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From: Jane MacLeod
Sent: Sun 03/07/2016 11 19 AM (UTC)
To: Tom Wechsler sRO.CS
Subject: FW: Confidential and Subject to Privilege - DO NOT FORWARD
Tom
Any help you can give in closing down further queries from Paula on this would be very helpful — as you know Rod is
working to a tight timetable to manage the response to the Freeths letter, and will have little time over the next few
weeks to spend going over old issues.
Apologies .....
Jane
Jane MacLeod
General Counsel
Ground Floor
20 Finsbury Street
LONDON
EC2Y 9AQ
From: Rodric Williams
Sent: 01 July 2016 17:23
To: Tom Wechsler
Ce: Jane MacLeod
Subject: Confidential and Subject to Privilege - DO NOT FORWARD
Tom — here are the bullet points summarising our telephone call earlier today,
- Tim McCormack’s recent communications focus on how errors in Horizon might (in Mr McCormack’s opinion)
affect the safety Mrs Seema Misra’s conviction.
Background
- Mrs Misra was suspended from her branch on 14 January 2008 following an audit which revealed a c.£75k
shortfall.
- Mrs Misra was subsequently charged with 6 counts of false accounting and one count of theft.
- She pleaded guilty to false accounting at the first case hearing on 19 December 2008, but not guilty to theft.
- Trial was listed for June 2009, but adjourned on the first day when Mrs Misra raised (for the first time) a
defence that errors in Horizon (as opposed to theft) may have been responsible for the shortfall.
- Trial then proceeded on 11 October 2010, with a jury handing down a unanimous guilty verdict on 21 October
2010.
- Mrs Misra was sentenced to 15 months’ imprisonment at Guildford Crown Court on 11 November 2010.
Legal Reviews
- Following publication of Second Sight’s July 2013 report, Post Office, through its external criminal law
solicitors Cartwright King, undertook a review of past prosecutions to consider whether appropriate
disclosure of Horizon issues had been made.
- Mrs Misra’s case was considered as part of that review, with Cartwright King concluding on 22 January 2014
that no further disclosure was required.
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- Mrs Misra’s case was also considered by Brian Altman QC in the advice he provided to Post Office on 15
October 2013 on the propriety of the Cartwright King review.
- Cartwright King and Brian Altman QC’s advice has been provided (without waiving privilege) to the CCRC as
part of its review into the safety of Mrs Misra’s conviction (which commenced April 2015).
- In September 2015 we asked Cartwright King to reconsider its January 2014 advice. Cartwright King advised
that the CCRC would decide whether appropriate disclosure had been made in the prosecution.
- The positon was again considered in April 2016 to confirm that the CCRC has available to it material to which
Mr McCormack has referred.
- Finally, Brian Altman is currently reviewing the Misra prosecution again to determine whether Post Office
acted properly when it decided to charge Mrs Misra with both theft and false accounting. This work was
initially instructed in connection with Tim Parker’s review of the “Sparrow” work undertaken, and is now
proceeding to support our response to the Freeths Group Litigation (in which Mrs Misra is a named Claimant).
We are also reviewing the work we undertook last year in connection with the ATOS / Outreach branch issue to which
Mr McCormack now also refers (and seeks to extrapolate back to the time of Mrs Misra’s conviction). I will be liaising
with Rob Houghton during the early part of next week to respond to Paula’s enquiries on those aspects of Mr
McCormack’s blogs.
I hope this helps. Please let me know if you need anything more.
Kind regards, Rod
POST
OFFICE