Thread by @nickwallis

Welcome to Day 2 of R v Hamilton et al at the Court of Appeal. 42 former Subpostmasters hope to have their criminal convictions overturned. Here is Ms Hamilton arriving at the RCJ this morning flanked by her barrister Tim Moloney QC (l) and her solicitor, Neil Hudgell.

(thread)

Proceedings are due to start at 10.30am. Brian Altman QC will be speaking for the Post Office.

The clerk has informed us we will be observing the minute silence at noon in memory of the victims of COVID-19.

Seema Misra is in court today, as is Declan Salter, the new(ish) Post Office Director specifically charged with dealing with the fallout from this scandal. Neil Hudgell has taken his place in the gallery. Sam Tobin from the Press Association has to deal...

… with two other big court cases this morning, so it looks like I might be the only journalist in the main court. Others are in court 5 and watching on via the court link. There are many dozens of appellants who can’t be here who are also watching on the court link.

I think I can see Jo Hamilton in the gallery too. It looks like Janet Skinner, Nicki Arch, Tracy Felstead and other appellants here in person are in Court 5.

As far as today’s proceedings go...

(just to be absolutely clear, Nicki Arch is not an appellant - she was prosecuted by the Post Office 20 years ago, went to trial and was found not guilty. Still ruined her life though: postofficetrial.com/2019/09/i-hate…)

As far as today’s proceedings go, the plan is to hear the PO’s perspective on all this (beginning to be explored yesterday) for most of the morning, and then some to-ing and fro-ing before a possible decision on the 4 appellants who are not being opposed and the 35 appellants...

… who are being opposed by the Post Office on limb/ground 2 (G2) of the @ccrcupdate’s referrals.

However that was never confirmed and we are running late anyway, so we’ll see.

Court is sitting. Brian Altman QC (BA) is on his feet.

BA appellants were prosecuted by the same company (albeit Royal Mail or Post Office) and referred for the same reason, but they can’t be considered as one.

Time specificity is important. It is only be detailed and fact-specific analysis there was any knowledge of Horizon (H)...

… issues in the mind of the prosecutor.

BA the court should resist a one-size fits all approach to cases, some of which are separated by 13 years. We are not arguing for a case-specific analysis of each case, but not a globalised route to limb 2 finding across the board.

BA our submission is that poor investigations and lack of disclosure do not go beyond limb 1 (G1). We say a broad-brush globalised approach, however attractive, whihc the court is being invited to take, can’t achieve a just outcome.
[goes to CCRC’s reasons]

[SORRY IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER - I AM PARAPHRASING AND SUMMARISING EVERYTHING SAID AND GOING ON IN COURT. IAM NOT TWEETING VERBATIM. DIRECT QUOTES ARE IN “DIRECT QUOTES]

Sorry to shout.

BA the CCRC’s conclusion on limb 2 is “it was an affront to the public conscience to bring proceedings in any case where the reliability of H was essential”

BA it took a global approach to the balancing exercise “the CCRC remains of the view that the High Court’s findings...

… give rise to a cogent argument that individual PO prosecution that the reliability of H data… were an affront to the public conscience and should not have been brought."

[Argh. Tweetdeck has crashed and won't let me back in. There will be a gap in coverage whilst I reboot the laptop.]

[It’s okay - it let me back in. No reboot required]

BA the CCRC combined concerns it had in relation to deliberate non-disclosure and that the contract was overstated to reason that where the PO was victim, invesetigator and prosuctor it “consciously deprived” Postmasters (SPMs)

BA of the opportunity to properly defend themselves.

BA re the idea that the PO did not disclose H problem because it might have an impact on ongoing prosecution cases - well the factual background to the CCRC’s conclusion is the receipts and payments mismatch bug...

… Fujitsu being less than forthcoming, an error in 2007, Fujitsu’s employees and their relationship to the truth, Callander Square bug, Fujitsu’s knowledge of bugs not communicated to SPMs, theme contained in PO internal documents vergin on “institutional paranoia”...

[BA is summarising CCRC’s reliance on the High Court judgments of Fraser J to come to their conclusions]
BA is appears the CCRC concluded not to disclose full details of defects “because they might have an impact on ongoing legal cases” - par 457 of the H Issues judgment...

[this is Fraser J’s second big judgment - they’re listed and fisked to a greater and lesser degree on my website: postofficetrial.com/2019/08/judgme…]

[BA is reading from par 457]
"o see a concern expressed that if a software bug in Horizon were to become widely known about it might have a potential impact upon “ongoing legal cases” where the integrity of Horizon Data was a central issue, is a very concerning...

.. entry to read in a contemporaneous document. Whether these were legal cases concerning civil claims, or criminal cases, there are obligations upon parties in terms of disclosure. So far as criminal cases are concerned, these concern the liberty of the person..

… and disclosure duties are rightly high. I do not understand the motivation in keeping this type of matter, recorded in these documents, hidden from view; regardless of the motivation, doing so was wholly wrong. There can be no proper explanation for keeping...

… the existence of a software bug in Horizon secret in these circumstances.”

BA what the CCRC did not do is analyse how this affected all the referred cases.

[BA is taking the court to the receipts and payments mismatch bug analysis in the techical appendix of the H Issues judgment. Which is a monster read, but it’s extraordinarily lucid, btw. highly recommended]

BA points out RAP bug had no impact on legacy Horizon cases.

BA that is the H system before 2009/2010. Fraser J tells us this bug affected 60 branches. It was Gareth Jenkins who told Second Sight for their 2013 interim report about the RAP bug.
[BA reads from the tech appendix showing how the RAP bug affected post offices only in 2010]

BA This was fixed in Oct 2010 after a patch had been released [explains rather cogently what a software patch is]
BA the important point is that a bug which appears in H online which has no direct applicability to any of these cases is relied on by the CCRC as a finding.

Lord Justic Holyroyde (LJH) asks: was this particular bug relevant to any of the appeals?
BA only in that it should have been discolsed in Mrs Misra’s trial and that an email to the Head of Legal Rob Wilson from Mr Simpson who was at a meeting to discuss the bug raised a concern

… to Mr Wilson about the prosecution of future cases. Mrs Misra’s trial started a few days later.
But the bug itself did not affect her branch. Anyone who applied their mind to the concerns which were expressed and they should have considered if for disclosure. It ought to ...

… have been disclosed in Mrs Misra’s trial and should have been considered for disclosure in future trials. It wasn’t. we don’t know if it was incompetence, not thought about or deliberate. We accept this was a serious failing in Mrs Misra’s case, which itself was the high...

