A former sub-postmaster serving a life sentence in jail for murdering his spouse is searching for a contemporary enchantment towards his sentence, arguing that the Post Office investigation has shed new gentle on his case.
Robin Garbutt was discovered responsible of murdering his spouse Diana at their dwelling in North Yorkshire final yr in 2011, however has at all times maintained his innocence.
Evidence from the Horizon IT system and the publish workplace helped convict him after prosecutors mentioned he stole cash from his department, plotted the theft and murdered Diana to cowl it up.
Garbutt's attorneys have utilized to the Criminal Cases Review Commission to ship it again to the Court of Appeal. Former Post Office minister Kevin Hollinrake MP informed the BBC he was supporting the brand new overview.
Garbutt's spouse Diana was discovered useless in 2010 of their flat above the publish workplace within the village of Melsonby, North Yorkshire. He was struck over the pinnacle with a metallic bar on his mattress.
Garbutt claimed they had been the victims of an armed theft.
He informed police {that a} man pressured him at gunpoint to open his publish workplace secure and hand over £16,000, earlier than he was in a position to escape upstairs, the place he discovered his spouse's physique.
But the jury didn’t imagine him. The prosecution mentioned that he had deliberate the theft and was stealing cash from his department, after which murdered Diana to cover it out of concern of being uncovered. He claimed that he was in monetary problem and likewise had issues in his relationship.
There was no bodily proof linking him to the homicide. A key problem of the case towards him was based mostly on knowledge from the Horizon system and the way it was interpreted by the Post Office.
Unlike the acquainted tales of lots of of different sub-postmasters, this isn’t a few discount in department accounts.
The prosecution claimed that Garbutt was concealing his theft by making false declarations on the amount of money held in his publish workplace secure. The suggestion is that he was requesting greater than vital and that there was by no means £16,000 within the secure on the morning of the homicide as a result of he stole it.
Two witnesses from the Post Office testified towards him, counting on knowledge from the Horizon laptop system. An investigator mentioned the amount of money he was requesting for his department account was suspicious and indicative of fraud.
Garbutt's attorneys now argue within the transient that key items of proof regarding Horizon can’t be relied upon, based mostly on the general public inquiry into the scandal and contemporary proof from different sources.
Diana's mom made clear in an interview earlier this yr that she believed her son-in-law was responsible, saying he was “jumping on the Horizon bandwagon”.
But Garbutt's supporters say that, given all of the proof and inconsistencies uncovered over time, he by no means obtained a good trial and it’s time for a complete have a look at his case.
“We believe that the fresh evidence and other significant developments that have emerged since the original trial mean that Mr. Garbutt's conviction is not safe,” says his lawyer Martin Rackstraw of Russell-Cook, who represents James Sturman. Represented by Casey. Garbutt for just a few years.
'truthful trial'
Conservative MP Hollinrake has written a letter of assist. He went to the identical faculty as Garbutt, however says that’s the reason he has not lent his assist to the overview.
He informed the BBC: “I can't judge whether Robin Garbutt is guilty or innocent, but I think we all want to make sure that people get a fair trial when they go through the justice system.”
Garbutt has already failed 3 times to steer the Criminal Cases Review Commission to ship his case again to the Court of Appeal as new data has emerged.
In her final try in 2021, her authorized staff raised her lack of information concerning the Horizon system, however the utility was rejected as a result of the watchdog determined that flaws in Horizon compromised the reliability of the info utilized by prosecutors in her trial. Did not have an effect on.
“I think it's the final roll of the dice,” says his shut pal and former neighbor Barry Connachie.
“We have by no means doubted his innocence and we’re all actually hoping that that is what is going to convey him success. Robin at all times mentioned he wasn't stealing any cash from the publish workplace.”
With inputs from BBC