End of the Innocence

(Reuters) – News Corp agreed to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds to an early phone-hacking victim because it recognized that evidence from the case was ‘fatal’ to its claims of innocence, new details released on Tuesday showed.

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News of News of The World

Anyone else notice that all the people involved in the News of the World/News Corporation scandal have names that sound like Alfred Hitchcock villains?

From The New York Times:

LONDON — A reporter who is among the 16 people arrested and then freed on bail in the phone hacking case that has shaken Rupert Murdoch’s media empire in Britain warned his former bosses on Friday that he planned to break his silence on the scandal in a civil court case. He said that he would reveal those who were responsible for the phone hacking.

The reporter, Neville Thurlbeck, 49, who was the chief reporter for the now-defunct tabloid The News of the World, gave the warning in a statement issued through his lawyers in connection with his wrongful-dismissal lawsuit against News International, the British newspaper arm of Mr. Murdoch’s News Corporation. Mr. Thurlbeck was one of the first people arrested by Scotland Yard in a renewed investigation of the phone hacking this year, but he has denied publicly having played any part in the illegal interception of cellphone voicemails.

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The Private Eye Goes Public

From the Guardian:

Private investigator Glenn Mulcaire has revealed the names of the News of the World staff who instructed him to carry out phone hacking, his solicitor has confirmed.

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Phone Tap Dance

From The Telegraph:

As detectives work their way through the 11,000 pages of telephone numbers that were hacked by the News of the World, they are still surprised by the extent of the illegal actvities at Rupert Murdoch’s now defunct tabloid.

Mandrake can disclose that the latest victim is the fitness trainer at News International’s gym, Kags Alexander-Cahill, who was the instructor to Rebekah Brooks, Andy Coulson and Neil Wallis.

His company, Training Partner, which ran the gym until the end of last year, has been notified by his mobile phone operator that his number was hacked dozens of times between 2005 and 2006.

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Die-nasty

(Reuters) – It was one of many strange moments in a hearing rich in absurdity. As British lawmakers questioned Rupert Murdoch last month over whether his News of the World journalists broke the law by hacking into mobile phones, the 80-year-old Australian-born boss of media giant News Corporation began to reminiscence about his late father.

…snip…

Member of Parliament Damian Collins tried to get the hearing back on track, but Murdoch, sitting beside his son James, the head of News Corp’s non-U.S. interests, continued: “That just addresses the question of it being a family business. I would love to see my sons and daughters follow that route — if they are interested.”

What Murdoch’s children are interested in may no longer matter.

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Hair’s to a Snake in the Grass

From the Mirror:

THE News of the World hacked a phone belonging to Sarah Payne’s mother – which was given to her by then editor Rebekah Brooks, it was claimed yesterday.

Scotland Yard have told Sara – mother of the eight-year-old schoolgirl murdered by Roy Whiting – that the mobile may have been targeted by the newspaper. They said they had found evidence suggesting she was hacked by News of the World ­investigator Glenn Mulcaire.

Officers from ­Operation Weeting told her on Tuesday that they had found her personal details among his notes. The evidence is believed to relate to the phone Rebekah Brooks gave her to help her stay in touch with supporters.

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Flop Secret

From THE INDEPENDENT:

The extraordinary access that Cabinet ministers granted Rupert Murdoch and his children was revealed for the first time yesterday, with more than two dozen private meetings between the family and senior members of the Government in the 15 months since David Cameron entered Downing Street.

In total, Cabinet ministers have had private meetings with Murdoch executives more than 60 times and, if social events such as receptions at party conferences are included, the figure is at least 107.

On two occasions, James Murdoch and former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks were given confidential defence briefings on Afghanistan and Britain’s strategic defence review by the Defence Secretary, Liam Fox. A further briefing was held with Ms Brooks, Rupert Murdoch and the Sunday Times editor John Witherow.

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