… watermark of the Post Office’s prosecution strategy.

LJH we take it there is no doc you wish to take us to which shows anyone raising any concerns about this?

BA no. Between 3 and 4 million documents have been looked at in a post disclosure exercise and no...

… one has broight an document to my attention showing any concern about this issue.

BA says his point is that the bug did not affect any of the appellants prosecuted before 2010.

Justice Picken (JP) interrupts re BA’s point on CCRC reasons.

JP listing the points which precedes BA’s “launching pad” point saying the par he is talking about starts with the word “furthermore” which suggests that that par127 has to be taken into account of all the other CCRC reasons before it.
BA accepts and says he is about...

… to get onto that point.

BA they do v much rely on the RAP bug as a key concern, and we say we have to step back and see wht they found it so persuasive in the context of how many people it affected.

BA when one thinks about the RAP bug and its date of 2010. It could not have been disclosed to appellants prosecuted before then as it didn’t exist. And the CCRC overlooked this. So to say the PO consciously deprived the appellants and the courts of information it needed in...

… all cases over all time is not right.

LJH well you can’t apply it before 2010 if there was nothing to disclose, but you’ll want to come on to Mr Stein’s submission, but even in 2013 Mr Clarke was having to give rudimentary advice about the PO’s disclosure duties...

BA I’m coming to that. But its wrong to say that PO counsel were depriving courts and defendants of full appraisal of H’s reliability over all cases over all time. When the court is determining the issue of Mrs Misra’s case and any cases thereafter, that it’s non-disclosure was..

… an affront to the public conscience… well we don’t know if it was deliberate or incompetence. The court doesn’t know if the PO was relying on duff info from Fujitsu. Like any system they had glitches and bugs - the point is what point does a system have so many bugs it...

… becomes so unreliable it is no longer robust… who decides that. At what point is a system unreliable?

BA CCRC’s analysis without any specific examples could lead to injustice...

BA

Mrs Misra pleaded guilty to Fals Accounting in March 2009. She was convicted of theft in October 2010. If the court believes her conviction is unsafe on grounds of limb 2...

… in the light of it’s failure to disclose the RAP bug, the same can’t follow in respect of her pleas of guilty to False Accounting.

Same true of Mrs Felstead convicted in 2002 and Mrs Skinner, convicted in 2007

[he’s picked three SPMs who led the way on arguing for...

… limb 2 to be argued at this court. Report and pics of them here: postofficetrial.com/2020/12/victor…]

[BA has taken court back to CCRC statement of reasons. Raising example of Mr Sabir in March 2010. Mr Sabir was a witness in the first High Court trial]
This is the quote from the Common Issues trial judgment raised by the CCRC. Par 222:
" There can be no excuse, in my judgment...

… , for an entity such as the Post Office, to mis-state, in such clearly express terms, in letters that threaten legal action, the extent of the contractual obligation upon a SPM for losses. The only reason for doing so, in my judgment...

… , must have been to lead the recipients to believe that they had absolutely no option but to pay the sums demanded. It is oppressive behaviour.”

[BA then goes to CCRC’s thoughts on this - which agree with the judgment]

BA the CCRC says it was the default position of the PO to hold SPMs responsible for all discrepancies. We concede that on limb 1, but the factual background to pars 221 and 222 of the common issues judgment was that Mr Sabir was being pursued by the PO for £360.

the PO sent him letters which Fraser J was a mistatement and that the behaviour that led SPMs to believe they had no option but to pay the sums demanded was “oppressive”. Also mrs Stubbs’ case from the Common Issues trial may have a bearing on this.
The CCRC relied on...

a finding in relation to Mr Sabir and Fraser J found no other examples of oppressive behaviour in anything but Mr Sabir’s case.

JP but par 723 says: " I agree that there is a lot to be desired from the Post Office’s behaviour as identified in the cases of the Lead Claimants...

… . I shall give four examples only.
1. Even though the Post Office’s own case on the relevant provision in the SPMC dealing with liability for losses requires negligence or fault on the part of a SPMC, this was routinely and comprehensively ignored by the Post Office...

… who sent letters of demand for disputed sums in express terms as though the SPM had strict liability for losses. These letters entirely misstated the legal basis of a SPM’s liability, even where they had been appointed under the SPMC….

[JP goes on to point out that this par shows generalised oppressive behaviour]
[BA acknowledges this, but says that was a civil case, and this is a criminal case on which the burden of proof is different]
[JP essentially having none of this]
BA what Fraser J said about the SPM...

… contract. It doesn’t apply to the 11 appellants who were just managers: Holmes, Gill, Capon, Hussein… all of them were managers and not subject to SPM contract.
Counter clerks: Felstead and Brennan
1 x officers in charge, 1 xcounter assistant
All the findings made on the SPM

… contract can ONLY apply to the SPM appellants. And the CCRC ignored this.
[BA goes back to CCRC’s conscious deprivation of info re H’s reliability and the repayment obligations]
BA it placed some weight on this and the matters it relied on - some are not relevant to some...

… of the cases.

[BA now on to those who pleaded guilty. He is reading lots of examples from the @ccrcupdate’s statement of reasons eg "Even where Post Office applicants have admitted to entering false figures into branch...

… accounts in order to conceal apparent shortfalls, the CCRC considers that, in the context of the numerous significant findings against POL in the High Court’s judgments – including the two particular findings...

…. which are set out at paragraph 127 above – there is a real possibility that the Court of Appeal will conclude that, in the words of Lord...

… Steyn in R v Latif and Shahzad, it was an “affront to the public conscience” for the criminal proceedings to take place.”]

BA says this is flawed.

BA now onto generics - the appellants arguments rely on painting a generalised picture. None of the documents brought up so far have case-sensitive limb 2 abuse. Also there is no analysis of how any potential limb 2 behaviour impacted each case.

BA in the case of Mrs Misra - the failure to disclose the RAP bug is relied on, and it is not specific to her case. This and other appellants make broad brush accusations about motives rather than relying on specific examples where limb 2 is made out.
BA let’s look at p105...

… of the skeleton argument put in on behalf of Misra, Felstead and Skinner on 12 March this year….
BA - Ms Busch relies heavily on the decision to prosecute and the responsibilities of the PO to do that in the public interest, including making decisions in a manner...

… that is fair and objective. That’s reasonable, but there can be no analysis of the failings of the prosecutor without an examination of the alleged misconduct of the prosecutors. The High Court did not hear from any of them. This is extrapolation and wrong.

BA the argument is made that PO ought to have known how its own system worked. The reference is to par 1018 of the HI judgment: "The Post Office ought to have known how its own system works. It is agreed...

