The Computer Glitch That Caused Nearly 1,000 Convictions

00:05
Speaker 1
For the past few weeks, a tv show has taken the UK by storm. It's not a period drama like Downton Abbey or a reality dating show like Love island. Instead, it's a tv series about the post office.

00:24
Speaker 2
How did the post office money get lost? What is it you've been doing wrong?

00:30
Speaker 3
I don't know either. I have no idea. Oh, I don't want to cry.

00:37
Speaker 1
Mr. Bates vs. The post office tells the story of a real life injustice that ruined thousands of lives across the UK.

00:46
Speaker 2
It is the biggest miscarriage of justice in modern british history.

00:52
Speaker 1
That's our colleague, Max Colchester.

00:55
Speaker 2
Over the space of a decade and a half, people who managed these small post offices were accused of various crimes, including theft, and over 200 of them went to jail. And it turns out that the reason they were found guilty was because of a faulty computer system. And so their accounts showed a deficit when they shouldn't, and they are accused, essentially, of stealing that money.

01:27
Speaker 1
Many of the postmasters who were affected were driven into bankruptcy. At least four people took their own lives. Now, thanks to the tv show, their stories are resonating with millions of people for the first time and has forced a reckoning one of the country's biggest public institutions. Welcome to the Journal, our show about money, business and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza. It's Tuesday, January 23. You coming up on the show, the tv drama putting a spotlight on a UK scandal.

02:14
Speaker 4
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02:49
Speaker 1
In episode one of Mr. Bates versus the post office, we meet Joe Hamilton, who ran a post office in a village in the english countryside.

02:57
Speaker 3
Morning, Joe. All right, Trevor?

03:01
Speaker 1
Nadia.

03:04
Speaker 3
Morning with you in a minute. No rush.

03:07
Speaker 1
And last week, I got to speak with the real Joe. It's a little funny because I was just watching the show, and so to sort of have the real you in front of me is kind of jarring in a good.

03:20
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's a story, isn't it?

03:23
Speaker 1
Yeah. And how would you describe your post office, especially to us here in the states? It's very different.

03:30
Speaker 3
It's a very quaint. It's like a little english tea room. We turned it into a deli where we sold lovely range of cold meats and cheeses from all over the world. And it was a proper little shop.

03:46
Speaker 1
Right. So it was a post office but it also sounds like it was much more than just yeah.

03:53
Speaker 3
It really was the heart of the community.

03:56
Speaker 1
In the UK, the post office is owned by the state and people like Joe run local branches in cities, towns and villages across the country. It's kind of like a franchise that provides government and financial services to the public. The story of the post office scandal begins in the 1990s when a japanese company called Fujitsu won a contract to bring the post office into the computer age. The deal was worth more than $1.5 billion and was one of the biggest outsourced contracts in UK history. In 1999, the post office rolled out a computer system run by Fujitsu called.

04:34
Speaker 2
Horizon which would allow the postmasters to log their sales. It's like a till, basically. It would process the transactions and basically spit out whether they were in what their sales were. And it was a way of cutting costs for the post office and it was seen as a cutting edge piece of technology that would help these people manage their small businesses better.

04:58
Speaker 1
The horizon software was installed in Joe Hamilton's post office branch in October of 2003. And at the end of each week Joe would use it to calculate her profits. But within months, problems began to crop up and calling Fujitsu technical support didn't help.

05:17
Speaker 3
My first discrepancy happened in December 2003 where I had a 2000 pound shortfall. And so I rang the help desk and I said, you know, I'm 2000 pound down. And she said, oh, well, do this and this. And I literally pressed the button. It doubled it literally right in front of my eyes.

05:36
Speaker 1
Joe says that suddenly she was down 4000 pounds and the problem escalated. Every week. The horizon system showed that she had a deficit no matter what she did to set the book straight. Joe says when she called the helpline she was told she was the only person experiencing these problems. And the post office said she was responsible for any missing money. So Jo borrowed money from her parents and from friends. Eventually she had to remortgage her house. One night a friend found her sitting on the floor of her post office.

06:10
Speaker 3
She literally saw the light on and came in and she said, whatever's going on? And I said, oh, I'm really in big trouble. And I said, I can't explain it but there's money missing. And I just presumed because the number was on the screen that I've obviously done something wrong and it shouldn't be there. But I didn't have any more money and I ran out and she said, well, you've got to stop it and right now you've got to get help.

06:40
Speaker 1
Joe didn't know it at the time, but others were experiencing the same problem. The horizon system was showing unexplained shortfalls at post office branches across the country. What did higher ups at the post office decide to do about these supposed shortfalls?

06:59
Speaker 2
Well, it appears they didn't do very much initially. And then they decided to clamp down on what they said they thought was fraud within their own company, as it were. And so they started prosecuting these postmasters, accusing them of stealing this money.

07:17
Speaker 1
If it was a computer glitch, though, like, why were these post office workers being prosecuted?

