Former Post Office manager Kamran Ashraf, 46, and his former sub-postmistress wife Siema Kamran, 48, bought the Hampstead Heath Post Office between 2001 and 2003. They felt forced to plead guilty to theft when £25,000 went missing from their Post Office, despite being innocent, and he was sentenced to nine months in jail in 2004. The father-of-three spent 10 weeks behind bars and eventually had his conviction overturned in 2020, receiving more than £200,000 in compensation so far. He now works for the Department for Work and Pensions and has been diagnosed with severe PTSD. The couple are still yet to receive full compensation for the mental toll, his time in prison and other losses.
There's a memory I often think back to, before this whole Post Office nightmare started. It was 2001 and my wife Siema and I were in our twenties with two young children and had just bought the local Post Office on South End Road in Hampstead. We had everything we wanted — kids, a business of our own — and it felt like everything would continue to go according to plan, as long as we were honest people and worked hard. We were in bed one night and and said 'I really hope this bubble doesn't burst'.
