A police officer described the students stabbed to death in Nottingham last summer as “proper butchered” and said officers “tried to hold their inners in”.

Sky News can reveal the “disgusting” police WhatsApp message sent in the aftermath of the killings of Barnaby Webber and Grace O’Malley-Kumar on 13 June 2023.

Their families are horrified by the language used by an officer when discussing the stabbings with colleagues.

Valdo Calocane, 32, a paranoid schizophrenic, stabbed the two 19-year-olds to death as they walked home from a night out before flagging down and killing 65-year-old school caretaker Ian Coates.

At the time, one officer messaged colleagues on a WhatsApp group.

The message said: “So 2 students on Ilkeston road have been proper butchered, 4 section [officers] turned up and tried to hold their inners in. Suspects then made off and attacked a man in a car on magdala [road] and stabbed him to death.”

Another officer, PC Matt Gell, then shared the message outside of the police WhatsApp group with his wife and two friends.

The families of Barnaby and Grace learned of the contents of the message in February but were so disturbed by its contents that they have only felt comfortable publicising it now, despite the pain it causes them.

Grace’s father, Dr Sanjoy Kumar, said the message is “so disgusting”.

“Would anyone with a child, a mother, a relative use words like that?” he asked.

“Why have police in Nottinghamshire forgotten that these are our dear and beloved children they are referring to? I have tears in my eyes every time the message echoes in my head,” said Dr Kumar.

“The message is as barbaric as the crime for me.”

Nottinghamshire’s chief constable Kate Meynell acknowledged to Dr Kumar that some of the WhatsApp message was “crude and distasteful”.

‘Callous and degrading’

Emma Webber, Barnaby’s mother, has now written an open letter to the members of the WhatsApp group after requests to meet the officers involved were rejected by the force.

“The callous, degrading and desensitised manner of your comments have caused more trauma than you can imagine,” she wrote.

“When you say ‘a couple of students have been properly butchered’ did you stop to think about the absolute terror that they felt in the moment when they were ambushed and repeatedly stabbed by a man who had planned his attack and lay waiting in the shadows for them?

“When you say ‘innards out and everything’ did you think about the agony they felt and the final thoughts that went through their minds as this vicious individual inflicted wounds so serious that they had no chance of surviving?”

Mrs Webber’s letter also calls for tougher action for the officer involved.

“Anyone who can witness the details of such a horror as happened… and refer to lost children as butchered animals; should seriously consider their position,” she says.

“So, to the author of that message, who we understand has received a management warning. I pray you will read this and pause for a while.

“Dig a little deeper for compassion and care. Show the respect in the future that you did not afford Barney.”

PC admits ‘lapse of judgement’

The officer who wrote the message did not face a misconduct hearing but received ‘management intervention’.

In January, PC Gell, who forwarded the message to people outside the force, was found guilty of gross misconduct and given a final written warning after he looked up records relating to Calocane when he had no part in the investigation.

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The panel at the hearing agreed with his acknowledgement that he had “a lapse of judgement”.

A special constable was also sacked for viewing body-worn footage of the two students in their final moments.

Almost 180 police staff were found to have viewed material relating to the case, with 11 of them having no “legitimate reason” to do so.

Nottinghamshire Police referred itself to the Independent Office for Police Conduct after the families raised a number of concerns over the investigation and police conduct, including the force’s failure to inform relatives their Professional Standards Directorate was investigating officers.

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The College of Policing is also conducting a review of how the force handled the case.

Deputy Chief Constable Steve Cooper previously told Sky News that action over the WhatsApp message was taken “immediately”.

“Some of the words were crude and distasteful. It was a single message and no images were taken or shared,” he said.

The post office scandal extends “greatly beyond” faulty Horizon software, according to a lawyer for victims.

Paul Marshall, representing former sub-postmasters, says problems with third party systems in branches, such as ATMs, have been “overlooked”.

A 2013 report commissioned by the Post Office, and not made public at the time, states: “Removing the ATM reduces the risk of (the sub-postmaster) being suspended… as does the presence of lottery tickets, (banking) services, and DVLA processing.”

It indicates there were issues known to the Post Office with third party systems within branches – separate to Horizon software.

Barrister Paul Marshall believes, as a result, there are “no convictions” secured by the Post Office against any sub-postmaster “that could or should properly be treated as safe”.

He says evidence of third party errors, such as ATMs, shows “the scandal extends considerably beyond, greatly beyond, it might be said, the limited focus of bugs in Horizon”.

Blanket exoneration legislation being introduced this summer will only quash convictions brought about “by erroneous Horizon evidence”.

Mr Marshall asserts that postmasters who have had appeals against convictions rejected by the Court of Appeal may have lost because their offences didn’t fall within the “narrow scope” of Horizon issues.