… by the experts that an SPM cannot record a dispute on Horizon at all. Indeed, this point was so very clearly conceded by Mr Godeseth when he was asked about it in cross examination that it was remarkable. He explained that there was no “dispute” button on Horizon...

… , and that this was something expressly and deliberately done by design. Yet there were two substantial points in issue in the Common Issues trial on this very same subject. One was the ability of a SPM to dispute...

… the figures shown on Horizon. The second was whether, in law, a branch trading statement had the effect of what is called a settled account between agent and principal (which would mean that certain legal consequences would flow if it were). Judgment No.3 found...

… in favour of the claimants, and against the Post Office, on both those points. It is therefore more than a considerable surprise to see that, as a matter of evidence in the later...

… Horizon Issues trial, those points should never have been put in issue by the Post Office at all.”

Ms Busch argues in her skeleton that the PO ought to know how it’s own system worked.

BA let’s go to the Common Issues judgment in which Fraser J deals with- evidence from Helen Dickinson - Security Team Leader.

BA reads out what Fraser J had to say about it:

" Mrs Dickinson did not know that there was no “dispute” button on the...

…. Horizon system and that even disputed items by the SPMs had to be “accepted”, so far as the Horizon system is concerned. This is a surprising omission in the knowledge of someone whose field includes dealing with potentially dishonest SPMs...

…. She had only limited knowledge of the Horizon system, although she had been given some initial training (on a course with SPMs) and said she had picked things up since. She said that the number of days’ training was...

… "Three. And then basically you pick things up as you go along. But ultimately I wouldn't work on the Horizon system because then that could cause a conflict with me investigating a matter.”

BA someone of that seniority in the PO didn’t know the system, the idea that...

… someone of that seniority didn’t know the system suggests that the decision-makers would have no idea.

LJH I just do not understand this point. They idea that they should know is not defeated by the fact they didn’t. It’s an admission, not a challenge.

BA I’m not….

… challenging that. But how much ought they to have known? How much should they understand about where the risk is

Justice Farbey: they should know sufficient not to prosecute irresponsibly

BA lets move away from PO and look at CPS. It prosecutes on fact provided by expertised outwith its own knowledge - eg expert DNA evidence. I accept that with Fujitsu contract - more knowledge was better than none - but that’s not to do with prosecuting irresponsibly...

… at what point should the PO not rely on info from Fujitsu.

Where Fujitsu provided evidence or Gareth Jenkins to be an expert witness, at what point should they disregard us - which brings us to the Clarke Advice where Simon Clarke noted the evidence about bugs given...

… by Gareth Jenkins to Second Sight - it was at that point Simon Clarke wrote the advice he did.

LJH we’re going to take a break now - but just to let you know you have touched on some of the issues raised by Ms Busch re who knew what when.

BA I will be coming to that.

LJH I thought you might be.

[court rises so all can observe the minute silence at noon. Court will be back in session at 12.05pm]

I am lucky enough only to have been tangentially touched by the horrors of the last year. This is an extraordinary meditation on grief from 2019:

johnpavlovitz.com/2019/02/21/eve…

[The only note I’ll make about the morning’s proceedings are re Helen Dickinson, a PO security team fraud “expert” investigating Subpostmasters over Horizon discrepancies. She did not know how Horizon worked. Nor it turns out had she heard of Enron:
postofficetrial.com/2018/11/bates-…]

[we’re back]
[BA is quoting from Fraser J once more]
" a number of contemporaneous documents internal to the Post Office show that there has been, at least to some degree, an awareness of Horizon problems within the Post Office itself over a number of years….

… A number of these documents were put to the different Post Office witnesses….

… These documents were referred to in the transcript of proceedings, but not all of the documents were put. I did however tell counsel for both parties that I would read all of the documents in preparing this judgment and neither party objected to my doing that."

[judgment goes through several docs]
Concludes: "These internal Post Office entries make it clear that, notwithstanding the tenor of the Post Office evidence before me, behind the scenes there were at least a number of...

… people within the Post Office who realised that there were difficulties with the Horizon system. Some of these entries relate specifically to some of the Lead Claimants, for example Mrs Stubbs. Whether the internally expressed reservations then, or the...

…. different position expressed now by the Post Office, is the correct one is something that will only be resolved after the Horizon Issues trial.”

[BA’s point is that Fraser J did not make any findings of fact on these points “because he did not have to”]

[BA now taking us to 960 of Horizon Issues judgment]
" In my judgment, a number of both the Post Office’s own internal documents, and Fujitsu ones too, namely those that were not drafted for public consumption, plainly support my conclusions on the evidence. Further...

… certain matters that have emerged in the Horizon Issues trial – such as discussions within Fujitsu itself as to whether the Post Office should be told certain detrimental information about the Horizon system, and the Post Office’s own decision...

… at the highest level not to investigate certain matters as recently as 2016 – are of great concern. The Post Office has gone to great lengths over the years, and spent a great deal of time and a huge amount of public money, in defending the performance of Horizon….

…. It is also the case that the Post Office must have been reliant on Fujitsu to a certain degree in terms of being provided with accurate information of a technical nature. That is not only obvious from the evidence, but has also been agreed by the experts...

… in the 3rd Joint Statement. That accuracy from Fujitsu has not always been available, as demonstrated by this judgment.”

[BA is making the point that Fraser J did not investigate who knew when what. So we don’t know.]

BA Ms Busch says limb 2 does NOT turn on who knew what when. We disagree. These prosecutions were made by human actors. What they knew was essential. There is a world of difference between negligence, incompetence, grossly incompetent and someone who didn’t do their job...

… properly.
BA if these arguments turn on limb 2 and my point is right then - quoting your lordship - G2 may substantially turn on whether material was available at the time when making decisions re proecutions. It DOES turn on who knew what when at ground level.

BA apart from the RAP bug and the email exchange between senior people in the day before Mrs Misra’s trial - there has to be something which distinguishes limb 2 from limb 1 - relevant knowledge, by the relevant decision maker in the relevant case

JP the appellants say...

… there was a cultural mindset about which this court can decide, because the decision-makers were following a cultural mindset
BA that proposition is a very dangerous one. When did it start? When did it stop? Who propogated it? Did everyone subscribe to it? Independent counsel

JP the Clarke Advice demonstrates that was the case? That someone suggested not to write anything down
BA I’ll come to that. And when I do, the court might change its mind about what Mr Stein had to say about the Clarke Advice yesterday.
LJH the CPS could launch a ...

