Post Office owner jailed for life for murdering wife to launch appeal after faulty Horizon used in conviction

13 January 2024, 14:27 | Updated: 13 January 2024, 14:32

By Kieran Kelly

@kellyjourno

A Post Office owner who was sentenced to life for murdering his wife is to launch a fresh appeal against his conviction due to the use of the Horizon IT system in finding him guilty.

Robin Garbutt was sentenced to life in prison in 2011, with a minimum tariff of 20 years, after his wife was bludgeoned to death in their flat above the Post Office in Richmondshire, North Yorkshire, in March 2010.

Garbutt has always maintained his innocence, insisting that a man wearing a balaclava and holding a gun made him hand over £16,000 while claiming to "have" his wife.

The former Post Office manager said he handed over the cash and ran upstairs, where he claimed to have found his wife, Diana, dead.

Garbutt retains the support of many of his former customers, who often visit him in prison.

Some claim they were served by him at the Melsonby Village Shop and Post Office on the morning of Diana's death and said he was his “normal cheery self”.

Diana’s mother, Agnes Gaylor, on the other hand, said she did not believe he will get very far with the appeal.

“It’s obvious to anyone that Robin is taking advantage of the Horizon scandal to gain publicity," she said.

Garbutt was found guilty in 2011 on a 10-2 majority verdict on the basis of circumstantial evidence

There was no DNA evidence to link him to Diana's murder, or the metal bar that was used to kill her.

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Part of his conviction was based on evidence heard by the jury from a Post Office investigator who had presented data from the Horizon system.

The investigator said data showed he had been stealing money from the Post Office.

It was concluded that he killed his wife in order to cover up his theft.

The jury was told how he 'staged the armed robbery to cover up his losses' - killing his wife to make the robbery appear legitimate, or to silence her.

The couple had been going to marriage counselling after Diana joined a dating site in 2009 to chat to other men.

“We were as close as close can be,” he told the jury at the time.

Speaking from a low-security jail in West Yorkshire, Garbutt said: “The way the Post Office dealt with me was the same way that they dealt with the other people.”

'Unreliable data' from Horizon “was used in court to make me look bad”, he added.

“We had a lot of problems with the system going down, not working,” he added.

“All the [financial] evidence used against me at trial, we have no means of checking whether it was accurate.”

He has already had an appeal rejected in 2012.

The Department for Business and Trade, which oversees the Horizon compensation scheme, said: “We will be unable to comment on this as it is an individual case.”