Cleared Briton faces release delay

Liz Shaw, from Leeds, told the Yorkshire Post she would not celebrate until the Afghan authorities formally release her husband Bill, whose four months in prison have included long spells in solitary confinement.

Mr Shaw, 52, was acquitted on Sunday of bribing officials while he was working as a manager of a security firm providing protection to foreigners.

He had been found guilty of the charges in April but the convictions were thrown out after a two-day appeal hearing.

Mr Shaw must, however, remain in jail until legal paperwork has been signed and prosecutors have confirmed they will not challenge the appeal verdict.

Mrs Shaw, 52, who spoke to her husband briefly on the telephone shortly after the acquittal was announced, said: "Until he has left Afghanistan I don't think I will feel safe, and we can't really celebrate until he has landed in another country."

The former Royal Military Police officer, who had served for 28 years and was awarded an MBE, was arrested in March on suspicion of bribing Afghan officials to secure the release of two impounded vehicles.

He maintained he had believed the payment was a legitimate fine but he was found guilty after a trial and ordered to serve two years in prison. He was also fined 16,000.

Mrs Shaw said: "He was worried about appealing because he had heard of cases where people had gone back to appeal and ended up getting an extended sentence.

"He wanted to do his two years and come home, but we wouldn't hear anything of that because it would be viewed as an admission of guilt.

"It was the humiliation of the trial that upset us. He had his head shaven and he was taken out of prison and into the courtroom in his pyjamas, all after serving 28 years in the Army.

"He put on a brave face for everybody, but I know it would have broken his heart."

Before his arrest, Mr Shaw had worked in Afghanistan for two years as a senior manager at G4S, the private security company which guards the British embassy in Kabul.

Mrs Shaw said: "I spoke to him in the week leading up to his arrest, and even at that point he said he was concerned because he had been called in to give evidence and there had been some talk of 'detention'.

"But he thought it would all get cleared up because he did everything they asked of him and they seemed happy with the details he had given them.

"When I spoke to him on the morning of March 3 everything seemed all right, but that evening I got a phone call from one of his colleagues and as soon as I heard his colleague's voice I knew there was a problem."

For a week Mr Shaw was held in a detention centre, where he was able to speak to his family on the phone but contact was limited after he was moved to Kabul's Pul-e-Charki jail which houses Taliban and al-Qaida inmates..

Mrs Shaw had to rely on messages from Mr Shaw's colleagues, who would occasionally get to visit him in cramped conditions with 10 beds for 20 prisoners.

Mr Shaw was moved to a counter-narcotics justice centre where he was held in solitary confinement for 22 hours a day.

"If he ever went out of his cell he was shackled and he would even have his watch taken from him," Mrs Shaw said.

"He was in there for nine weeks and his mental state really did go down while he was there because of the isolation and loneliness."

She added: "When I saw him on the television at the weekend, you could see that he had lost about two stone in weight.

"He looked quite grey in his face and the spark had gone out of his eyes. We need to get him home."