Mr Bates vs The Post Office

[skwdenyer]

WrekinCrew said:

vaud said:

I think there are a few factors against this, and there are many defences to perjury.

1) He may have received a letter stating his responsibilities as an expert witness....

I'm sure we've all clicked a "I have read and agree to the terms and conditions..." box without having done so.

He doesn’t appear to have received a letter addressed to him, as I dealt with yesterday. He was forwarded an email that on its face appears to set out *Fujitsu’s* responsibilities, which Fujitsu appear to have wholly failed to discharge.

Surely he has a defence of vicarious responsibility? Unless I’ve missed something, Fujitsu were engaged to provide him as an expert witness, putting the onus firmly on them (and POL’s lawyers) to ensure that he delivered what was required.

I realise there’s some nuance, but this whole thing reads like an arrogant cluster fk of epic proportions on the parts of both POL and Fujitsu more than it reads (so far) as a noose to hang GJ with.

[James6112]

I have it on in the background, he’s looking a bit tired/strained today.

I wouldnt be surprised if he snaps before the end.

[Camoradi]

The aspect of this which surprises me is that an employee of Fujitsu could have been an acceptable Expert Witness.

Surely anyone employed by the Post Office or Fujitsu had a conflict between their duty to their employer and their duty to the court?

[Bonefish Blues]

Camoradi said:

The aspect of this which surprises me is that an employee of Fujitsu could have been an acceptable Expert Witness.

Surely anyone employed by the Post Office or Fujitsu had a conflict between their duty to their employer and their duty to the court?

That's why the Expert Witness Rules are in place, presumably - I'm guessing there will be fields where the only possible Expert Witness is employed by one of the protagonists?

[vaud]

Camoradi said:

The aspect of this which surprises me is that an employee of Fujitsu could have been an acceptable Expert Witness.

Surely anyone employed by the Post Office or Fujitsu had a conflict between their duty to their employer and their duty to the court?

I think sometimes the courts have to be pragmatic when you are dealing with a highly bespoke system from which very very few people would know all of the ins and outs...

Providing the conflict is clear and declared, I don't see it as an issue - and in this case I think GJ is one of the few to give decent, considered answers.

Only general topics - e.g. cyber security you can find expert witnesses from a raft of places. You can't do that for a bespoke, complex system in use at one place?

[outnumbered]

Bonefish Blues said:

Camoradi said:

The aspect of this which surprises me is that an employee of Fujitsu could have been an acceptable Expert Witness.

Surely anyone employed by the Post Office or Fujitsu had a conflict between their duty to their employer and their duty to the court?

That's why the Expert Witness Rules are in place, presumably - I'm guessing there will be fields where the only possible Expert Witness is employed by one of the protagonists?

Yes, that's it exactly. Almost the first thing it says in the expert witness rules is that your duty is to the court, even if that conflicts with what the people who hired you would like you to say.

[The Wookie]

Camoradi said:

The aspect of this which surprises me is that an employee of Fujitsu could have been an acceptable Expert Witness.

Surely anyone employed by the Post Office or Fujitsu had a conflict between their duty to their employer and their duty to the court?

In fairness we defended a patent dispute a while back and the mutually accepted expert witness was actually one of the founders of our business who had only retired a year or two before the case

[LimmerickLad]

He's an IT expert on a specific IT system that very few had sufficient knowledge to be able to claim expert knowledge of.......... so on that basis he was possible one of very few, if not the only, expert available to advise the Court.

He is no doubt a very clever man but he isn't is a legal expert!.........therefore IMO he should have been properly supported /advised / protected by all of the legal "experts" involved and / or instructing him including FJ's & POL's who instead, again IMO, used and manipulated him to get what they wanted in the way that they wanted and earned £0000's in doing so.

Yes he made mistakes and SPM's suffered in part because of them but is not a bad evil person......... unlike PV, VdL, JS et al as well as very many of the legal "proffessionals" (not forgetting the wee Scots Union fella) involved who quite frankly should be strung up from Tyburn Gallows, pelted with rooten food for a month and then locked in the Tower of London for tourists to jeer at.

[mikeiow]

WrekinCrew said:

vaud said:

I think there are a few factors against this, and there are many defences to perjury.