… prosecution on the basis of DNA, even if the scientist concerned knew full well his work was shoddy. but if the CPS knew the evidence to be shoddy, it couldn’t prosecute. Somewhere in between those two extremes, the “ought to have known” comes into play and I’d be grateful...

… for your assistance on this subject.
BA it’s a difficult one to confront
LJH that’s why I asked you to assist
BA is it the right question though? What ought they have known and what might they have known is relevant.

BA we are lawyers, not engineers, not computer engineers, what should they have known? If they should have known something, how much? Or could they rely on assumptions about reliability. In Fraser J’s pars on the meaning of robustness, his ultimate finding was that Ho was more...

… robust than lH - does that mean it could be relied on more.

JP you say criminal law is not a question of constructive knowledge - no one is putting the PO in the doc here. Surely abuse is a looser concept?

BA it’s an issue of evidence. As a matter of evidence, when one...

… speaks about the criminal law of knowledge.

JP no one is sauing the PO is guilty of a criminal offence. We’re asking the question if the PO is guilty of abuse.

JP bearing in mind the question, why is constructive knowledge not relevant to the company

BA because we are looking at the decision-makers

JP the PO brought the prosecution

BA bit it operates through human actors

JP but it prosecutes as a company

BA but if you ask what...

… they should have known, the question is how much?

BA I understand your lorship’s point an what went wrong here and it did go wrong, we need to find out what the decision-makers on the ground knew

LJH accepting for a moment everything you said...

… if we get down to the prosecutor on the ground - is what s/he knew and what s/he ought to have known.

BA certainly the former, and only the latter if we have a definition of what ought to be known.

BA I’d like to prsent to the court how PO was reliant on Fujitsu...

BA via example from Fraser J’s judgment. Par 459:

" In my judgment, however, there are sufficient entries in the contemporaneous documents to demonstrate not only that Fujitsu has been less than forthcoming in identifying the problems that have been...

… experienced over the years, but rather the opposite. The majority of problems and defects which counsel put to Mr Godeseth [a Fujitsu witness], and which were effectively admitted by him, simply would not have seen the light of day without this group litigation."

Par 652.8: "It is obvious that the Post Office has had to rely upon Fujitsu to a large degree. However, given it was Fujitsu who told the Post Office what the Known Error Log contained...

… – see further [586] above – Fujitsu has, so far, shown itself not to be entirely reliable in this respect. Fujitsu are also responsible for the Post Office making a directly incorrect important statement in its EDQ about...

…[EDQ is an electronic documents questionnaire] retention of KEL [Known Erroe Log]s, which led to the disclosure of about 5,000 of these some months after the trial closed."

934: “… Fujitsu had powers which, until shortly before the trial started, Fujitsu sought to keep from the court, and may not even have fully disclosed to the Post Office...

… Because the extent of these powers was kept secret in this way, the Post Office finds itself now having made misleading public statements previously….

[onto par 935…]

"Fujitsu personnel routinely refer in such documents to the known existence of bugs, without this (so far as the documents deployed in the trial are concerned) being communicated to the SPM in question in these terms….

… In places there is even debate at Fujitsu shown in the documents about whether the Post Office and/or SPMs should be told. I do not see how a thorough, professional and conscientious organisation can have produced for disclosure in this litigation...

… so many thousands of KELs during 2019 itself, both during and even after the trial. I reject that description; it is an inaccurate description of Fujitsu and/or its investigative motivation.”

BA so when one speaks about withering criticism, that was withering crit...

…icism of Fujitsu.

BA takes us back to par 960: "It is also the case that the Post Office must have been reliant on Fujitsu to a certain degree in terms of being provided with accurate information of a technical nature.”]

BA 995: "I also consider that although the Post Office did have access to “the causes of alleged shortfalls in branches, including whether they were caused by bugs, errors and/or defects in the Horizon system”, this had to be obtained through Fujitsu...

… . This should be recorded for completeness. The evidence does not show the Post Office IT department either being capable of investigating directly itself, or if it was capable of doing so, actually undertaking this….

… All investigations recorded in PEAKs and KELs show that Fujitsu did this. The terms of the experts’ agreement in this respect was that the Post Office was “reliant upon Fujitsu for diagnosis of whether the occurrence of shortfalls was caused by bugs/errors...

… or defects within the Horizon system.” I find that the Post Office plainly was reliant upon Fujitsu in this way.”

BA can I remind the court in annex 2 to the CCRC’s statement of reasons, Fraser J’s statement to the court on handing down his judgment about the very grave...

… concerns about the veracity of evidence provided by Fujitsu employees to the civil and criminal courts.

[I was there, read it here: postofficetrial.com/2020/01/horizo…]

BA - in LB QC’s assertion in the table of her submissions that PO knew or F knew about a bug doesn’t begin to engage with how they knew and what they knew. And the dangers of doing this can be seen when we look in detail at reported PEAKs - [he finds and read som which are…]

[… not to deal with bugs or data loss when a base unit was replaced]
BA if you look at what PO was told was that the situation was resolved. So taking just one PEAK as an example, if known, is not going to put anyone from PO on notice about the reliabilirt of H software...

… because it was, pure and simple, a hardware issue.

BA - Fraser J was assisted by two expert witnesses - no appellant is asking this court to properly extrapolate what was going on in a PEAK. PEAKS have many causes including user error. We would invite caution because...

… of the mere fact PEAKS have been laid out to you.

LJH - you say PEAKS would be expected

BA no system and H was a prime example of this will ever be bug free - glitches, power outages… this case is about non-disclosure, not about a bug-free system

BA on the issue of...

… Gareth Jenkins - is what it led to was the sift reivew - a post-convictions disclosure exercise, in which the Second Sight interim report was to be disclosed in cases where Cartwright King deemed appropriate and the Helen Rose report, because it indicated GJ had knowledge...

… of an issue which came up in Lepton.

GJ gave oral evidence only once 14 Oct 2010 in the case of Mrs Misra. In the cases before the court where he provided witness statements were Hughie (noel) Thomas and Khayam Issaq

I am not seeking to pre-judge the ongoing police...

… investigation. It relied not only on Fujitsu, but on Gareth Jenkins and other F employees. When I say PO I say RMG, Cartwright King other lawyers prosecuting and not forgetting independent counsel.

BA to move on to Mr Stein’s submissions. The skeleton arguments for Mr...

… Stein’s five appellants (including Scott Darlington - great interviewee in our R4 series).

BA Mr Stein heads one section “cumulative effects of PO behaviour” - he asserts the PO’s behaviour must be seen in the round. “The poss suggestion that the actions of the PO…

… should be considered case by case is unsupportable by commons sense…. all decisions on disclosure were made in the context of proecting the PO at all costs and to the detriment of the SPM.”

