Lee Castleton OBE

Ex spm and very proud of the group. I accept Dm.

[Lee Castleton OBE @CastletonLee]

Let’s hope change is afoot.

[ACME Aerospace @IamSoFarAhead]

@ArturNadol7566 @CastletonLee @PostOffice Executives an corporate lawyers do what they want and get away with it every time.
They are never really accountable for their actions

[Lee Castleton OBE @CastletonLee]

Looking very much forward to it.

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

THE FINAL WORD IS COMING

Counsel to the Post Office Inquiry, Emma Price, says Sir Wyn's remaining volumes are in the "final writing stages" and due "very soon".

Subpostmasters have waited years. The report must name names. Then someone has to act on it.

[Monsieur Cholet @stugoo17]

#PostOfficeScandal #PostOfficeInquiry

Counsel to the Inquiry Emma Price of @5essexchambers
has said the remaining Volumes of Sir Wyn's Final Inquiry Report are in the ‘final writing stages’ and will be published ‘very soon’.

https://t.co/y9ZDKCd4N3

[Nick Wallis @nickwallis]

If you live in or near Cranleigh and fancy coming along to see my new Post Office talk tonight (Wed 11 Nov) FER FREE, I have two tickets which can be yours. PM me asap. First come, first served.

[Mohamed Omer @Mohamed_GOP]

@ArturNadol7566 @CastletonLee @PostOffice What the post office did to innocent people managing the post office is not forgivable. The management ofcthe post office should be held personally responsible and thise who were wrongly accused need justice and compensation

[Karl Flinders @Karlfl]

The long goodbye has a but more to go. Fujitsu’s 30-year relationship with the Post Office is finally coming to an end, with an exit deadline of September 2027. #PostOfficeScandal https://t.co/tPWzcgGgrL

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

FUJITSU'S EXIT, IN THE SMALL PRINT

Post Office's contract notice: Fujitsu keeps running Horizon from 1 April to 30 November 2027.

Why no one else? A change of contractor "cannot be made for technical and economic reasons".

Extensions since 2019: nearly £200m, per @Karlfl.

[Karl Flinders @Karlfl]

Fujitsu's Post Office scandal financial contribution shield will soon be turned off soon, but it has earned huge sums of public money while it was active #PostOfficeScandal https://t.co/85hWt7V6Ah

[Humpty Bumpty 🇬🇧🇺🇸 @RealHumptyB]

@SeemaMisra_OBE Relatably saddened to read this, Seema. Are you one of the SPMs with an outstanding claim? Who has charge/control of your case?

cc @CastletonLee
#PostOfficeScandal

[Seema Misra OBE @SeemaMisra_OBE]

16 years on it still hurts.

On my eldest son’s birthday, I was sentenced to prison 8 weeks pregnant
A day of joy became a lifelong reminder of injustice.

Where is the accountability for PO scandal?

Plz ask your MP and share your suggestions. We must keep fighting for justice.

[Lee Castleton OBE @CastletonLee]

Thank you. Very kind. It’s a team effort.

[Malcolm Simpson @Malcolm22206844]

@ArturNadol7566 @CastletonLee @PostOffice Lee and his family have always acted with dignity and integrity and they are giants in this struggle. Total respect to them as they continue to stand up to Post Office, lawyers and Civil Servants who have never had any of these qualities.

[Lee Castleton OBE @CastletonLee]

I agree.

[AntiBS @Ive_R_Mectin]

Go get em @CastletonLee a medal is all well and good but you deserve to be compensated! @RupertLowe10

[Lee Castleton OBE @CastletonLee]

It’s a team effort.

[Jackie Pearce @tarot_jack]

@ArturNadol7566 @CastletonLee @PostOffice A proper hero. Thank you, Lee.

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

Christopher Head OBE @chrish9070 took over the West Boldon Post Office near Sunderland in 2006 at 18, the youngest sub-postmaster in Britain.

By 2014 the state owned @PostOffice said he owed £88,000. It questioned him under caution, searched his home, then dropped the case because there was no evidence.

It still chased him through the civil courts for the same £88,000.

With his name damaged locally and no work available, Chris rebuilt his life in Greece.
He later received his OBE for campaigning for more than 400 other sub-postmasters. He said the honour does not pay the bills.

This is the State owned, Post Office scandal.

Britain hands out medals for surviving things it should never have allowed.

SOURCES
@itvtynetees @SunderlandEcho @BBCNews

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

Lee Castleton @CastletonLee rang @PostOffice for help 91 times in 12 weeks. Horizon kept showing losses he couldn't explain.

Their answer was an audit, a suspension, a demand for £25K and then bankruptcy.

He sold his home in 2003 to buy a small branch in Bridlington. He couldn't afford a lawyer at the High Court, lost, and got hit with £321K in costs.

His daughter was spat at because people thought her dad was a thief.

Paula Vennells later told the Inquiry his treatment was unforgivable. She also accepted she probably signed off the costs that bankrupted him.

Lee is now going after the Post Office and Fujitsu for up to £8M, saying the 2007 judgment was obtained by fraud.

In May 2026 the Court of Appeal let it go ahead as one trial.

Nearly 20 years on, he's still fighting.

