Oxford post office manager takes Horizon case to Court of Appeal

A POST office manager convicted of swindling £36,000 from his branch is fighting back.

Vipichandra Patel was convicted of misappropriating the funds at Horspath Post Office in 2010.

He and his wife Jayshree had to empty their life savings, sell family heirlooms, and were stigmatised by some in their community.

Now, he is one of more than 50 postmasters who have won a fight to have their convictions reconsidered by the Court of Appeal.

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The 67-year-old father-of-two said: "What the Post Office has done is abuse of power and authority.

"People picked on me and my wife: we suffered abuse, people stopped coming into the shop and the business went down.

"I felt suicidal a few times before the court case, but the thought of my family kept me going."

Mr and Mrs Patel, who still run the village shop in Horspath, took his case to the Court of Appeal after the Post Office last year agreed to pay out £57 million to 550 postmasters – including him – who it had taken to court for misappropriating funds over the past two decades.

The postmasters and their lawyers say they were all the victims of the company's faulty Horizon IT system which made errors that made it look like they were stealing cash.

The Post Office has never admitted liability in court, but it paid out £57m to the claimants.

Like many of the postmasters it prosecuted, Mr Patel pleaded guilty, but says he never intentionally misappropriated any funds.

The main reason he pleaded guilty, he says, was that the Post Office was one of the most powerful institutions in the country.

He added: "I knew that if I did not plead guilty, they would finish me off."

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Mr Patel and his family came to the UK from Uganda in 1971.

He joined the Post Office in 1987 as a postal officer in West London, and moved to Horspath in 2002.

He and his wife have two children – his son was 23 and daughter 22 at the time of his original court case.

He said: “It was insulting and humiliating for the whole family, I am sure they both suffered mental scars during the following years and memories of injustice are still very fresh."

The Horizon IT system, installed between 1999 and 2000, ran well for the first few years.

Between 2002 and 2008 Mr Patel said he noticed several small shortages in his accounts.

But he said: “I trusted the Post Office – I thought it was my fault so I did not run an investigation."

Eventually he reported some problems to the Post Office, but he recalled: "They said it would sort itself out.

"Between 2005 to 2008 there were many similar cases in the press, so I was aware of them, but I wasn’t too sure whether it was the postmasters or the computers – until it started happening to me."

By early 2010, Mr Patel was missing £36,000.

The Post Office realised the amount and brought legal action against him.

He pleaded guilty, he said, because he knew there was no way he could prove that the Horizon system was failing.

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Appearing at Oxford Magistrates' Court, Mr Patel, then 57, pleaded guilty to 'aiding and abetting fraud by abuse of position'.

He was given an 18-week jail sentence, suspended for a year, and ordered to pay back the money as well as £200 legal costs.

He was also given a two-month curfew, meaning he had to stay at his home between 10pm and 5am every night.

One Horspath resident, who asked not to be named, told the Oxford Mail at the time: "I was shocked when I heard about it.

"I don’t think anybody suspected anything, he was always very friendly and helpful."

After the hearing, Mr Patel and his wife had to pay the money back from their savings and were forced to sell her gold jewellery, which she had inherited from her family.

But they suffered more than just the financial loss.

He said: "People picked on me and my wife.

"We suffered abuse, people stopped coming into the shop and the business went down.

"It was insulting and humiliating for the whole family."

The family had to live with the shame for the next decade.

He said: "I had to force feed myself and my health went down because of it.

"I felt suicidal a few times before the court case, but the thought of my family kept me going."

They were just one of hundreds of families across the country prosecuted by the Post Office – their own employer – for misappropriating funds over several decades.

Another was Kashmir Gill, who managed a post office on Cowley Road, and was convicted in 2009 of misappropriating £57,000.

However, postmasters started to join the dots and eventually 550 of them hired legal representation and launched action against the Post Office.

In December, before the case had reached a legal conclusion, the Post Office agreed to pay out £57.75m in compensation.

The company said at the time: "The court found the risk of bugs affecting balances was greater than the Post Office believed, it does not mean every shortfall was caused by a bug and each case needs to be determined on the full evidence.

"The Post Office should have done more to prevent the risks and more help to postmasters, that is something we deeply regret."

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However, after discounting tens of millions in legal fees, the postmasters were left with just £11m to cover all their losses, or £20,000 each.

What's more, despite the Post Office's apparent admission of some culpability, all of the convictions it won against its postmasters still currently stand.

That is why many of them asked to have their convictions reconsidered by the Court of Appeal.

Mr Patel is one of just 50 who won that right, and are now having their cases reviewed.

He also wants Parliament to take further action, and to pay all of the legal costs postmasters incurred in their fight.

He said: "What the Post Office has done is abuse of power and authority and no one yet has been made accountable for all the injustices.

"It is my personal belief that all the people that work as postmasters are good, honest and hard working. It was only a handful of very top officials in the Post Office that created these injustices.

"Some issues were raised by the workers and they were told not to worry about it and not to get involved in the scandal."

The Government has launched an independent review of the whole case, but has said it won't pay out any more money except to those whose convictions are actually overturned.

In the meantime, Mr Patel and others must wait to see what happens with his Court of Appeal case.

He said: "It depends on how they see this as an urgent matter and give this case as a priority.

"As a group of postmasters that have suffered this for nearly 20 years – we deserve it."

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The Post Office said it could not comment on individual cases at the Court of Appeal, but said it had taken a long list of actions following the Horizon legal battle.

Firstly, it has established an 'Historical Shortfall Scheme' for former and current postmasters who were not part of the litigation settlement but believe they may have been affected by shortfalls in their branch accounts caused by Horizon.

The company said it had also 'undertaken a programme of improvements to overhaul culture, practices and procedures throughout every part of the Post Office to forge an open and transparent relationship with our postmasters'.

It said: "Improvements have been made in support provided for postmasters, from initial recruitment and training, through to daily transaction accounting, with nearly 100 area managers providing personalised, individual support and dedicated teams to investigate for postmasters if they have concerns."

Finally, the Post Office said it was continuing to make 'strenuous efforts regarding former postmasters with historical convictions that may be affected', was 'fully co-operating with applications to the Criminal Cases Review Commission' and was establishing a review of historical convictions to identify and disclose material in accordance with Post Office’s duties as former prosecutor.