Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 585 posts

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#291

Post by michael1999 »

noisy_boy wrote: post #86
rwmj wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The actual answer to this is terrible. Courts had to trust the computer was correct. There was a common law presumption that a computer was operating correctly unless there is evidence to the contrary (and getting that evidence is basically impossible for the individuals being charged who were post office workers, not computer experts, and the source code was a trade secret). This might change, partly in response to…

> The actual answer to this is terrible. Courts had to trust the computer was correct. There was a common law presumption that a computer was operating correctly unless there is evidence to the contrary That is just mind bogglingly stupid - who the hell are the idiots who wrote a law like that? Any of them wrote a line of code in their life?

It's incremental, and goes back to things like clocks.

Imagine a witness says "I saw him go into the bank at 11:20. I know the time because I looked up at the clock tower, and it said 11:20".

Defence argues "The clock must have been wrong. My client was at lunch with his wife by 11:15".

Clocks are simple enough that we can presume them to correct, unless you can present evidence that they are unreliable.

This presumption was extended to ever-more complicated machines over the years. And then (fatally) this presumption was extended to the rise of PROGRAMMABLE computers. It is the programmability of computers that makes them unreliable. The actual computer hardware rarely makes an error that isn't obvious as an error.

The distinction of software and hardware is a relatively recent concept for something as old as common law.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#292

Post by njovin »

jordanb wrote: post #191

I went on a deep dive on this scandal about a year or so ago. One thing that struck me is the class element. Basically, the Post Office leadership could not understand why someone would buy a PO franchise. It's a substantial amount of money up front, and people aren't allowed to buy multiple franchises, so every PO was an owner/operator position. Essentially people were "buying a job". The people in leadership couldn…

So the PO creates a franchise program that they later decide isn't suitable for any sane, good-faith actor, and instead of revising the terms of the franchise program to make it so, they assume that the participants are criminals and prosecute them?

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#293

Post by mr_toad »

mrkramer wrote: post #40
cedws wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>if software developers screw up Well, yes, they did screw up, but the fallout was amplified 100x by bad management.

"The Horizon IT system contained "hundreds" of bugs[0]." If your accounting software has hundreds of bugs then you are really in the deep shit. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal#:~...

If any large system wasn’t constantly logging errors I’d immediately assume there was something wrong with the error logging system. Only trivial software is bug free.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#294

Post by arrowsmith »

akudha wrote: post #284
arrowsmith wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? That makes no sense whatsoever.

Why does it not make sense? If I was involved in a robbery at age 18, as a dumb kid, should I still be called "robber xyz" for the rest of my life? Especially if I turned my life around?

I agree that we should be forgiving, give people second chances etc, but that doesn't change the meaning of words. "Defamation" is when you damage someone's reputation by saying things about them that aren't true. If you were convicted of a crime long ago and someone draws attention to that fact, they're not defaming you. The truth isn't defamation, by definition.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#295

Post by michael1999 »

nwienert wrote: post #247
tokai wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iraq war was definitely not the work of any deep state, if you follow your definition. It was pushed by the president and his government, not faceless bureaucrats.

Certainly the pressure on them and the “intel” they saw on WMD was in part the work of the deep state, that the president was captured by them is sort of the point.

That's completely backwards.

The CIA was very clear that there was nothing there, and the publicly appointed leadership (Rumsfeld, Feith, Cheney, etc) badgered them until they gave in and made some wishy-washy statement that Powell could pretend was real.

The war was led from the top - Sec Def and VP. That Bush was a moron and appointed liars to Sec Def and VP is on him. Cheney and Rumsfeld had a long history of making things up, going back to the 70s.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#296

Post by [deleted] »

ImHereToVote wrote: post #184
dagmx wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well said. I really wish we had a better word for someone who is bullied into suicide. It’s tantamount to manslaughter imho. Recently, a snark/bullying community on Reddit resulted in the suicide of their target (a woman responsible for rescuing foxes). That kind of targeting and bullying is horrific for any individual to process, let alone people who don’t have the press teams and training that celebrities do.

This sets a bad precedent. There is a wide gamut of emotional resilience in people. What is a funny insult to one person, can be rope-fuel to another. Would you want to be called that if you make a light jab at a middle aged bald guy?

[deleted]

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#297

Post by mr_toad »

mrkramer wrote: post #92
noisy_boy wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yea management failed but wouldn't the most logical thing be to call in computer forensics experts Yea and who is responsible for engaging them?

I meant courts should've called in multiple expert witnesses and even computer forensics companies. This case looks like government or in this case courts colluded with British Post Office.

> I meant courts should've called in multiple expert witnesses and even computer forensics companies.

UK courts don’t (can’t) do that, that’s up to the plaintiffs or defendants.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#298

Post by fn-mote »

rossant wrote: post #207
akudha wrote: post #140

This was depressing to read. Failures at so many levels. 1. Immediately after Horizon was rolled out, issues were reported. But ignored 2. Prosecutors didn't bother to verify if there is another explanation before accusing thousands of people of stealing? Isn't it common sense to pause for a second and think, "could we please double check the evidence? how can thousands of postal workers suddenly turn into thieves?"…

Read about this [1, 2]. This is not yet a well-known scandal, but I expect (and hope) it will surface in the coming years or decade. It is on an even bigger scale, not limited to a single country, and it has been going on not just for 10 years but for many decades. [1] https://cambridgeblog.org/2023/05/a-journey-into-the-shaken-... [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37650402

Incredible. Reading HN pays off again. Thank you for sharing.

The link is to a book by a PhD neuroscientist investigation the scientific basis for shaken baby syndrome.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#299

Post by spwa4 »

jen20 wrote: post #244
Maxious wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I regret to inform you that not only is Fujitsu not banned from UK government work, they're not even banned from continuing the same project https://www.publictechnology.net/2025/03/17/business-and-ind...

Wow. That is the kind of thing that every reasonable person should be calling their MP's office about daily.

What do you mean? The government very strongly responded to this scandal, including having the person directly responsible, who instructed the post office to hide proof of the postmaster's innocence, appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire.

She has since been thrown under the bus, though, of course, not prosecuted or imprisoned (despite ordering wrongful prosecutions of over 900 others)

The politician responsible for her was Vince Cable, who since became leader of the Liberal Democrats, and holds 10 positions, most of which are either funded by the government or related to it.

Re: At Least 13 People Died by Suicide Amid U.K. Post Office Scandal, Report Says

#300

Post by [deleted] »

tialaramex wrote: post #79
mrkramer wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The Horizon IT system contained "hundreds" of bugs[0]." If your accounting software has hundreds of bugs then you are really in the deep shit. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Post_Office_scandal#:~...

So long as the jury understands this, it's all fine. If you're on trial for doing X and your jury is told by a prosecution witness "mrkramer did X" and under cross they admit that's based on computer records which are often bogus, inconsistent, total nonsense, it doesn't take the world's best defence lawyer to secure an "innocent" verdict. That's not a fun experience, but it probably won't drive you to suicide. One o…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN