Rupert Murdoch and the Corruption of the British Media

[Douglas Caddy]

Phone hacking: Scotland Yard arrests 48-year-old man

Arrest is sixth made by detectives working in Operation Elveden, which is investigating alleged payments to police officers

By Lisa O'Carroll and Sandra Laville

guardian.co.uk,

Friday 4 November 2011 07.59 EDT

A 48-year-old man has been arrested as part of Scotland Yard's investigation into alleged payments to police officers by newspapers.

The arrest at 10.30am on Friday is the sixth made by detectives working in Operation Elveden, which was set up in July following allegations that police officers had received up to £130,000 over several years from the News of the World for information, including contact details of the royal family.

The Guardian understands the man arrested is not a policeman. It is also understood that the person is a current employee of News International.

Scotland Yard said he was arrested outside London and brought to a south-west London station.

Scotland Yard said in a statement: "He was arrested at an outside London on suspicion of corruption allegations in contravention of section 1 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906, and is being brought to a south-west London police station."

Operation Elveden is one of three Met investigations relating to alleged illegal activities by newspapers. The others are Operation Weeting and Operation Tuleta, set up to examine phone hacking and computer hacking, respectively.

On Thursday, Scotland Yard confirmed to the Guardian that the number of people whose phones may have been hacked had reached 5,800 – 2,000 more than previously stated.

So far 16 people have been arrested and bailed on allegations of phone hacking.

[Douglas Caddy]

'Sun journalist' arrested over 'payments to police'

Daily Telegraph

By Mark Hughes, Crime Correspondent

12:26PM GMT 04 Nov 2011

Detectives investigating corrupt payments between journalists and police officers have arrested a 48-year-old man, believed to be a journalist on The Sun newspaper

The arrest took place at an address outside of London at 10.30am although the Metropolitan Police refused to confirm the exact location. Sources said the man is a reporter at The Sun.

The man is the sixth person to be arrested in Operation Elveden, the Scotland Yard investigation into illegal payments to police officers.

A Scotland Yard spokesman said: “At approximately 10.30 today officers from Operation Elveden arrested a man, 48, in connection with allegations of corruption.

“He was arrested at an outside London and is being brought to a south west London police station.”

News International declined to comment.

Operation Elveden was launched in July after News International provided the police with emails which alleged that corrupt police officers had received payments totalling about £130,000 over several years.

The News of the World’s former editor Andy Coulson and Rebekah Brooks, the News International chief executive and former editor of both the News of the World and The Sun have been arrested by officers from Operation Elveden.

It is running parallel to Operation Weeting, which is investigating phone hacking. A total of 16 people have been arrested in that inquiry.

[Douglas Caddy]

Man arrested over alleged police payments named as Sun journalist

Reporter arrested over alleged payments to police officers believed to be paper's district editor, Jamie Pyatt

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Friday 4 November 2011 10.56 EDT

The man arrested by police is believed to be Sun journalist Jamie Pyatt.

The reporter is believed to be Jamie Pyatt, district editor of the paper. The arrested journalist was taken to a South West London police station at 10.30am on Friday. Pyatt, 48, has been working at the Sun since 1987.

He is the sixth person arrested by detectives working in Operation Elveden, which was set up in July following allegations that police officers had received up to £130,000 over several years from the News of the World for information, including contact details of the royal family.

News International refused to comment on the arrest and saying it had "a very clear duty of care to employees and would not be making any comment on individuals".

Scotland Yard also refused to confirm the identity of the person it arrested, but said in a statement earlier that it had arrested a 48-year-old man in connection with Operation Elveden.

Its statement said: "He was arrested outside London on suspicion of corruption allegations in contravention of section 1 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906, and is being brought to a south-west London police station."

Operation Elveden is one of three Met investigations relating to alleged illegal activities by newspapers. The others are Operation Weeting and Operation Tuleta, set up to examine phone hacking and computer hacking, respectively.

On Thursday, Scotland Yard confirmed to the Guardian that the number of people whose phones may have been hacked had reached 5,800 – 2,000 more than previously stated.

So far 16 people have been arrested and bailed on allegations of phone hacking.

[Douglas Caddy]

Journalist’s Arrest Adds to Woes of Murdoch’s British Empire

The New York Times

By SARAH LYALL

November4, 2011

LONDON — A journalist at the tabloid The Sun was arrested Friday on suspicion of making illegal payments to police officers, a sign that a scandal has spread beyond The News of the World to other papers in Rupert Murdoch’s British media empire.

The suspect, a 48-year-old man, is the sixth person to be arrested in Scotland Yard’s investigation into illegal payoffs by newspapers to police officers in the wake of the phone hacking scandal at The News of the World. He was arrested outside London “in connection with allegations of corruption,” the police said, and taken to a police station in southwest London for questioning.

The police would not identify the man, but News International, the British newspaper arm of Mr. Murdoch’s media conglomerate, said in a statement that he was a News International employee, and people at the company have identified him as Jamie Pyatt, a senior journalist at The Sun, the Murdoch-owned tabloid that is the most popular daily newspaper in Britain.

The arrest suggests that payoffs to the police may have extended beyond The News of the World, which was closed by Mr. Murdoch in July in an effort to contain the scandal, to other parts of the Murdoch newspaper stable. Mr. Pyatt is the first journalist not employed by The News of the World to be arrested in connection with the police corruption case; he has been at The Sun for more than 20 years and has never worked at The News of the World.

In 2006, Mr. Pyatt, the newspaper’s district editor, won the Scoop of the Year prize at the British Press Awards for his report on how Prince Harry, the younger son of Prince Charles, attended a costume party dressed as a Nazi.

There is increasing evidence that The Sun might also have been involved in phone hacking, a technique used to illegally intercept voice mail messages. Documents in the case of Guy Pelly, who sued News International this year when it became clear that his phone might have been hacked, show that information illegally obtained by The News of the World was passed to The Sun “from time to time.”

Scotland Yard opened the investigation into police payoffs by journalists, known as Operation Elveden, this summer after e-mails turned over to the police by News International showed that its journalists might have paid more than $200,000 to police officers in exchange for news tips, including information about the movements of members of the royal family.

Those arrested in the Elveden case so far include Andy Coulson, former editor of The News of the World and the former chief spokesman for Prime Minister David Cameron; and Rebekah Brooks, who also worked as the editor of The News of the World and is a former chief executive of News International.

Operation Elveden is running alongside the phone hacking investigation, known as Operation Weeting, which has produced 16 arrests so far.

No charges have yet been brought in either inquiry; typically, suspects are questioned, released and asked to present themselves to the police for possible criminal charges at a later date.

Meanwhile, News International announced Friday that it had set up what it called a “speedy, cost-effective alternative to litigation” that would allow phone hacking victims to apply for swift out-of-court settlements through a company Web site. The purpose of the program, called the Voicemail Interception Compensation Scheme, is to “process good claims quickly to an award of compensation, not to get bogged down in complex legal arguments and speculative requests for disclosure of documents,” the company says on the site.

People claiming to be victims and wanting compensation are asked to fill out and submit electronic forms detailing their claims.

News International has already set aside more than $30 million to pay phone hacking victims; this move is intended to contain its legal costs as it deals with an increasing number of claims.

Earlier this week, the police admitted that as many as 5,795 people might have been victims of The News of the World’s phone hacking. This summer, they said the figure was 3,870.

Ravi Somaiya contributed reporting.

[Douglas Caddy]

Sun journalist arrested over alleged police payments bailed

Jamie Pyatt bailed until March following arrest by detectives working on inquiry into allegations journalists paid police

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Saturday 5 November 2011 06.51 EDT

The Sun journalist arrested as part of Scotland Yard's investigations into alleged payments to police by journalists has been bailed until March.

District editor Jamie Pyatt, 48, was released from a west London police station last night and given police bail pending further inquiries.

Pyatt, who has worked with the daily tabloid since 1987, was the first Sun employee to be arrested in connection with any of Scotland Yard's three current investigations into the media, which focus on allegations of police payments, phone hacking and computer hacking.

He is the sixth person arrested by detectives working on Operation Elveden, which was set up in July following allegations that police officers had received up to £130,000 over several years from the News of the World for information, including contact details for the royal family.

News International, which owned the now-defunct paper and owns the Sun, confirmed that an employee had been arrested. "News International is co-operating fully with the Metropolitan police service in its various investigations," a spokesman said.

Scotland Yard refused to confirm the identity of the man arrested, but said in a statement that it had arrested a 48-year-old man in connection with Operation Elveden. Its statement said: "He was arrested outside London on suspicion of corruption allegations in contravention of section one of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906."Operation Elveden is one of three Met investigations relating to alleged illegal activities by newspapers. The others are Operation Weeting and Operation Tuleta, set up to examine phone hacking and computer hacking respectively.

On Thursday, Scotland Yard confirmed that the number of people whose phones may have been hacked had reached 5,800 – 2,000 more than previously stated.

So far, 16 people have been arrested and bailed on allegations of phone hacking.

[Douglas Caddy]

News Corp. Starts Compensation Process for Phone Hacking Claims

The New YOrk Times

November 4, 2011

By AMY CHOZICK

News Corporation has begun a voluntary program that allows people who believe they have been the victims of phone hacking to apply online for compensation.