1) He may have received a letter stating his responsibilities as an expert witness....

I'm sure we've all clicked a "I have read and agree to the terms and conditions..." box without having done so.

For an appearance in court, where you are the expert?

Seriously??

I doubt ANY of us would have taken that lightly.
I certainly wouldn't have.

Pretty sure a couple have commented here how they (or their spouse) have been expert witnesses, and know full well what their role is in court.

[LimmerickLad]

mikeiow said:

For an appearance in court, where you are the expert?

Seriously??

I doubt ANY of us would have taken that lightly.
I certainly wouldn't have.

Pretty sure a couple have commented here how they (or their spouse) have been expert witnesses, and know full well what their role is in court.

It was probably me............I had to engage an Expert witness and my wife is an Expert Witness also.......... it was made 100% clear by all the legal bods involved in my case that that the Expert's duty was to the Court and not to the persons that engage them. Even the relevent legislation was cited in the engagement letter with links to it............. but, given how many "legals" were involved in this, I am surprised this wasn't specificaly pointed out ' highlighted to him in no uncertain terms....but that may not have suited POL's agend methinks?

[Stussy]

I may be wrong, but I thought he never actually went to court? So probably never felt the full weight of how important it all was?
To me he’s an IT bod who clearly has zero interest in the law or how any of it works. He was happy to give his input into the questions about the system and that’s where his attention stayed.
Rightly or wrongly, he seemed oblivious to the rest of it

[WrekinCrew]

GJ said today he went to the first week of the Misra trial.

[AceRockatansky]

Oooft.

Does this reveal your state of mind, that you thought postmasters were trying to "get away with it"

It seems the "bandwagon" statement originated from you.

Butt errr mmm nnnn, eeerm bubububtt errrr

[Bonefish Blues]

He went native didn't he. There was coincidence between his protectiveness of the system and the PO's suspicion and mistrust of the SPMs and his evidence was the key to both.

[Randy Winkman]

Speed 3 said:

Randy Winkman said:

Mercdriver said:

Just watched the sad story of Zulu delta, the chinook helicopter that crashed full of top special forces and special branch.

Eventually the RAF insisted the aircraft was OK and blamed the pilots.

The pilots were not happy with the mark2 following upgrades including software. The captain asked to use a mark1 but was refused.

After many years of investigation the decision by a committee was it was all about software and protecting the RAF and Boeing, ahem, where have we heard that before?

Computers are infallible, not

Cheers. I've been considering watching that. I heard that you need to see both to get the full picture that it's actually an intriguing story. By that I guess I mean that the first episode isn't that interesting other than as a set-up.

It's a very similar story of the Establishment doing all it could to divert blame when it was faced with overwhelming evidence to the contrary and protecting "Bigger National Interests". In that case the easy path was to blame the pilots who died in the aircraft that the Establishment themselves had officially classified as unairworthy (effectively a test prototype).

Thanks to you, Mercdriver and the others that replied a couple of days ago about this. Yes, very similar and still a mystery what/who provided the main impetus behind the cover up. I can see the reason cover ups happen but when individual people (in this case the 2 pilots) end up as directly targeted victims I'd like to think I'd never get involved. As a civil servant I'd hate to think that too many people in MoD knew how bad it all was. But I guess someone did.

[hidetheelephants]

The RAF have a terrible record for covering up stty decision-making, it killed the Nimrod crew that crashed in Afghanistan, no doubt there have been other bad decisions that resulted in less serious incidents which don't reach the press.

[mikeiow]

AceRockatansky said:

Oooft.

Does this reveal your state of mind, that you thought postmasters were trying to "get away with it"

It seems the "bandwagon" statement originated from you.

Butt errr mmm nnnn, eeerm bubububtt errrr

Indeed.
Do not fall for the kindly old gent appearance.
He was more than aware of the back doors into the system, and was a key protagonist behind maintaining that being hidden.

[Maxdecel]

No, not that computer, this one Poor chap is simply misunderstood.
https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366590300/Expe...

[hidetheelephants]

What a load of jackanory.

[732NM]

Maxdecel said:

No, not that computer, this one Poor chap is simply misunderstood.
https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366590300/Expe...

That's insane.