BA a sweeping statement with no evidence. Yes I accept there were unacceptable...

… representations of reflecting H and there are other examples in cases not before the court. I accept that. but to say every single disclosure decision was tainted without evidence is not a representation this court shoulc act upon. He goes on…

the concept of bad character...

should be considered, as should the number of cases still comeing forward… reprehensible behaviour of the PO witnesses at the High Court were ONLY concerned with reputational protection… it goes to bad character and corporate malfeasance.

BA state of mind? whose? how is it...

… evidenced? ref to the High Court is not specific to these cases. Bad character and corporate malfeasance? who exactly? why?

BA the acts of PO personnel - post-incident - post-incident conducts isn’t nec in the jurisdiction of this court’s considerations

BA this doesn’t help the court - it’s so sweeping broad and unspecific it is unhelpful and unfair. It can’t be dealt with.

LJH wants to know more about not every appellant being an SPM - subject to the contract point, is there any material difference in their cases?

BA no

LJH thought not. good.

[court rises for lunch. Back at 2pm]

If you would like to find out more about this story, please put a few quid in my crowdfunding pot - you can get on the secret emails, and buy an advance copy of my forthcoming book. Or just read into the...

…. post office trial website for free!

postofficetrial.com/2021/02/crowdf…

[About to get going again. I have managed to charge the laptop back up to 81% and the phone is on reserve battery. I never thought I’d pine for the Rolls Building (the business and commercial part of the High Court)]

[but it had power in abundance and relatively comfortable chairs. The Victorians held no truck with ergonomics]
[we’re back]

Brian Altman QC (BA) for the Post Office is back on his feet. He is having a go at Tim Moloney QC’s skeleton. TM reps a lot of appellants and led the way yesterday.

BA whilst concession were made on abuse of process on the facts for limb 1 for three cases...

… concessions on limb 2 have been made only in four cases, again on the facts.

BA it is submitted that the inherent danger of adopting a global approach without looking at specific cases. Balance is needed. Such as time period as to when alleged offences took place. ...

… frequency of offence, which version of Horizon (H) was being used, the underlying facts - was there a confession before a plea? Impact of failures to investigate or of diclosure in each case. The cases range from 2000 to 2013. A tenable argument for limb 2 from 2010...

… may not be a tenable argument for a case prosecuted in 2001. They are not just fact sensitive, they are time sensitive. Reliance on H itself was not wrong.
We don’t complain on reliance on a disparate array of documentation from the late disclosure of documentation...

… does not allow limb 2 to be argued in every case. If it shows an individual in a bad light it doesn’t cast doubt on the actions of others.
If there is only one such example how does it apply to everyone, or how does it apply to those before it is written?

BA mentions TM’s note about PO’s decision to prosecute as a way of asset-recovery and how that motivated PO… let’s look at the actual memo he refers to, shall we?[refers to bundle]
It’s dated 8 Feb 2006 - it’s not about an appellant - Memo says: defendant has agreed to plead...

… guilty for false accounting AND agreed to pay outstanding amount. Do we want to go for a POCA as it brings the defendant into “criminal lifestyle”?
BA now set against TM’s submission you might think this memo was improper? This defendant was charges with two POCA offenses...

… as well as false accounting. This memo is about acceptability of plea.
[now referring to prosecutors code current at that time]
BA quoting LJH prior decisions re POCA and improper motivation for prosecution.
BA theres nothing wrong with this memo - it was actually...

… carrying out a mandatory exercise. We say that criticism based on this document is completely misplaces. The memo was talkina bout the acceptability of the please being offered. No the charging decision.
[BA goes to another example]

[Please note all my tweets summarise and paraphrase everything being said in court. Nothing is a direct quote unless it is in “direct quotes”]

BA - TM talks about prosecutions being in the “business interest” and says this should not happen. The document he refers to is in the bundle - an email from Jarnail Singh - PO in-house senior lawyer to Martin Smith a solicitor at Cartwright King. Subject is someone who isn’t...

… an appellant. Memo says that it is not in the public interest to proceed with prosecution. It must be communicated that this has nothing to do with Horizon integrity, but more to do with the healrth of the defendant.
BA TM says this is about a business interest decision...

… when it clearly says it’s about the public interest.

BA the PO was not in the business of prosecutions. It provided services. When it did prosecute it was proper to take the business interest into account as part of the public interest. It was not motivated by financial...

… interest in proecuting. If it was, more would have been made of this, rather than just this one document.

BA this document is not about improper motives.

LJH your submission is that it is not in the interest of the complainant or the public interest

BA yes. Finally TM refers to a suggestion to a defendant’s solicitor that providing ARQ data...

… was expensive, irrelevant and pointless. This was about Seema Misra. The memo states that Horizon comes from Fujitsu - Fujitsu is not an associated company of the post office. Requesting 2.5 years of data and it will take 6-8 weeks to produce. in order to provide the data...

F wants to know what is required and for what period. Also - why is the data relevant? The retrieval of data from F is not a free service. Please give further information about the data you require. I’ve set out the matter above quite clearly because in the past many thousands...

… of pounds have been spent on getting this data and then the defendant makes it a guilty plea, wasting a great deal of time and money.

BA goes back to another doc quoted by TM on 4 August 2009 to John Longman saing that due to the size of the ARQ request because it takes up...

… a lot of our contractual ARQ requests. For lumpy defence requests we can obtain a quote from F for the work. Defence can then pay up, seek legal aid or seek a court order to get us to pay. We make this point in case it’s one of the usual attempts to muddy the water.

BA this is not a refusal. Indeed the judge agreed the ambit of the request was too wide. It was narrowed, and some ARQ data was provided.

LJH so the PO had a contract with F for a modest number of ARQ request and that had the effect of inhibiting the number of PO requests.

BA yes, but that’s not to say the PO didn’t get the data, they did, just that there were other deserving cases. Rightly or wrongly a request...

… for data for 2.5 years was not considered reasonable. A smaller request was.

Justice Farbey asks re a memo if a factor operating on the PO’s mind that if someone pleaded guilty it could make their data requests pointless

BA i don’t know, I'm not in their way of thinking, but all I would say is that there is a cost attached to the ARQ retrieval. Also depends on whether there is an admission. There are a number of factors that go into this. It’s not a felicitously worded email, it’s an internal...

… email, but we say it doesn’t mean anyone is at fault. Care needs to be taken when reading this emails so too much isn’t read into them, or that they are applied across the board.

