Former Post Office Executive Denies Lying Throughout Horizon IT Scandal Inquiry
Angela van den Bogerd, a former top executive at the Post Office, has denied lying “throughout” her two days of testimony at the inquiry into the Horizon IT scandal. During her time at the organisation, van den Bogerd held various roles over 35 years and told the hearing that while she may have missed evidence of problems with the computer software at the time, it was not intentional.
One of her key roles at the Post Office was handling complaints about the Horizon system, which was provided by Japanese firm Fujitsu. Between 1999 and 2015, more than 700 Post Office managers were prosecuted after the software falsely showed that money was missing from branches. At the time, the company maintained that Horizon was a robust and reliable system.
Edward Henry KC, representing some of those wrongly convicted, accused van den Bogerd of telling a “blatant lie” in a September 2015 letter sent to former sub-postmaster Parmod Kalia. Kalia was falsely accused of stealing £22,000 from his London branch in 2001 and spent three months in prison. In the letter, van den Bogerd stated that there was “no evidence of transactions recorded by branches being altered through remote access,” despite receiving emails years earlier that highlighted this issue.
Under further questioning from Mr. Henry, van den Bogerd maintained that her understanding was based on the information she had been given at the time. As he pressed her for more information about her knowledge and actions, Mr. Henry accused her of lying “again today, as you have done throughout,” and asked if she understood the impact of her actions on the lives of those wrongly convicted.
In response, van den Bogerd acknowledged the suffering that had occurred as a result of the prosecutions but maintained that she was not involved in them. She also stated that she had worked to understand any issues with the Horizon system.
During Thursday’s hearing, van den Bogerd expressed her apologies for the devastation caused to wrongly convicted sub-postmasters and stated that she had never knowingly done anything wrong. On Friday, she was questioned about the case of Martin Griffiths, a former sub-postmaster in Cheshire who was accused of being responsible for shortfalls of up to £100,000 and was then blamed for a robbery at his branch in 2013. Griffiths died a few months later, and a coroner ruled that he had taken his own life.
Counsel for the inquiry, Jason Beer KC, pressed van den Bogerd on whether a subsequent offer of compensation to Griffiths’ family was dependent on them dropping any legal action against the Post Office. He also asked about a separate claim the family held against Second Sight, which produced a report detailing issues with the Horizon system. Van den Bogerd stated that the offer was part of a broader payment for network transformation and covered everything.
Beer then became frustrated with van den Bogerd’s answers and asked if the payment was conditional upon the family withdrawing their claim, to which she answered yes. The inquiry also heard from Sam Stein KC, representing other scandal victims, who described van den Bogerd as being “Post Office through-and-through like a bad stick of rock.” Stein referred to a 2019 court case in which a High Court judge said van den Bogerd had sought to “mislead” him during her evidence defending the Post Office. When asked if the Post Office had investigated her as a result of the judge’s comments, van den Bogerd said no.
Stein then asked if van den Bogerd had received her bonus in 2019, despite the High Court judge’s findings, to which she responded yes. The inquiry will continue next week with evidence from the Post Office’s former head of legal, Hugh Flemington.
