An Indian-origin former manager of a Post Office in England, wrongly jailed while pregnant, has declined the apology of a former boss of the government-owned entity during an ongoing public inquiry into the accounting scandal. Seema Misra, now 47, had her conviction overturned in April 2021 when the Court of Appeal ruled that she had been falsely imprisoned over 12 years ago, accused of stealing GBP 75,000 from her Post Office branch in Surrey where she was the sub-postmistress.
During Thursday’s hearings for the Post Office Horizon IT inquiry in London, former Post Office Managing Director David Smith expressed regret for a congratulatory email he sent after Ms. Misra’s conviction.
“It was intended to be a congratulatory email to the team, knowing that they had worked hard on the case,” Mr Smith said in his written evidence to the inquiry.
“However, knowing what I do now, it is evident that my email would have caused Seema Misra and her family substantial distress to read and I would like to apologise for that… Even if this had been a correct conviction, I would never think that it was ‘brilliant news’ for a pregnant woman to go to prison and I am hugely apologetic that my email can be read as such,” he said.
“However, seeing this email in the light of what I know now, I understand the anger and the upset that it will have caused and sincerely apologise for that,” he added.
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But, speaking to reporters later, Ms Misra rejected the apology which comes many years after her ordeal.
“I was eight weeks pregnant – they need to apologise to my youngest son. It was terrible. I haven’t accepted the apologies,” Ms Misra told the BBC.
“We had my conviction overturned, nobody came at that time to apologise. And now they just suddenly realised that when they have to appear in a public inquiry, they have to apologise,” she said.
Ms. Misra was sent to Bronzefield prison in southeast England and served four and a half months. She later gave birth to her second son while wearing an electronic tag.
Mr. Smith informed the inquiry that Ms. Misra had been utilized as a “test case,” and the success of her case bolstered confidence in the flawed Horizon IT accounting system.
“How can they do a test on a human being? I’m a living creature. I heard that my case had been used as a test case before. But hearing it again and again, it’s just annoying. It makes me more and more angry, to be honest,” Ms Misra told ‘Sky News’ concerning his evidence.
The UK government, which officially owns Post Office Ltd, has paid out millions in compensation to hundreds of sub-postmasters, many of whom are of Indian heritage, affected by the faulty Horizon software.
Earlier this year, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak pledged action in the historic scandal that wrongly accused sub-postmasters of fraud.
Last month, a new law was introduced in Parliament, known as the Post Office (Horizon System) Offences Bill, aiming to provide blanket exoneration to overturn convictions based on erroneous Horizon evidence. A public inquiry into the case, currently underway in phases, is expected to conclude in July
The controversial Horizon system, developed by the Japanese company Fujitsu, was initially introduced in 1999 to certain post offices for various tasks, such as accounting and stocktaking. However, it exhibited significant flaws that could lead to inaccurate reporting, occasionally resulting in substantial discrepancies, as seen in the cases of these sub-postmasters.
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