BA moves on to appellant Carl Page and what is being said on his behalf by Mr Saxby QC…

[the Carl Page story is quite something - I do hope to tell it in full one day]

BA Saxby says the role of PO as privte prosecutor is an important consideration on limb 2…. PO had a desire to preserve confidence in its own H system even if it leads to miscarriages of justice.
But there is no order for costs or compensation in Mr Page’s case.

[BA now addressing the comments made yesterday]

BA you remember TM said prosecutions from 2 or 3 a year prior to H to 14 or 15 after the introduction. Peters and Peters (PO solicitors) have been busy overnight on this. in 1996 there were 11 prosecutions fo SPMS in 1997 22,

in 1998, 41. The only gap in info is what we can’t say if they were on discrepancies or shortfalls. In 1999 there were 60 in total. It’s not beleived any were H based.

In 2000 there were 6 in
2001 - 41
2002 - 64
2003 - 56
2004 - 59

… 2005 - 68
2006. -69
2007 - 50
2008 - 48
2009 - 70
2010 - 55
2011 - 44
2012 - 50
2013 - 56

there was an increase, but not such an increase that it should put the PO on notice there was an issue. H had an inbuilt detection of fraud, so there might be an anticipation of increases in detection of fraud.

LJH 6 in 2000?
BA yes
LJH in 2012?
BA 50
LJH ah - I thought...

… you said 15.
BA my fault

BA the percentage of those cases being prosecuted given the scale of the network, it is still extremely small

BA now let’s move to the minutes and their retention raised by Sam Stein QC, you will be familiar with the issue because of his disclosure..

… application. The court is aware of the context of this matter. The context is set out in detail of our response of the 3 march 2021 to Mr Stein’s disclosure skeleton. To summarise the position. An individual - Mr Scott - had a wholly erroneous view of disclosure obligations...

… it came to the attention of the PO senior lawyer and he asked Cartwright King to advise. An email from Jarnail Singh to marin smith of CK. “I know Simon is deciding on disclosure” can he look into the common myth - if it’s produced then it’s available for disclosure...

… possibly true of civil cases, not true of criminal?
BA we will see this was nipped in the bud extremely quickly and was escalated to general counsel of the PO
LJH - Mr Scott’s shredding instructions of 31 July 2013… where is that?
[bundle tab is given]

LJH that was the date Mr Clarke learned about this - not the date when someone gave the instruction that documents should be shredded.
BA I think it’s at the end of July my Lord. There are two documents the court has… dated 16 Aug 2013 from Susan Crichton PO GC to Andy Cash...

… at CK. That advice was prepared as a consequnce of statements made as a result of discussion re the H system. A key purpose of those calls is to discuss H system. CK are asked to attend those calls so you are aware of issues with H so prosecutions can be conducted properly...

… I am therefore deeply concerned to hear that any minutes should be destroyed
[Susan Crichton goes on to say that no H info was destroyed, that destroying minutes is not a policy of PO, this will not and should not happen and every meeting will be minuted thereafter]

[it becomes formalised in a protocol note - all info is kept, all meetings are properly minuted]
Justice Picken what is the date of Susan Crichton’s note
BA 13 Oct 2013
[we move on]
LJH when was the last H prosecution?
BA I think it was 2015…
[much discussion]

BA 2 people in 2014 - it stopped thereafter

[BA moves on]

BA Mr Stein referred to these as mnutes of the calls they are an individual’s notes and if one goes over the page to 7 Aug 2013 note “minutes will be taken by legal” - so not saying minutes will not be taken...

BA the other important note to observe… as you are aware the minnutes of the meeting in question have actually been disclosed to the appellants, so no meeting minutes were destroyed. No other such material has been found by the PO. It would have been disclosed. There is no basis

… for Mr Stein’s allegation that the Post Office destroyed documents.

[BA moves on]
BA TM criticises PO for not starting an investigation into Horizon - re a document about challenged to Horizon. The PO commissioned Mr Ismay to conduct an internal review of H reliability. It was independent of F who they had relied on in the past. Mr Ismay’s...

… conclusion was that H was reliable. This was not in a vaccum. Ernst and Young and Deloitte were among their advisors and Mr Ismay says he has discussed media reports with E&Y and Deloitte.
[BA starts talking about the Fraser J conclusions over E&Y’s reports about H....

… super-user access]
BA - TM says there should have been an independent rather than internal review, but there was a discussion with independent advisors. It did not happen in a vacuum. The report was not about H’s reliability, but a discussion about whether an independent...

… review was necessary in the light of media reports.
BA - TM says failure to commission an independent report was shameful and culpable - given the report found H reliable - it’s not clear how it can progress to need further investigation. Bear in mind there was no evidence...

… Horizon was unreliable. Just media reports. The decision not to pursue an independent report needs to be see in that context.

[BA goes to point about a press article about H unreliability being put on a sensitive schedule so it was kept fro the court]
BA this was not being kept secret - the defendant in the case - not an appellant -

- was the person who raised it with the Post Office - so it wasn’t being kept from her.

LJH hang on a minute. it was put on a sensitive schedule. Why

BA because the lawyer involved didn’t know what she was doing

LJH who signed it off

BA she did, Natasha Bernard

LJH is there

… no reviewing signature?

LJH is this not an example of the culture

BA No. It’s the activity of one person I’m not trying to justify it

LJH where’s the letter saying I’m sorry Ms Bernard you’ve got this wrong

BA we don’t have one. I’m not trying to justify this… I’m just

… answering a point by TM that it was available to the defence.

[we move on]
[BA is now summing up why limb 2 abuse is not appropriate for the vast majority of the cases before th court]
BA we submit that by adopting on a global approach reliant on a series of factors...

… unless anyone can point to the specific case applicable to all the appellants before the court, then it can’t be limb 2. Without careful analysis of each case and each limb 2 factor making out limb 2 is difficult.
[he is done]
[Tim Moloney QC stand up]
TM raises...

… issue of rough numbers of prosecutions. He was sent figures via FOI request which contain very different figures - the FOI categorises prosecutions as to whether they were SPMs or Assistants and others

1992 - 3
1993 - 2
1994 -

LJH we can have the email - could all parties..

… agree what the figures are.

Yes, it is a cause of concern to hear there were 6 in 2000 when the figures we have is 45.

LJH yes I can see you point, perhaps we can come to agreement.

TM just on BA’s point that there is no evidence on limb 2 for the appellants...

TM - firstly so far as Fujitsu is concerned. BA has sought to say that PO relied on F for a lot of what it knew and perhaps seeks to shift some of the blame to F’s door during these proceedings. BA read from par 935 of the HI judgment by Fraser J

but he didn’t read all of that par

[this is what it says in full]
" I have explained above at [172] how the Post Office sought to draw a particularly glowing reference in Fujitsu’s favour from the evidence of Mr Roll in their closing...