A statement issued Friday by the company’s British publishing unit, News International, urged possible victims to take advantage of the settlement plan, calling it a “speedy, cost-effective alternative to litigation.” Charles Gray, a former High Court judge and arbitration specialist, will assess the applications and serve as an independent adjudicator, News International said. There is no limit on how much the company might have to pay.

“It should provide very significant benefits to applicants such as avoiding the enormous expenses of court proceedings,” Mr. Gray said in the statement.

As an incentive to participate, News Corporation is offering possible victims a premium of 10 percent on whatever Mr. Gray chooses to award. The company also said it would pay applicants’ legal costs and ensure confidentiality.

The London police have said that the number of British citizens whose phones may have been hacked by reporters at the now-shuttered News of the World tabloid could reach as many as 5,795. On Wednesday, Chase Carey, News Corporation’s president and chief operating officer, said the company had “fully reserved” funds to pay for litigation related to hacking.

Last month Rupert Murdoch, the company’s chairman and chief executive, said that he would personally donate $1.6 million to charities chosen by the family of Milly Dowler, the murdered British teenager whose phone was hacked by the News Corporation tabloid. Additionally, the company said it would pay $3.2 million to the Dowler family.

The company first announced that it planned to offer a compensation program in April, a result of the 2006 arrest of a private investigator, Glenn Mulcaire, who was hired by News of the World and who admitted to intercepting voice mails. In June, News International confirmed that Mr. Gray would serve as an independent adjudicator, just before the phone-hacking scandal exploded in July. The program began accepting claims on Friday.

[Douglas Caddy]

Murdoch gave loyal lieutenant Rebekah Brooks £1.7m pay-off, car and office

News International chairman may face questions in Commons over generous severance deal despite phone-hacking scandal

By Daniel Boffey, policy editor

guardian.co.uk,

Saturday 5 November 2011 17.00 EDT

Rebekah Brooks, the former News of the World editor who resigned as chief executive of News International at the height of the phone-hacking scandal, received £1.7m in cash, the use of a London office and a chauffeur-driven limousine as part of her severance package from the newspaper group.

Brooks, a favourite of Rupert Murdoch who rose from being a secretary on the features desk of the Sunday newspaper to the very top of the mogul's UK operation, quit in July amid claims over the alleged illegal activities carried out by her executives and reporters. Days after she resigned, she was arrested and bailed in connection with allegations of phone hacking and corruption.

Records at Companies House show that she has resigned from 23 directorships related to the firm. However, the Observer has learned that, along with a generous payoff and continued use of her company limousine and driver for two years, Brooks, 43, has been given an office for the same period of time in an affluent central London area which her spokesman asked the Observer not to reveal for security reasons.

The decision to give Brooks an office will inevitably be raised on Thursday when James Murdoch, the 38-year-old son of Rupert and chairman of News International, returns to Westminster to answer questions from the Commons culture, media and sport select committee about his knowledge of illegal activities by his employees.

Tom Watson, the Labour MP who helped lead the fight to expose the phone-hacking practices carried out by News of the World journalists, queried the company's decision. He said: "It is remarkably curious that such an generous package is given to Ms Brooks when others have been cut loose. It is almost as if she hasn't really left the company. I am sure Mr Murdoch will want to explain the decision to his shareholders."

James Murdoch is set to make his second appearance before the Commons committee this week after discrepancies arose between his previous testimony and that of his key lieutenants.

During the session he is also likely to be questioned about previous claims that illegal practices did not take place at the Sun newspaper, where Brooks was editor between 2003 and 2009 before being elevated to the role of chief executive of News International.

The investigation into police corruption and newspapers' illegal payments to officers was extended to the Sun last week, as detectives arrested one of its reporters at his home near Windsor.

Jamie Pyatt, 49, the first journalist from the title to be arrested by Scotland Yard's Operation Elveden into payments to police officers, has been at the Sun since 1987 and worked under Brooks when she was editor there.

Dave Wilson, the chairman of Bell Pottinger, the public relations group hired by Brooks to deal with the fallout from her resignation, declined to comment on the "confidential" details of her severance package.

News International also declined to comment.

[Douglas Caddy]

James Murdoch prepares to face MPs over phone hacking

News Corp boss is preparing to concede that company should have taken further action over allegations earlier

By Dan Sabbagh

guardian.co.uk,

Sunday 6 November 2011 13.48 EST

James Murdoch is preparing to concede in front of MPs that News Corporation should have taken further action earlier to investigate allegations that phone hacking was more widespread at the News of the World than the actions of a single rogue reporter.

The News Corporation boss is to appear before the culture media and sport select committee on Thursday ready to admit that more could have been done between 2007 and 2010 when first insiders and later rival newspapers said the illegal practice was widely deployed.

Fighting to save his career, Murdoch is aware he has to appear informed about how News Corp dealt with the hacking allegations – and he has to be prepared to admit that mistakes were made, including by himself.

