Bexhill daughter’s fight after Post Office scandal 'tormented' dad before sudden death

Rebecca Armstrong’s father Jonathan (Jono), died last October of a heart attack, aged 58. She said he spent more than a decade ‘tormented’ by being wrongly accused of stealing from the Post Office he ran in Bexhill.

She is now seeking compensation under the new Horizon Family Members Redress Scheme.

It is open to close relatives of any former sub-postmaster who receives compensation for bankruptcy, imprisonment or death related to Horizon, and for those who experienced personal injury themselves.

Law firm Hudgell Solicitors, which has represented more than 1,000 sub-postmasters affected by the scandal, said Jono was one of thousands wrongly accused due to faulty IT and accounting systems that caused unexplained shortfalls in branch accounts during the 1990s and 2000s.

The firm added that in 2014, when Post Office auditors arrived at Jono’s branch, he left, intending to take his own life.

Hudgell Solicitors said he had regularly taken money from the profitable shop he and his wife Sarah owned to balance the Post Office accounts, with shortfalls having run into tens of thousands of pounds.

Hudgell Solicitors said Jono was sectioned and spent nearly a month in hospital, but the Post Office banned him from setting foot inside the branch again.

It led to Rebecca quitting her university course to support her mother Sarah, taking over the running of the shop, with Sarah becoming sub-postmistress.

However, as shortfalls continued, the family decided to sell up, enabling them to pay off the alleged debt to the Post Office and prevent Jono from facing prosecution.

Rebecca, 34, said: “I put dad’s death down last year to the impact the Post Office had on his and our lives for more than a decade.

“Had he not been put through all he was; I’m sure he’d still be here now. That breaks my heart, and really angers me, and its why I’ll never stop fighting for justice and the compensation we all deserve.

“When my mum called me to say he had died last October I collapsed and cried like I have never cried before. My heart was broken and I don’t think it can ever be whole again.

“That day changed our lives forever, and since then, nothing was ever the same again. My proud, honourable father was reduced to a shell of the man he had previously been.

“He had worked so hard at that Post Office and loved serving the community. He and my mum won awards, but when it started going wrong, he became obsessed.

“He was a chartered accountant and he couldn’t understand why the shortfalls were happening. I can remember him coming home looking completely shattered on Wednesday nights as he had been trying to balance the books.

“It got to the point where he installed CCTV.

“He was tormented by it and would sit watching the CCTV footage for hours checking every transaction. It drove him crazy – and ultimately to almost ending his life.”

Hudgell Solicitors said Jono sadly never saw his own claim completed, despite starting the process in 2020.

The Post Office first offered a settlement of just under a third of what he claimed for, said Hudgell Solicitors. The law firm submitted further evidence, including medical reports detailing the impact on his mental health.

It said his case was transferred into a new appeals process, run by the Department for Business and Trade (DBT), last April, and it still remains unsettled, with only a modest interim payment received before he died.

After running the Post Office for a short period, the family sold the business at a loss and moved to Brockworth, Gloucestershire, to be closer to Becky's siblings.

They entered the pub trade and ran a fish and chip shop, but lockdowns during the pandemic and increased business rates forced the ventures to close.

Rebecca says her father was determined to secure full financial redress not only as vindication that he had done nothing wrong, but to help start a new life.

He did not see either of those two things happen. He was also denied the opportunity to walk Rebecca down the aisle, though he had helped her and her fiancé Brandon, 37, make their plans just a month before he passed away.

Rebecca said: “My dad helped us choose our wedding venue and our wedding music playlist. We also chose our song for the father and daughter dance which brought him to tears.

“He gave us his seal of approval but at present, I just can’t face having that day without him there. I don’t want to do it without him.

“Now, mum is left alone and having to pick up the pieces again, just like she had to all those years ago.

“I’ve just not been able to cope with the loss of my dad. They say there are different stages of grief, but not for me. I’ve only ever had one stage and that’s anger, anger which is directly at the Post Office for doing what it did to our lives.

“My dad had years of his life ruined, and he was only 58 when he died and had so much more to live for, and so much more to prove.

“I can’t bear the thought of even having children without him being here.

“Dad was consumed by the fight for justice before he died and we now need to see this through until the end. I need to now take on that fight for my dad and to help my mum. At present we can’t see the end, and that’s not fair.”