Police investigating crimes linked to the Post Office Horizon IT scandal are looking at “dozens” of potential suspects, but do not expect trials to begin until 2027.
Police are investigating possible wrongdoing by Post Office and Fujitsu employees and outside lawyers, after hundreds of subpostmasters were wrongfully prosecuted after Horizon software allegedly disappeared money from their Post Office branch accounts.
According to police, three suspects have already been interviewed under caution and plans to interview others next year.
But no one will be charged until officers read the final report of a separate public inquiry, almost 30 years after concerns were first raised.
Lee Castleton, sub-postmaster from Bridlington, North Yorkshire, who went bankrupt in 2004 after the post office lost a two-year battle with Horizon, said: “I can’t understand why it’s taken so long. , I don’t understand. Why things have to go again and again… but you know, never give up, we’ll get there.”
The first media reports of Horizon’s problems were published by Computer Weekly in 2009. Alan Bates and his fellow sub-postmasters won the first of their two High Court victories in March 2019, eight years before the first criminal trial began.
Around 100 officers from around England and Wales are now working on what they have dubbed Operation Olympus, which will start in 2020. The investigation will be led by the Metropolitan Police in London, while Police Scotland, the Police Service of Northern Ireland and the National Crime Agency are also involved.
Commander Steve Clemens, who is leading the investigation, said: “We think over 3,000 people have been affected by Horizon. So it’s huge and we have to deploy an appropriate number of officers.”
The first phase of the investigation will focus on those who make “key decisions” about investigations and prosecutions, looking at potential offenses of perjury and the serious offense of perverting the course of justice.
A second phase will cast the net wider, possibly taking in senior Post Office executives.
Work is already underway to build some cases, and the police are in regular discussions with the Crown Prosecution Service.
Police said the first trials could involve cases at any stage, but the number of possible suspects and timing could change as more evidence is gathered.
Officers are already working with 1.5 million documents in the case and expect that number to rise.
The inquiry has also launched an online portal to allow sub-postmasters and others to submit evidence in the inquiry.