07:24
Speaker 2
Well, one of the weird things of english law, actually. Strangely, in 1999, the year that this horizon system was rolled out, english law changed and said that from now on, evidence presented from a computer will be presumed accurate. It'll be up to the defendant to prove that the computer is wrong, as opposed to the post office to prove that their computer system is working correctly. And it was done with good intention. The idea being that if you were caught, I don't know, speeding, that the camera that logged your speed was accurate. But then in the computer age, it's just not really fit for purpose. And so the postmasters were caught in this dystopian nightmare.

08:11
Speaker 1
Right? And presumably a lot of these folks who were in post offices weren't able to figure out, okay, this is the bug in the system here.

08:18
Speaker 2
Exactly. And to make matters worse, and this is the next leg of this scandal, there was a systematic cover up of the problems with the computer system. And the post office didn't provide the postmasters with the evidence that would show that there were others who were struggling with similar problems. And worst of all, they even got experts at Fujitsu who made the computer system to come and give statements saying that the computer system was working fine and was completely robust.

08:54
Speaker 1
Hundreds of postmasters suddenly found themselves facing prison time for theft. Some were told that if they pleaded to a lesser crime, they could avoid time behind bars. That's exactly what happened to Joe. In 2006, she was fired by the post office and charged with theft. She pleaded down to false accounting, essentially fixing the books.

09:16
Speaker 3
I must admit, the night before I went to court, I never slept because I just imagined myself waking up in a prison cell the next night, you.

09:24
Speaker 1
Know, Joe avoided prison, but she was ordered to pay the post office more than 36,000 pounds. That was about $72,000 at the time. Joe didn't have that kind of cash, so her community rallied around her and helped raise the money.

09:41
Speaker 3
I could only get 30,000 on the house. And then someone said, well, why doesn't Joe have an early Christmas present? And I'm not kidding, they all popped money through the solicitor's door.

09:52
Speaker 1
Oh, my gosh. It's like, it's a wonderful life.

09:55
Speaker 3
Yeah, isn't that lovely?

09:57
Speaker 1
The support Joe got from her community made national news.

10:01
Speaker 3
I nearly died when I heard. I was in the Daily Mail and the Daily Express. I was like, oh, my God, I'm in the national papers now. Now everyone knows I'm a fraudster.

10:12
Speaker 1
Nearly died.

10:14
Speaker 3
Embarrassment. No, embarrassment. Embarrassment. It was national news that Jo Hamilton had been spared from prison by her village. They called me the fallen subpost mist.

10:23
Speaker 1
Oh, my goodness.

10:26
Speaker 3
And then people rang the shop and said, I know someone else has happened to. And then Alan phoned and it was.

10:33
Speaker 1
Like, wow, alan was Alan Bates. The tv show Mr. Bates vs. The post office is named after him. He had also lost his post office but wasn't convicted. Alan Bates knew that the horizon system was at fault, and he wanted to prove it. He and Joe joined forces, and soon they realized that there were hundreds of others like them. Their struggle to get justice, that's next. You.

11:20
Speaker 5
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11:48
Speaker 1
Journal this episode is brought to you by Volvo Cars.

11:53
Speaker 4
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12:25
Speaker 1
In 2009, Alan Bates gathered a group of former postmasters in a sleepy english village. Joe was one of them.

12:33
Speaker 3
We sat round in the circle and we all told our names and what we'd been done for. And every single one of us had been told were the only ones. And honestly, when I realized that I'd been taken for a fool all that time. It kind of turned a switch in me, and I turned into. I went from being a tiny, scared person to a monster. Because I just write, they're not going to get away with this. It's like, how dare they? And in the beginning, there was just, I think, about 2030 people in the hall. And then it's like, then it grew and grew, and then we got 150.

13:12
Speaker 1
Joe met former postmasters who had lost their homes. Others had spent time behind bars. One woman was pregnant when she was imprisoned.

13:21
Speaker 3
I've spent many a night on the phone trying to keep people together, to keep going, because when you lose everything, it's so hard. And when you're in debt up to your ears, it's really hard not to drown in it if you're not careful.

13:39
Speaker 1
Many of the workers who were prosecuted were from minority groups. Here's Max again.

13:44
Speaker 2
There is definitely an insidious racial tone under this whole thing, which again adds another layer of awfulness to the situation. And there was even this incredible document that was unearthed in the post office where they grouped those they were prosecuting by their racial features.

14:04
Speaker 1
The documents, which were later made public, showed that post office fraud investigators used group names like chinese, japanese types, dark skinned european types, and negroid types. The post office has since apologized for racist language it called, quote, unacceptable. As Joe and the other postmasters kept talking, their sense of injustice grew. They began working to try to prove their innocence through the courts.

14:34
Speaker 2
The process of rectifying that is glacial. And that's what really is actually shocking, is that people have for years known that the horizon system didn't work and that these people probably didn't commit any crimes. But getting them compensation and getting and clearing their name has taken many years.

