Professional Pathologies, Causal Pathways and the Post Office Miscarriages of Justice

2000年，作为变得更加商业化的驱动力的一部分，邮局在其所有分支机构中引入了一个有缺陷的电子会计系统。该系统产生了错误的债务记录，邮政局（PO）说，其工作人员负责。根据这些错误的记录，邮政署的工作人员被要求偿还他们不欠的钱;当被指控管理不善或不诚实时，失去了他们作为邮政局长的工作或业务;许多人（估计有700多人）被起诉，定罪，许多人因盗窃和伪造账目而被监禁。生计、名誉和自由都丧失了。这些定罪的第一次撤销始于2021年，此前上诉法院发现邮政局的行为如此恶劣，以至于他们的定罪是“对公共司法的侮辱”。多年来，一系列的不良行为被曝光，这些行为往往是由为邮政局工作的律师推动或监督的。上诉法院的判决基于2019年高等法院案件的调查结果，该案件发现PO一直在运行一个不适合目的的会计系统。律师们以压制性和误导性的方式为此案辩护。这些案件揭示了一些事件，特别是在2010年，2013年及以后，PO内部问题的证据被忽视或压制，对PO行为的受害者产生了灾难性的影响。由温威廉姆斯爵士进行的诉讼和正在进行的司法调查已经并将产生大量关于邮政局错误和不当行为核心行为和决定的详细信息。这提供了一个关键的机会，把律师的行为和思维过程放在显微镜下。在人们日益关注律师道德的时候，我们可以发展新的思维，旨在减少这种行为的可能性。我们可以超越传统的方法，律师的道德是抽象的，复杂的，不太可能影响行为和发展的方法，可以鼓励律师更认真地对待自己的道德规则。我们还可以帮助监管机构改进其自身的规则手册和其他流程，以使律师承担责任。为此，我们将部署最新的道德思想，并与从业人员合作，探讨他们在真实的世界中将如何或应该如何做出决定。我们还将借鉴丑闻受害者的叙述，以确保我们的知识和方法了解受害者如何体验有时令人困惑的法律世界。尽管邮局丑闻的结果令人震惊，但导致这一丑闻的问题对于在商业（和其他）组织工作的律师来说是相当普遍的。我们的方法和思维将确保我们从邮局丑闻中吸取的教训将适用于这一可怕案件的范围之外。

In 2000, as part of a drive to become more commercial, the Post Office introduced a flawed electronic accounting system into all their branches. That system generated erroneous records of debts which the Post Office (PO) said its staff were responsible for. On the basis of those erroneous records, PO staff were asked to repay money they did not owe; lost their employment or businesses as sub-postmasters when accused of mismanagement or dishonesty; and, many (estimated at over 700) were prosecuted, convicted, and many were imprisoned for thefts and false accounting they did not commit. Livelihoods, reputations, and freedom were lost. The first quashings of these convictions began in 2021 after the Court of Appeal found that the Post Office had acted so badly that their convictions were an "affront to public justice". A litany of poor behaviour, often driven or overseen by lawyers working for the PO, over many years was exposed. The Court of Appeal's judgment built on findings in a High Court case in 2019 which found that PO had been running an accounting system that was not fit for purpose. The case was defended by lawyers in ways which were oppressive and misleading. Those cases revealed a number of episodes, especially in 2010, 2013, and beyond, where evidence of problems within PO was ignored or suppressed with catastrophic impacts on the victims of PO's behaviour. The litigation, and the ongoing judicial inquiry, being conducted by Sir Wyn Williams has, and will, produce a wealth of detailed information on the behaviors and decisions lying at the heart of Post Office's mistakes and misconduct. This provides a crucial opportunity to put the conduct and thought processes of lawyers under the microscope. At a time when concern about lawyers' ethics is growing, we can develop new thinking which will aim to make this kind of behaviour less likely. We can move beyond traditional approaches to lawyers' ethics which are abstract, complex, and unlikely to affect behaviour and develop approaches that can encourage lawyers to take their own ethical rules more seriously. We can also do work that will help regulators improve their own rule-book and other processes to hold lawyers accountable.To do this we will deploy the latest thinking on ethics, and work with practitioners to explore how they would or should take decisions in the real world. We will also draw on the accounts of victims of the scandals to ensure that our knowledge and approach are informed by how victims experience the sometimes bewildering world of law. Although the outcome of the post office scandal is horrifying; the problems that led to it are quite common for lawyers working within commercial (and other) organisations. Our methods and thinking will ensure that the lessons we learn from the Post Office scandal will be applicable well beyond the confines of this terrible case.