Sheffield cat lost in snow reunited with owners three years laterA cat who went missing in a snowstorm has been reunited with his owners three years later.Oscar disappeared from his home in Sheffield in January 2020, when he was caught in heavy snow.Owner Katie Salt, 39, said she assumed he had died.But she had a phone call from a vet saying Oscar, who was microchipped, had been found living in a garden about six miles away.
Greece Begins Process of Adopting Global Minimum Tax LawGreece’s Ministry of Economy and Finance sent its global minimum tax draft law to the Ministerial Council on Tuesday for approval.The proposal includes a domestic minimum top-up tax that levies groups in the country with a minimum 15% effective corporate tax rate and an income inclusion rule that levies the 15% rate on entities of local groups that are in foreign jurisdictions, too.The ministry highlighted that Greece’s corporate tax rate remains at 22%, and said there is no risk of multinational companies leaving the country because other jurisdictions will impose the minimum tax, too.
Three arrested in connection with child prostitution ringPolice arrested three people in different parts of Athens on Thursday on suspicion of involvement in a child prostitution ring.A 31-year-old woman and two men, aged 33 and 55, are suspected of pimping out children under the age of 15 and recording child sex abuse material, among other offenses.
Fujitsu won Foreign Office contract despite concernsFujitsu won a £184m government contract in 2021 despite concerns from officials that the system it was offering was likely to be "unfit for purpose".The Japanese-owned firm is at the heart of the long-running Post Office IT scandal.Court documents reveal the Foreign Office had originally wanted to rehire Vodafone for the contract to supply communications equipment.But it re-ran its procurement following a legal challenge from Fujitsu.Last autumn the most senior civil servant in the department told MPs scrutinising government spending that the programme to replace its communications system would also be 12 months late being delivered.Fujitsu was one of three companies bidding for a Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) contract in 2021 to replace a system of secure electronic communications connecting civil servants and diplomats across 532 sites in more than 170 countries.Officials had abandoned an earlier procurement process in 2018 following a challenge from Fujitsu.When Vodafone contested the FCDO's decision in the courts it emerged that Fujitsu's winning 2021 bid had been evaluated as having "significant deficiencies resulting in a technical solution that is likely to be unfit for purpose, and requiring workarounds".
‘Innocent’ postmaster convicted of wife’s murder ‘using Horizon evidence’ Robin Garbutt is either a cold-blooded murderer, rightly languishing in jail for battering his wife to death and then inventing a robbery at their Post Office to cover it up.Or else he is the victim of the greatest miscarriage of justice yet perpetrated by the Post Office’s defective Horizon IT system.Garbutt, 57, has spent the last 12 years in jail after being convicted in 2011 of the murder of his wife Diana, 40, at their home above the Post Office they ran together in the pretty village of Melsonby in North Yorkshire.He protests his innocence and claims that the Post Office produced evidence against him – drawing on the Horizon IT system – to show that he was stealing money to fund an extravagant lifestyle.Without the Post Office’s analysis of the Horizon evidence, claim Garbutt’s supporters, then a huge chunk of the motive for the murder – and the manner in which it was staged – disappears too.Dr Michael Naughton, a law academic at Bristol University who runs the campaign website CCRC Watch and has studied the case, said: “The prosecution used the Horizon evidence to support its claim that the motive for the murder was that Robin Garbutt was stealing money from the Post Office side of the business and he needed to kill his wife to cover it up.“Horizon was used to show he was defrauding the Post Office. I don’t know if Robin Garbutt did or did not kill his wife, but I do know that the evidence that led to his conviction is no longer reliable and every aspect has been discredited.”
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Topic: 12/01/24 (Read 1217 times)
