Secret tapes from 2013 show Post Office’s top lawyer warned about ‘dangerous’ convictions

ITV News says the latest reporting from the Post Office tapes reveals that in 2013 the Post Office’s top lawyer was told that a sub-postmaster general might have been wrongfully convicted. ITV News Investigative Editor Daniel Hewitt reports

Secret recordings obtained by ITV News reveal that the Post Office’s most senior lawyer may have misled a court more than a decade ago to force subpostmasters and others into “fraudulent and dangerous” guilty pleas, an independent investigation finds It was revealed that he had received a warning from the government.

The recording was of a meeting in December 2013 between the Post Office’s former general counsel Chris Augyar and Second Sight’s forensic accountants Ian Henderson and Ron Warmington.

The report said the two men were denied the right to defend themselves over the Post Office’s actions in investigating and prosecuting the subpostmasters and others, leaving them with little choice but to plead guilty and take a “bargain deal”. It shows that he had a terrible assessment of what he had revealed under duress.

In the recording, Mr. Warmington told Mr. Augyar, then the Postal Service’s top lawyer, that the organization was “more defensive than any other company I’ve ever met in my life,” adding, “The existence of the Postal Service is… He completely denies it.” There is nothing wrong with anything at any time. ”

Less than four months after that meeting, postal officials secretly decided to remove Second Sight from the independent investigation into the subpostmaster’s case and move that role in-house.

In 2012, the Post Office set up a second site to investigate problems with its Horizon IT system after activists including former Deputy Postmaster General Alan Bates and then-MP James Arbuthnot called for an independent investigation. of forensic accountants.

Sir James Arbuthnot, who campaigned for deputy postmasters wrongly accused in the Horizon scandal, told ITV News that former postmaster general Paula Vennels should face “serious consequences”.

ITV News reported that in July 2013, Second Sight revealed that CEO Paula was in a secretly recorded meeting about serious issues with Horizon, including allegations that Fujitsu employees at its Bracknell headquarters could access branch accounts remotely.・He clarified that he had told Mr. Vennels.

They also called on Vennels and other postal officials not to cover up the problem.

ITV News reported on 5 December 2013 that another meeting between the then Post Office General Counsel Chris Ogiard (the organization’s most senior lawyer) and Second Sight’s Ian Henderson and Ron Warmington Possesses secret recordings.

Mr Ojal had been in the role for six weeks when the talks took place.

Mr Warmington outlines a catalog of failures by the Post Office in pursuing and prosecuting sub-postmasters.

First, he presents evidence that the Post Office pressured subpostmasters into taking plea deals, even though they knew there was no evidence to prosecute.

He told Mr. Ojal: “In many cases, there was a threat of theft, which was released as part of a deal, like a court proceeding, but the condition was that the theft would not be pursued – by the way, in any case. We would not have had the information or evidence to prevail – unless you plead guilty to false accounting and refrain from speaking in your defense related to your criticism of Horizon.”

Secondly, Mr Warmington said there was evidence that the Post Office may have misled the court by assuming the sub-postmaster was guilty and failing to properly investigate the incident.

“The first interview was at a branch, and the rep said, ‘I’ve been telling the help desk for the last six months that there’s this terrible discrepancy,'” he said.

“And all that’s happening is the investigative team is saying, ‘So what did you do for those six months?'” Well, the problem will go away, it will go away on its own, the help desk said. said, so I brought it forward…I pretended there was cash in the register. Ah, you committed false accounting. right? thank you.

“It’s closed. You literally hear the book slam shut and that’s it.

“What this means is that the Postal Service has moved to file criminal charges without investigating the underlying factors.

“Now, this is extremely important because it would be a criminal offense to withhold evidence from the defense that could undermine the prosecution.

“Post Office Limited has essentially taken actions that could be accused of misleading the court. Just as serious as that, Chris.”

During the meeting, Mr. Ojal responded as follows: Well, macros, the issue of macros is a different topic.

“Those aren’t in my pot. They belong to other parts of the organization. You can input some of your thoughts about this call into that portal.”

He reiterated his intention at the meeting to report what had been said.

“The focus right now is on moving it forward, but I think the points made make sense…I’m definitely going to reach out to the right people,” Ojal said.

Second Sight is particularly interested in a separate case with Chris Ogiard, Alison Hall, who was wrongly convicted of false accounting in 2011 after discovering a £15,000 shortfall at a branch in West Yorkshire. took up the lawsuit.

Mr Warmington made it clear to the Post Office General Counsel that there was clear evidence that Alison Hall could very well be innocent.

He said: “When we come to the Alison Hall case, the key question is why did the investigation team charge her with false accounting when the root cause was undoubtedly that she was in total disarray?” “The question will be whether they have taken the step to do so.” When Post Office Ltd found out that there was a big problem with adjusting scratch cards;

“But it seems like neither the investigation team nor the prosecution team knew about that, or if they did, they didn’t give her any leeway because of that…and this is really serious because it’s a potential This is a dangerous conviction.”

Ian Henderson added: “We consistently see prosecutions focusing on false accounting issues without any consideration of actually identifying the cause of the deficiencies in the first place.”

Chris Auger replied: “There’s definitely a lot of personal pain…”

We played the recording to Alison Hall, whose conviction was overturned in 2021, eight years after she was sued by the Postal Service’s top lawyer.

“It’s unbelievable,” Alison says. “You think it can’t get any worse, you can’t stress it out any more. And then this comes out. It’s horrifying.”

she asks, listening to a recording of her case. Why did it take so long for this to come out? ”

“I ended up spending another seven years before my conviction was overturned. If they knew it wasn’t a safe case, why didn’t they try to overturn my conviction sooner?” Sho?”

So what happened after the December 5, 2013 meeting?

We don’t know if Chris Aujard actually addressed the issue within the Post Office, as he promised investigators.

Four months after this meeting, documents show that Post Office management secretly decided to fire Second Sight and instead conduct a subpostmaster investigation within the Post Office’s purview. we know.

It wasn’t until seven years later, in 2020, that the charges began to be overturned.

Professor Richard Moorhead is a legal ethics expert and a member of the Horizon Remuneration Advisory Committee. He said Mr Ojal would have been obliged to submit what was said at that meeting to the Post Office board.

“he [Chris Aujard] “There is a duty to report all material information to the client… this is very serious so in my opinion the board would be the body that needs to hear about this,” Professor Moorhead told ITV News. Ta.

“[Second Sight] It identifies key facts and important issues facing the Post Office in this regard and states that they need to be addressed. And we know it wasn’t handled properly. That’s the truth. ”

Darren Jones, a Labor MP and former chairman of the Business and Trade Committee, told ITV News: “Over the years, even as more people realized what was going on, they continued to prosecute innocent subpostmasters and refused to admit they were wrong,” and that seems to be the definition of a cover-up. It seems to me.

“As a result, people end up suffering the consequences of their actions. They shouldn’t be allowed to say sorry and go home. That’s the least a victim should expect.”

A representative for Mr Ojal told ITV News in a statement: “Chris served as interim general counsel for the Post Office on a fixed-term contract for approximately 16 months, from mid-October 2013 to late February 2015.

“Chris has been called as a witness in the investigation and fully supports his role in the investigation, but as proceedings are ongoing we are unable to comment further.”

A Post Office spokesperson said: “We remain committed to uncovering the truth about what happened and supporting a statutory public inquiry chaired by a judge with the power to question witnesses under oath. , and is therefore in the best position to achieve this objective.”

Ian Henderson and Ron Warmington told ITV News they could not comment on the recording as they are named core participants in the ongoing Post Office investigation and have signed confidentiality agreements. .