14:58
Speaker 1
And it was also hard for the postmasters to get their story out there. News outlets did cover the scandal, but the story didn't build much momentum with the wider public in the U. K. Meanwhile, the post office continued to prosecute workers until 2015, and it took until 2019 for a court to rule that there were bugs and defects with the horizon software. And another two years after that, before Joe was able to clear her name. In 2021, she and 38 others were able to get their convictions overturned.

15:36
Speaker 3
They had gone into court this morning as convicted criminal. They emerged as innocent.

15:43
Speaker 6
Relief, joy, anger. There's a lot mixed in with these tears.

15:50
Speaker 3
But 736 people have convictions in total, many of them still waiting for their day in court, hoping they, too, can finally prove their innocence.

16:05
Speaker 1
So in 2021, when this happened, when your conviction was quashed, was any of that big news at the time?

16:12
Speaker 3
Yeah, we did have a big splash that day and may have been a day after, but it still kind of fizzled out of the news.

16:22
Speaker 1
Hundreds of postmasters still hadn't cleared their names or received compensation. But their story caught the eye of a group of tv producers. They believed it was a tale worth telling. Did you immediately think, like, wow, this would make a great tv show?

16:38
Speaker 6
Yeah, I did. It was pretty obvious. It was a good story.

16:42
Speaker 1
Patrick Spence is an executive producer of Mr. Bates vs. The post office.

16:46
Speaker 6
And what felt so compelling to us was that we didn't know the story right.

16:53
Speaker 1
Somehow, even though it was in the news, people weren't really as familiar with, not just, like, the details of it, but how it had truly affected everyday humans.

17:02
Speaker 6
And remember that what they were reading was a computer said they were guilty.

17:08
Speaker 1
Right.

17:08
Speaker 6
And that's quite hard to disbelieve. They were also hearing that many of the subpost masters had pleaded guilty to false accounting. So you think, well, they were guilty of something. And then when you see the facts and you see how the post office behaved and what they did and how they bullied them based on no evidence, into accepting a lesser plea, so that they felt and sounded like criminals. And so as soon as those facts were laid out in front of us and we started to realize the horror, it became very obvious that this was a story that needed to be told.

17:41
Speaker 1
On January 1, Mr. Bates versus the post office aired on the british network ITV. And at what point did you realize that it was having an impact, that people were watching it?

17:53
Speaker 6
The next morning.

17:56
Speaker 1
Millions tuned in and the public outcry was immediate and intense. Almost overnight, former postmasters found themselves at the center of a media storm. Here's Joe.

18:09
Speaker 3
I don't think I've ever seen so many cameras or done so many interviews. And, you know, we've been banging away for all these years and it took the drama to lift it off the page and make it real for the nation.

18:25
Speaker 1
When did you realize that the show and these stories, your stories, were resonating with people in the UK?

18:33
Speaker 3
Well, if I tell you, I went to London yesterday, I had nine people come and give me a massive hug out of nowhere, and I had four of those wanted selfies with me because they said, you are our hero.

18:51
Speaker 1
And the outcry went all the way to the top. In an unprecedented move, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced plans for a new law that would exonerate hundreds of postmasters.

19:02
Speaker 2
This is one of the greatest miscarriages of justice in our nation's history. People who worked hard to serve their communities, had their lives and their reputations destroyed through absolutely no fault of their own.

19:17
Speaker 1
A public inquiry into what happened is ongoing. In a statement, the post Office said that they're aware of the human costs of the scandal and are, quote, doing all we can to right the wrongs of the past, as far as that is possible. The Fujitsu group, which owns the horizon system, says it's taking the matter seriously, working with the UK government and hoping for a just outcome for the victims. How long do we think this process of exoneration will take?

19:50
Speaker 2
That's a very good question. And you've seen quite a lot of the postmasters have come out, actually, of late and say, how is this going to work and when are we actually going to get money for this? Because it could still be years. Not all is sold by any means.

20:06
Speaker 1
Could there be more consequences for the post office?

20:10
Speaker 2
Yes, I mean, there could be financial consequences for the post office, but ultimately, this is a state owned company and there is a sort of presumption that this taxpayer will step in to ensure this thing doesn't go bust. But, I mean, it's going to have a big mountain to climb in rebuilding its reputation here and its trust with people.

20:34
Speaker 1
The post office still uses horizon systems. Joe, what do you want people to learn from what happened to you?

20:44
Speaker 3
It would be nice to think that people might see us as an example of grouping together and fighting back and not taking corporate nonsense. If something's wrong, it's wrong and stand up for it. But you need to be resilient and be in it for the long haul because it's not going to be easy.

21:16
Speaker 1
You. That's all for today. Tuesday, January 23 the journal is a coproduction of Spotify and the Wall Street Journal. Additional reporting in this episode by Joanna Sugden. Thanks for listening. See you tomorrow.