“Horizon was the only accounting system,” says Mr Marshall, “so other systems like ATM machines, bank giro payments, pension payments, lottery tickets, they’re all processed by Horizon, but they weren’t Horizon.”

“The position adopted by the Court of Appeal,” he states, “is if this is a Horizon shortfall case, that is the sole basis you can have your conviction overturned.

“But you could lose your business and have an accounting shortfall that has got absolutely nothing to do with Horizon.”

The report by Detica, a consulting division of BAE systems, concluded that “Post Office systems are not fit for purpose in a modern retail and financial environment”.

Chirag Siphura’s case – ATM shortfalls

Chirag Siphura was threatened with prosecution for ATM shortfalls at his branch in Surrey in 2017, four years after the Post Office received the Detica report.

He was ordered to pay £57,000.

Last year he received interim compensation, with Post Office accepting it was a “Horizon related” issue.

He says that the banks “used to be able to access the ATM remotely”, and that they would carry out updates, “but where the updates happened remotely the figures were always thrown out”.

Mr Siphura describes how the Post Office “always believed the figures that the ATM was giving were 100% correct”.

“If the bank came back and said ‘no, this figure is not correct’,” he continues, “then the Post Office will always take their word over our word.

“And we would then have to come up with evidence to demonstrate their figures are wrong.”

With an IT background Chirag was able to eventually investigate.

IT expert Jason Coyne: Many more impacted.

IT expert Jason Coyne, hired by Alan Bates and other sub-postmasters, submitted a report as part of their High Court case in 2016.

He describes asking the Post Office for information related to third party systems, such as ATMs.

“They would attempt to resist my request for information,” he says, “because what they would say is this isn’t Horizon information and therefore it’s outside of the Horizon trial.”

He says that the High Court judge at the time, Mr Justice Fraser, was “rightly trying to keep the Horizon trial just about the Horizon system”.

“But what he didn’t know at the time,” he continues, “…is that all of these third party systems were absolutely critical to Horizon’s operation” so it was “wrong of Post Office to prevent us access to those documents.”

Mr Coyne believes “many more people” affected by third party systems may not have come forward to date – separate to those already identified as having Horizon issues.

Wendy Cousins case: “My wife died totally innocent”.

Wendy Cousins was convicted of stealing £13,000, relating to pension payments, from her branch in 2005.

Judges at the Court of Appeal ruled that the Horizon computer software had not been “essential” to her prosecution, and upheld her conviction.

She died in February 2022 – less than a year later.

Her husband Paul says he believes her conviction “was a factor in her premature death” from cancer.

“She was treated as a criminal right from the very start,” he says, “…they stuck a sign on the door saying ‘Closed’.”

Paul Cousins says Wendy was persuaded to plead guilty to escape jail.

He is convinced of her innocence and wants her case reviewed again.

“My hope would be that Wendy will be exonerated,” he says.

A Post Office spokesperson said: “We are deeply sorry for the pain which has been suffered by so many people throughout the Horizon IT Scandal.”

They added: “We remain focused on supporting the inquiry.”

In a statement the Department for Business and Trade said it was “committed to righting the wrong of the past and have introduced urgent legislation to overturn the convictions of hundreds of postmasters before the summer.

“If any further injustices emerge, these can be considered by the Criminal Complaints Review Commission, which can ask the Court of Appeal to overturn convictions,” the statement added.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, the former leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, will appear in court this morning charged with rape and other historical sex offences.

The 61-year-old, who is Northern Ireland’s longest-serving MP, was suspended by the party following his arrest last month.

In a statement at the time, the DUP said: “The Party Chairman has received a letter from Sir Jeffrey Donaldson MP confirming that he has been charged with allegations of an historical nature and indicating that he is stepping down as Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party with immediate effect.

“In accordance with the Party Rules, the Party Officers have suspended Mr Donaldson from membership, pending the outcome of a judicial process.”

In his resignation letter, he said he would be strenuously contesting the charges.

Sir Jeffrey Donaldson had been arrested at his home in County Down the previous morning and taken to Antrim Police Station for questioning.

In a short statement, the Police Service of Northern Ireland confirmed that a 61-year-old man had been charged with “non-recent sexual offences” and that a 57-year-old woman, arrested at the same time, had been charged with “aiding and abetting” in connection with the offences.

Both are due to appear before Newry Magistrates Court in County Down.

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Sir Jeffrey Donaldson, who has been MP for Lagan Valley for 27 years, was knighted for his services to politics in 2016.

He helped broker the DUP’s £1bn confidence and supply deal with Theresa May’s minority Tory government, when the party held the balance of power at Westminster between 2017 and 2019.

More recently, he had compromised and led his party back into the power-sharing government at Stormont, which it had boycotted for two years over post-Brexit trading arrangements.