It is 10 years since the big phone-hacking trial ended at the Old Bailey. Ex-News of the World editor Andy Coulson went to prison; ex-News International chief Rebekah Brooks walked free. It was the climax of a scandal that provoked seven police inquiries into the interception of communications, into bribery and into the theft of data on behalf of some of Britain’s most powerful newspapers—but it was not the end.
Since then, hundreds of victims have gone to the civil courts to sue not only Rupert Murdoch’s UK company but also Mirror Group Newspapers and Associated Newspapers, which owns the Daily Mail. With the rare exception of Prince Harry in his case last year against MGN, none of them has been able to afford to go to a full trial, but many of them have been able to persuade the High Court to order disclosure of material from police files and, more importantly, from the inner records of the news organisations. The claimants have now amassed a trove of new evidence including emails, call data, records of payments to private investigators, agenda notes, minutes of meetings and recordings of intercepted voicemail messages. Some of this has been deployed in open court. Much of the evidence in relation to the Murdoch papers is due to be deployed at an eight-week trial scheduled for January next year.
It is essential to say that, although some 1,600 cases have been settled with the payment of damages, much of this new evidence consists of unproven allegations. The news organisations contest many of the alleged facts as well as the inferences on which the claimants are resting their cases. It will fall to the Metropolitan Police and the Crown Prosecution Service to check the reality of the new evidence, to decide whether any of it is strong enough to warrant opening an investigation and, if so, whether it would be right to bring any charges against any of those alleged to be involved in unlawful behaviour.
What follows is the story of the evidence that is waiting to be examined, in addition to what was already known 10 years ago. Ultimately, it is a tale not only about the behaviour of the press, but also about the behaviour of power.
The Spy Papers part one: Did the Murdoch empire hack MPs for commercial ends?
Part two: How Murdoch’s company magicked away 31 million emails
Part three: What did Rupert Murdoch know, when?
Part four: Exposed: How powerful newspapers hacked phones during Leveson
Part five: Did Washington Post publisher ‘pervert the course of justice’ under Murdoch?
More to come...
