Family insists jailed ex-officer is innocent

Bill Shaw was working for G4S, a British security group which provides protection for diplomatic personnel, when he was arrested over a 13,000 payment for the release of two impounded armoured vehicles belonging to the company.

Mr Shaw, who served for 28 years with the Royal Military Police and was awarded an MBE, claims the payment was a fine but officials reportedly disappeared with the money.

He is now serving a two-year sentence in a Kabul prison after being prosecuted by an anti-corruption tribunal.

His family say he has done nothing wrong and are campaigning for his release.

His daughter, Lisa Luckyn-Malone, who lives in Kent, said: "He is completely straight. If he went into a shop and they gave him too much change he would return it. It is just not in his character at all."

His wife, Liz, said he thought he was making an official payment.

"That is the policy there. The vehicles were taken on several occasions and to get them back you have to pay a release fee, and that is what he did."

She said her husband had co-operated with the Afghan authorities, believing they were conducting an investigation into the payments for impounded vehicles.

"He believed that the inquiry was into the fact that they were having to pay this release fee continuously to get their vehicles back. He co-operated and eventually they turned the attention on him and said he was the one who was the guilty person," she said.

Mr Shaw was jailed along with Afghan bodyguard Maiwand Limar. A spokesman for G4S said: "We continue to believe the charges against both Bill Shaw and Maiwand Limar were totally misconceived, not proven in court, and we stand fully behind their innocence.

"We strongly disagree with the verdict and maintain that both men behaved in an open and fully transparent fashion. We expect an appeal to be lodged shortly and will be encouraging the Afghan and British authorities to work with us in overturning this patently unfair judgment. We will continue to support both men and their families at this most difficult time."

He said that staff had raised concerns with Afghan and British authorities about "random" confiscation of the company's armoured vehicles. Mr Shaw genuinely believed the payment he made was legitimate.

A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: "We continue to follow Bill Shaw's case closely following the verdict at the court hearing on April 26. We shall continue to provide consular assistance to Mr Shaw and his family, including working to ensure best possible treatment and facilities."

Pressure for his release is coming from friends and ex-colleagues. An online petition to the UK Government has attracted over 2,000 signatures and thousands have joined two groups on networking site Facebook.

A former colleague called Les, commenting on one website, said: "Billy Shaw is one of the finest and most honourable men I ever knew in 22 years of serving...he rose from private to major, no easy feat."