Sources: @BBCNews @lawsocgazette @ComputerWeekly

[Peter Davies @MastermanDavies]

17/1/24 iNews: PO “Capture” IT accounting system from the 1990s pre-Horizon was similar & led to SPM prosecutions!
1998 SPM Steve Marston was convicted for theft & false accounting with “Capture”. There are others too!
https://t.co/knGJWNPxp3

[Karl Flinders @Karlfl]

Fujitsu has landed another government contract – a £9m deal to support the UK’s Emergency Alerts Service. Despite its pledge to pause bidding for public sector work amid the Post Office scandal, contract renewals remain fair game. #PostOfficeScandal https://t.co/hUuEVHqvgp

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

DON'T LET ANYONE PUT WORDS IN YOUR MOUTH

The Horizon inquiry's own counsel told expert witnesses that Fujitsu's Gareth Jenkins admitted changing crucial court evidence at the Post Office's request, during wrongful prosecutions of subpostmasters.

https://t.co/CoCWBEW6nU

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

THE RETIRED LAWYER WHO DID PARLIAMENT'S JOB AND WON A JOURNALISM AWARD FOR IT

Dan Neidle (@DanNeidle) retired at 49 from Clifford Chance, one of the world's most powerful law firms, where he spent nearly 25 years as head of tax. Most people in that position go quiet and enjoy the garden.

Neidle started a non-profit think tank and spent his retirement doing what journalists, regulators, and parliament couldn't be bothered to do.

In July 2022, he published detailed analysis showing that Chancellor Nadhim Zahawi (@nadhimzahawi) had used an offshore structure to avoid approximately £3.7 million in capital gains tax on his YouGov stake. Then he showed Zahawi had lied about it.

Zahawi's lawyers at Osborne Clarke sent him threatening letters marked "confidential" and "not for publication," demanding he retract the allegations within 24 hours or face defamation action. They told him it would be "improper" and a "serious matter" to publish the letters.

Neidle published the letters.
He also published more detailed analysis. Then he referred the lawyers to the Solicitors Regulation Authority.

@TheSun then revealed Zahawi had secretly settled with HMRC for the exact amount Neidle estimated, plus a 30% penalty. Total: nearly £5 million. Rishi Sunak sacked Zahawi in January 2023 after an investigation found he had breached the Ministerial Code by failing to disclose he was being investigated by HMRC while serving as Chancellor.

Neidle won Investigation of the Year at the British Journalism Awards 2023. He is not a journalist.

The SRA referred Osborne Clarke partner Ashley Hurst to the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal, marking the first time a solicitor had been referred to the SDT for abusive tactics in libel litigation. In December 2024, the Tribunal found Hurst guilty of misconduct and fined him £50,000.

A retired tax lawyer spotted what a sitting Chancellor was hiding, refused to be silenced by his legal team, was proved right in every detail, won a journalism award, and then got the silencing lawyer sanctioned.

Zahawi got a pension. Neidle got a prize. The lawyer got a fine. The public got to watch.

This is what accountability looks like when institutions won't do it themselves.

Sources: @guardian @BBCNews @FT @TheSun @PressGazette |

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

THE OTHER POST OFFICE SCANDAL

Steve Marston, 42, emptied his £23K savings to cover missing money. @PostOffice repaid his loyalty with a criminal record, and almost 30 years later it is still fighting him.

Steve Marston ran the Heap Bridge branch in Bury from 1973 and never had trouble with paper accounts. In 1996 an area manager pressured him into using new software called Capture, the system that came before Horizon. He says auditors told him Capture does not make mistakes, a brave claim about software from 1996.

Shortfalls of £5K to £10K kept appearing. He paid the gaps from his savings and inflated his weekly cash figures to balance the books. Auditors then turned up unannounced, closed the branch, left him out of the audit and told him it was all his responsibility, which certainly speeds things up.

On advice that pleading guilty would keep him out of prison, he pleaded guilty to theft and false accounting over an alleged £79K shortfall. He received 12 months probation, then bankruptcy, a new town for his family and the loss of his friends. Full service, with the bankruptcy included.

Steve Marston blamed himself for 25 years, which was very convenient for everyone else. Then a government review by Kroll found a reasonable likelihood that Capture caused shortfalls. On 27 March 2026 the Criminal Cases Review Commission sent his case to the Court of Appeal, saying there is a real possibility his prosecution was an abuse of process.

Post Office chairman Nigel Railton told MPs on the Business and Trade Committee in January that all Capture convictions should be overturned by law. The chairman wants them all overturned, so naturally the Post Office is contesting all three pre-Horizon cases sent to the Court of Appeal, according to @ComputerWeekly and Karl Flinders @Karlfl.

@SkyNews reports it also sought a two month delay in Steve Marston's case, which shows real respect for a 70 year old's time, and the court refused. Nigel Railton later wrote that the Post Office must concede or oppose, with no third way, and that evidence unrelated to Capture may keep these convictions safe. Christopher Hodges, who chairs the Horizon Compensation Advisory Board, replied that the conflict of interest is blatant, since the Post Office was the original prosecutor.

The Post Office says it is only assisting the court, with remarkable energy. Neil Hudgell of Hudgell Solicitors, who represents many Capture victims, says the Post Office hides behind an unnamed spokesperson. Steve Marston asks how taxpayers' money can compensate victims and also pay the Post Office to fight those clearing their names.

The government owns the Post Office, and a minister told the Lords the Post Office was the original prosecutor in a Capture case, so the Department for Business and Trade can relax. Ownership clearly comes with no responsibilities.

Steve Marston is 70 and the Post Office is in no hurry.