… submissions. The Post Office stated that from his evidence “….a clear picture emerged of Fujitsu as an organisation which was thorough, professional and conscientious and which took considerable care to ensure that matters were properly investigated and dealt with."

TM there has been a shift. The PO represented F as an excellent organisation. Even in the closing submissions of the GLO. All submissions so far before the court of appeal. Nothing in any written or oral submissions before today. Now, instead of blaming SPMs it seems the PO...

… wishes to blame Fujitsu.
TM Fraser J makes it clear that the PO had everything it needed to get the information it needed from Fujitsu.

TM quotes Fraser J 913:

" I can see no sensible or justifiable reason for the Post Office’s reluctance to consult the audit data in cases of serious dispute with SPMs, in particular the types of dispute which form the subject of this case, and without doubt...

… , any dispute that involves criminal proceedings against SPMs. I also consider the same point applies in relation to internal Post Office proceedings that lead to the suspension or termination of SPMs. Acceptance of that point does not mean...

… that that the audit data has to be consulted for every transaction correction issued by the Post Office. As can be seen from the passage of cross-examination at [908] above, the Post Office effectively jumped to the issue of whether audit data should be consulted...

… before issuing every single TC. Mr Coyne accepted it was not necessary to do that. That is not the same as accepting it should not be consulted in circumstances where there was a dispute between the Post Office and SPMs."

TM goes to 920 of the HI judgment: " That charges are raised by Fujitsu to the Post Office is not an adequate answer, in my judgment, to the Post Office’s failure to consult or provide the audit data in cases such as those in...

… [912] above. There are some contemporaneous references within Post Office documents suggesting this may have been a disincentive in some cases to raising ARQ requests of Fujitsu. Further, there are numerous references within Post Office documents...

… (at a high level) of the very great cost to the Post Office of the Horizon system generally, that cost being paid to Fujitsu. Fujitsu were said in one document to see the contract with the Post Office...

… as a “cash cow”. This entry came in a document (parts of which were redacted, which I record simply for completeness) dated 17 January 2017 which were the minutes of the Post Office Group Executive Meeting of that date."

923: " Such private commercial arrangements between the Post Office and Fujitsu are a matter for the Post Office and Fujitsu. They do not, in any way, justify any failure to seek the audit data – the best evidence...

… – in cases where SPMs are being suspended and/or having their appointments terminated, particularly in circumstances where there are so many bugs acknowledged as existing, and also at...

… a time (much earlier than this judgment in 2019) when Fujitsu knew there were bugs in Horizon such as Dalmellington and Callendar Square, and also given the Credence data has been shown to have been wrong on occasion...

…. There is quite enough in issue in this litigation as it is, without widening it to include the way the Post Office deals with its commercial arrangements with Fujitsu."

Onto 924:

"Finally on this point, I am surprised that the desirability - if not the actual and basic need - to consult the audit data is a controversial point. In my judgment...

… it is not only good practice to consult the audit data, given the very purpose of audit data within a complex IT system such as this one, but it is also obvious common sense. There is little point in having audit data if it is not consulted in the circumstances...

… that I have identified above. I appreciate that the audit data itself will not be immediately comprehensible to some SPMs. There may also be charges raised by Fujitsu in respect of such requests. However, neither of these are reasons for the failure to consult it….

… I also make no findings on whether Fujitsu are, or are not, entitled to raise charges and if so how much. Those latter two points were not fully argued before me, and Fujitsu were not represented."

TM goes onto Mr Latif (as BA said the Fraser J judgments was about a small number of individuals):

928. "The approach by the Post Office to the evidence of someone such as Mr Latif demonstrates a simple...

.. institutional obstinacy or refusal to consider any possible alternatives to their view of Horizon, which was maintained regardless of the weight of factual evidence to the contrary...

… That approach by the Post Office was continued, even though now there is also considerable expert evidence to the contrary as well (and much of it agreed expert evidence on the existence of numerous bugs)."

TM goes onto the report which decided not to commission an independent investigation into H.

TM if one starts from the proposition that H is robust, one reaches the conclusion that any steps to mitigate risks are not proportionate.

TM takes BA to task on Helen Dickinson’s evidence and how Mr Justice Fraser presents it. Par 458 "Mrs Dickinson is a fraud specialist and it is simply inconceivable that she was not familiar with the Enron case, at least in outline terms...

… . I reject her evidence that she did not know about Enron, which I find incapable of belief. The only reason to claim ignorance, as she did, was simply to be unhelpful, which is what I find she was being.”

459: "With respect to Mrs Dickinson, and...

.. in any event, in my judgment her evidence wholly misses the central point that is at issue in this litigation. I entirely accept that the Post Office requires its SPMs to be honest, and I do not believe that point to be in issue. If it is, it should not be. ..

The central point in this litigation is that the Claimants’ case is that due to the Horizon system, shortfalls and discrepancies appeared in their accounts through no fault on their part. They however maintain they were...

… treated in a great number of cases as though they were dishonest, with all that entails, even though they were not. Explaining the importance of fraud detection and prevention measures is not relevant to whether these SPMs were or were not engaged in fraudulent accounting...

… , or in resolving the very large number of legal and factual disputes between the parties.”

460: Mrs Dickinson did not know that there was no “dispute” button on the Horizon system and that even disputed items by the SPMs had to be “accepted”, so far as the Horizon...

… system is concerned. This is a surprising omission in the knowledge of someone whose field includes dealing with potentially dishonest SPMs. She had only limited knowledge of the Horizon system...

… , although she had been given some initial training (on a course with SPMs) and said she had picked things up since. She said that the number of days’ training was:...

“A. Three. And then basically you pick things up as you go along. But ultimately I wouldn't work on the Horizon system because then that could cause a conflict with me investigating a matter.”

461: " It is not clear why having more detailed knowledge of Horizon...

… , or even having worked on Horizon, would cause her a conflict in the way she explained. Logic would suggest that an investigator might be assisted by having more - or even some - detailed knowledge of how Horizon worked; at the very least...

… I would expect her to know the options available to a SPM if they were faced with (say) a TC that would affect their branch accounts with which they disagreed. In my judgment, an investigator such as Mrs Dickinson ought...

… to have a detailed knowledge of how Horizon works, certainly in terms of the options available to a SPM at the end of a trading period, as otherwise she would not know if a SPM she was investigating was telling her the truth or not.”

