Telford woman who was wrongly jailed in Horizon scandal meets Post Office bosses face-to-face
A victim of one of the UK's most wide-scale miscarriages of justice has received an apology from the boss of the organisation responsible for pursuing her wrongful prosecution.
Tracy Felstead, from Telford, was wrongly jailed for six months in 2001 after being convicted of stealing more than £11,500 from the Post Office, where she worked as a counter clerk when she was 19.
She was one of scores of post office workers wrongly prosecuted because a faulty computer system called 'Horizon' had suggested they were responsible.
Miss Felstead had her conviction overturned on appeal.
Earlier this week Miss Felstead, accompanied by Lucy Allan, Telford MP, and Flora Page, an experienced legal advocate who has been representing wronged sub-postmasters, met with representatives from the Post Office in parliament.
In the meeting she received an apology from the organisation, but also used it to outline how the Post Office should look to remedy the injustice, and how to improve the remediation process.
Speaking after the meeting, Ms Allan described her constituent as "an inspiration".
She said: "The meeting was intended for Tracy to receive an apology from the chief executive Nick Read.
"Tracy used the meeting to set out the personal impact on victims and their families to great effect.
"But what was incredibly empowering was that she took the opportunity to tell the Post Office how to shape their future direction in their efforts to remedy the terrible suffering and injustice inflicted on so many decent honest people.
"Tracy invited the Post Office to ensure that their actions matched their words.
"She helped the Post Office to see and understand the issues they must address.
"She asked them to return in six months for a review of their progress on the issues she had raised.
“Tracey showed professionalism, courage, and the ability to show her emotions and to get her points across with confidence.
"Tracy was impressive. She held the chief executive of the Post Office to account and told him how to improve the remediation process.
"The Post Office representatives appeared genuinely moved by her testimony, but they had not reckoned on Tracy’s extraordinary strength of will to see justice done, without further anguish being caused to postmasters.
“It’s been a long path to justice and Tracy has been an inspiration.”
