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A former postmaster says he is preparing to sue the Post Office for ‘hundreds and thousands of pounds’ for the damage caused during the Horizon scandal. A total of 736 postmasters and postmistresses were wrongly prosecuted by the Post Office between 2000 and 2014 over allegations of fraud and theft.
One of the postmasters who eventually had their conviction quashed 11 years after an original seven-month suspended prison sentence, is Tom Hedges. He ran the Hogsthorpe Post Office, near Skegness, between 1994 and 2010, and is now working with his lawyers to prepare a lawsuit against the Post Office.
Mr Hedges was given £100,000 compensation in July 2021, but he said it did not compensate for the pain and financial loss he endured. Many who were fired from their jobs at post offices around the country, but were not convicted of any criminal offences, also suffered financial loss, but were not part of the scheme Mr Hedges gained the £100,000 from.
READ MORE: Post Office management should be ‘named and shamed’ in public inquiry says former postmaster
Those postmasters and postmistresses have only just received a £19.5m interim compensation package, which Mr Hedges says helps move his case to sue the Post Office forward. He said: “Obviously I am pleased for them, because they were left [jobless] and they did all the heavy lifting to get this case into the media and get it resolved.”
He added: “Because I was prosecuted and then had my conviction overturned just over a year ago, I am in a position where I can sue the Post Office for malicious prosecution. This is now moving forward.
“We are hoping that the whole thing will be done and dusted by Christmas, but saying that we also wanted it done by last Christmas.” Mr Hedges did not want to put an exact figure on the record, but said he is planning to sue the Post Office for “a lot of money – in the hundreds of thousands of pounds.”
If that is successful, Mr Hedges would like to then get on with his retirement. “I want to be in the position I would be if this did not happen,” he said.
“They robbed me of my work for nearly 10 years – 10 years of a salary. I had to sell my house at a distorted rate and we had to live in rented accommodation.
“When it is done we will buy our retirement bungalow and live on the rest of the money to help us with our retirement.”
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