Luke Engelen

A man who stopped to help at the scene of the Southport stabbings described 'locking eyes' with the attacker and says seeing the injured children will 'probably stay with me for the rest of my life' Read more: trib.al/BCzYsOJ

#FUJITSU #LOSTCHANCES #BUSHIDO #StateScandal #PostOffice #GLO555 #MrBatesVsThePostOffice #PostOfficeInquiry On the 19th of January PAUL PATTERSON of @fujitsu_uk gave evidence to the Post Office Horizon IT Inquiry (See below). Sam Stein KC asked searing questions about the impact on families and children of Subpostmasters. Paul Patterson responded that he would be willing to engage. Katie Downey who founded lostchances.co.uk to represent the children of the victims of this Scandal has yet to hear from Mr Patterson about how @Fujitsu_Global could help. MR PATTERSON - YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF TO BURDEN YOUNG PEOPLE ALREADY DEEPLY TRAUMATISED WITH INHUMANE FALSE HOPE !! 🥲😡🆘⚖️💷💔🎌💴 PAUL PATTERSON and his legion of Legal and PR Advisers would be well served to be reminded of MILLIE JO CASTLETON'S heartbreaking Human Impact Statement. “I am the daughter of Mr LEE CASTLETON, a former Postmaster. My family moved to run a small newsagents post office in 2003. For over 17 years the Post Office has had a significant part of my life. I’m now 26. In 2004, when the Post Office started all this, I was 8. We were to be thrown into something that has drastically shaped the rest of our lives." “The Post Office brought civil proceedings against my father in the High Court in 2006 on a false basis. I was 8 years old when I first took note the confusion, frustration and anxiety leaching into my home before talks of courts, trials and accusations of theft. This was an ordeal that not only cost my father legal fees and made him bankrupt, it blackened our family name, branded thieves and liars." “It was also a lonely time. The financial strain of legal fees and supporting the family saw my Dad working near 100-hour weeks often spending days on end away from us. He became a stranger to me, someone I barely saw and lost a close relationship with. My mother worked too during the day in the newsagents we still had, but which was failing due to the label attached to us after the legal case. “I remember feeling terrified on the school bus when I was a child. I was asked, ‘Didn’t your Dad steal lots of money or something?’ I removed myself from social interaction. I lost faith in everybody around me over the years. Living in a constant cycle of fear and anxiety led me to not even want to go to the school canteen. Lunch period became a time for me to hide. The cycle was impossible to escape. “At home I was dealing with parents who were working their hardest to provide, utterly pained by the stress that the Post Office trial caused them. Dad was working insane hours. My mother was also working as much as she could but also dealing with stress-induced epilepsy. These seizures were unpredictable. I remember having to handle her seizures alone as a child, sometimes in the middle of the night. When Dad was away, I’d sleep beside her just in case." “I felt helpless. I didn’t tell my parents about the bullying or my social withdrawal. They didn’t know I spent my breaks sitting alone or just walking around. They didn’t know I could go a day or two without really talking. They didn’t know that I was assaulted on the school bus and had to run off on the first stop, wet from water being thrown at me, being spat on. I spent days out in the town alone walking around for hours, pretending I met with friends when I didn’t. By the time I was 17, I was wrecked by feelings of self-loathing, depression and feeling like nothing more than a burden to my family. The Post Office just loomed too large in our lives, controlling every aspect of our beings. “I had spent years in self-imposed isolation afraid of adults and peers. I often feel I had no teenage experience. By the age of 18, I couldn’t even tell you about my favourite activities, shoes or hobbies. I didn’t put any time to myself. I was anxious about going to university. Mum was still having seizures and Dad was still fighting a legal battle. I felt guilty also related to the fear of spending money. “At university, I walked. Some days I walked for eight or more hours without a break. This whilst being on a diet that was absolute minimum resulted in me fainting a few times in the middle of the town. My late teens and early 20s were governed by my eating disorder and mental anxieties. I began to sink under the weight of it and grabbed for some sense of control. “By the end of my first year at university, I had been diagnosed as anorexic. I was too sick to go into my second year. I spent a year out. My lowest weight saw we weighing little more than 5 stone. I had to stay in hospital for heart-related issues for days on end. The surrender of a broken spirit, the pain and self-loathing of someone who just couldn’t escape such a terrible situation. " “It took years, relapses, hospital stays, scares about my heart possibly failing, and a period of months in a day clinic post graduation. I walked for my degree in 2017 weighing 5 and a half stone. I would have graduated in 2016 but I had to take a gap year in 2014 to 2015 because of medical intervention because my health problems and my eating disorder. " “This is what the Post Office did to me and my family. While my story won’t be the only one, the mental toll that so many years of fighting has taken is frightening.” 🥲🥲🥲 @CastletonLee @lisa_castleton @katieddowney @tonydowney67 @ElCShaikh @VarchasPatel @RosieBrock71780 @carolvorders @BBCEmmaSimpson @rbrooks45 @TomWitherow @Karlfl @japantimes @JapanToday @bracknellnews @murphy_simon @JAPANinUK @voguejp @KemiBadenoch @kevinhollinrake @DavidDavisMP @marionfellows @HouseofCommons @UKHouseofLords @premnsikka