462."In any event, her evidence does demonstrate the Post Office’s default position regarding their SPMs. This is that shortfalls and discrepancies are not caused by the Horizon system, therefore those that do occur can only be the responsibility of SPMs."

TM is onto disclosure. says that we don’t know if lack of disclosure was incompetence or deliberate, but when we find someone doing something deliberately it’s one rogue actor.
TM we say in respect of disclosure there is no evidence, he has called...

… no evidence, being in control of it. He says it’s not relative to our cases, but we say it is indicative.

[I’m afraid TM is going too fast for me…]

TM the way in which PO proceeded where the reliability of H was an affront to justice and the approach taken by the PO in this case reflects the way they did in the GLO. They said - you cannot link a bug to each of these...

… of these claimants. Now they are saying because we can’t link a bug to the appellants there is no case.

We say where H was essential to a prosecution there is a ground 2 abuse.

But the PO says unless there is somerthing more then the conduct of the PO is not entitled to G2

THis ignores the institutional condcut of the PO. Ignoring how people who worked hard and worked well and suddenly became criminals. The facts set out by BA do not militate G2 conclusoins - we say they actually support it. The court can look at this case by case.

We say the full case it does not need to be known. H being essential to their prosecution is G2 and G2 is made out. The PO was institutionally incapable of acting impartially in these prosecutions and didn’t. Nothing precludes the finding of G2 abuse.

G2 is on the relationship between the prosecutor and the court, not between the prosecutor and the defendant.

There is still no explantation from the PO that there were such fialings in disclosure. There is no explanation from the PO as to why they didn’t heed the warnings...

… from the pilot and testing of H. Why they ignored the concerns of SPMs, why they did not commission an indepdent investigation as to why there were difficulties with H or why there were failings in disclosure.

G2 is made out in relation to each case before it.

LJH your submission is that whatever the assessment by the respondent is that this isn’t mere non-disclosure or to investigate a fact properly - you are saying the same failures justifying a g1 finding justify a g2 finding.

TM yes because it’s systemic

Justice Picken - which amounts to a degradation of the criminal justice system

TM yes

Sam Stein on his feet asks if we can stay on even if tho it is 4pm as some QCs have trials

LJH we have to finish at 4.30pm. Mr Saxby

[Oliver Saxby QC via videolink]

OS we say with regard to

post-conviction conduct it IS relevant in Mr Page’s case. To put it another way the decision to prosecute in 2005, the whole period from 1999 to 2019 has to be viewed as a whole. events post-2005 in Mr Pages’ case have a specific relevance. They reveal that had the PO...

… been doing their job properly, Carl Page would never have been prosecuted. Had it been doing its job properly, it would know that. Establishing what the PO did or didn’t know in 2005, Mr Page is utterly in the PO’s hands. Provably flawed disclosure systems.

As far as further observations are concerned the PO say “there are any number of reasons where the PO may have accepted a plea on the basis of a lower figure” with respect to the PO feeling forced into accepting a plea on the basis of something he hadn’t done was to Mr Page’s...

… advantage. Also the fact there was not a POCA or confiscation order was because the PO had already bankrupted him. He had no assets to confiscate.
Mr Page points out that when the PO went after him, the police had decided not to pursue him…
[he goes on… Carl Page’s story...

… is quite the most amazing thing. I’ll see if I can interview him after all this is over]
OS the affront to justice test is met

[now onto Mr Gordon]
G - Dawn O’Connell is not here today she passed away. Her claim is met by her son. Her son and brother are in court today. After being convicted, Do’C’s health declined and her personality changed. She became reclusive. She struggled desperately to deal...

… with the stigma of her conviction. She suffered from depression and she sunk into alcoholism. In recent years she made repeated attempts on her own life. Her body gave up late last year and she died at the age of 57. It is a profound regret she cannot be here to hear her case

… being argued.
[explains what happened to her. usual story - accused of theft and false accounting, plea bargain if she accepts Fa the PO would drop the theft charge. 12 month suspended sentence]
G - she had an anomaly that grew and accumulated. Ultimately having...

… kept the figures hidden in order to keep her job, she then admitted false accounting. She denied theft there was no evidence of theft at her branch. There was no other evidence to corroborate the H data. Evidence was collected which attested to her honesty and integrity...

… no attempt was made by the PO to get the ARQ data or test Horizon. She could not do it. The PO did not. The PO failed to interrogate the system or to disclose to the appellant or the court. No disclosure was forthcoming into any inquiry into the functionality of the system...

… the case was predicated on proving how the account was falsified, which she had admitted. No effort was made to discover the cause. She raised the problems she was having with H, but they were ignored. She was a lady of hitherto good character. People lined up togive character

… statements. The PO says there are reasons to agree this was an unsafe conviction. For the reasons as set out by TM and others - her prosection was unconscionable and an affront to the natinoal conscience. On her son Matthew’s behalf we invite you to quash th convition on...

… both grounds.

LJH just as a matter of info - why was your client a branch manager not an SPM

G - her branch was inside a tesco stor - her salary came from Tesco, even tho she was a post office manager.

LJH thank you

[we are into housekeeping now…]

[that was a powerful speech by Mr Gordon. I met Dawn O’Connell’s brother and son outside today.]

[Ian Henderson from Second Sight may be giving evidence for wendy Cousins tomorrow having delivered an expert report. The PO don’t accept his report and want to cross examine him on it. This could be interesting.]

[we are basically still dealing with the 39 cases where at least 1 limb of the CCRC’s referral is not being resisted. Then we move on to the three resisted ones.]
[Ian Henderson is not required tomorrow - he will be xe’d on Thursday]

As you might have guessed. Court has risen. I am being told (at least third hand) that the court is not going to give any orders quashing any convictions this week. All that are going to be quashed will be announced in a judgment on 23 April. This is odd, as judges don’t...

… afaik tend to give specific dates for their judgments in advance. Also there is nothing to stop the barristers asking at least for the four uncontested appellants to have their convictions quashed, but several people have now told me nothing this week, it’s happening on the...

… 23rd, along with a ruling which will go into exactly what the judges think of the CCRC referral and the PO’s case.

We’ll see. I’m heading home to write today up and send out the secret email. Both may be a little later tonight.

Thanks v much for all the donations today. Your contributions are keeping me here all week and I am grateful. There are rewards if you want to chuck me a few quid - a forthcoming book, and the secret email. More here:

postofficetrial.com/2021/02/crowdf…

Thanks for all the comments. Sorry I can’t respond to them all. Back in court at 10.30am tomorrow.

Have a good evening.

N

@threadreaderapp unroll pls