However, with advisers such as News Corp's acting chief lawyer Janet Nova flying in, it is not clear how far the company's legal team will allow James Murdoch to make the limited concessions planned. Friends of Murdoch say he is "surrounded" by people giving him advice, making it hard to proceed.

The News Corp boss also plans to sidestep any questions about the size of the severance payment made to former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks. It was reported at the weekend that the figure received was £1.7m, although it is understood the payment was in fact larger than this.

Acutely aware of what is becoming a sensitive issue at the company, Murdoch is expected to say any payments made to Brooks cannot be discussed due to contractual confidentiality. News Corporation has no legal obligation to disclose the size of the severance because Brooks was not a director of the US-listed company.

Murdoch was in charge of the News of the World and the company's other British newspapers as part of his job as executive chairman at UK subsidiary News International. He took over from Les Hinton at the end of 2007, nearly a year after News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman was jailed for his involvement in hacking into phone messages left for Prince William and Prince Harry's staff.

Before Murdoch arrived Hinton agreed to pay Goodman a severance of £240,000, after Goodman launched an unfair dismissal claim. News International has said it found no evidence at the time that hacking went on more widely.

A year later, Murdoch agreed to pay football boss Gordon Taylor £425,000 plus £200,000 to settle a phone hacking lawsuit. Controversy surrounds the payout – with former News of the World editor Colin Myler and chief lawyer Tom Crone saying Murdoch was told of an email that made it clear hacking went beyond Goodman. Murdoch has told the committee he had no knowledge of the email.He has also said he was not shown a separate report prepared for Tom Crone by QC Michael Silverleaf – which said that there appeared to be a "culture of illegal information access" at the News of the World. It is understood that he will offer new additional information about what he knew at the time.

[Douglas Caddy]

James Murdoch: Will the crown remain beyond his grasp?

A relative newcomer to the title of News Corp successor, his performance at this week's select committee hearing on phone hacking will shape not only his own destiny, but that of the dynasty founded by his father, Rupert.

By James Robinson

The Observer,

Saturday 5 November 2011

When he was a teenager, James Murdoch and his older brother, Lachlan, used to hang from the rafters of their father's house in Aspen, Colorado, and challenge one another to pull-up competitions. One former Murdoch executive who attended a retreat at the holiday home recalls seeing red stains on the woodwork and being told by their mother Anna – Rupert Murdoch's second wife – that the boys were so pig-headed they would compete until their hands bled. "James usually won," he adds.

Two decades later, he also looked set to triumph over Lachlan in the race to become their father's successor at News Corp. But now his grip on that prize is starting to slip. When James Murdoch returns to Parliament to face questions from MPs investigating the phone-hacking affair, he will be fighting to repair his reputation and that of the company his father founded. He will also be shaping his destiny and determining the fortunes of a dynasty. Should he fail to convince, the chances of James succeeding Rupert at the helm of the world's most powerful media conglomerate will be remote. Succeed, on the other hand, and the hereditary principle may yet hold at News Corp.

It is no exaggeration to say that the future of the company is in the hands of the 38-year-old London-born executive, once regarded as the most rebellious and unconventional of his father's four adult children. The teenager who once sported an eyebrow piercing and ran a hip-hop label called Rawkus Records is now deputy chief operating officer at News Corp, where only Rupert and his number two, Chase Carey, outrank him.

James has been groomed to take charge of News Corp, the owner of the Sun, Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, since Lachlan resigned as deputy chief operating officer six years ago. James had already served a youthful apprenticeship at News Corp's internet arm by then, followed by a rapid rise through the executive ranks at the company's television businesses.

By the time he appeared before MPs alongside his father in July, when public revulsion over the News of the World's targeting of a mobile phone which belonged to murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler was at its height, Rupert's sharply suited son had also run News Corp's UK newspapers, Murdoch's power base for decades.

Yet the activities of the News of the World, a paper which generated less than 1% of the group's profits, has shaken the foundations of the Wall Street-listed company so hard it is in danger of crumbling.

When he was questioned by the culture, media and sport committee, which has been investigating phone-hacking for four years, his meandering responses were peppered with management-speak. His father, sitting beside him, grunted his answers. This time, he will face MPs alone. It promises to be a far tougher ordeal.

Immediately after the Murdochs gave evidence in July, two former News of the World executives, the paper's former editor, Colin Myler, and ex-head of legal affairs, Tom Crone, issued a dramatic statement contradicting the evidence of their former boss. Both men insisted they had told Murdoch three years before about the existence of a company email from 2005 which showed beyond doubt that phone-hacking had not been the work of a single "rogue reporter". Myler and Crone allege that is why Murdoch agreed to pay more than £700,000 – to settle the case – to Professional Footballers' Association chief executive Gordon Taylor, who was suing the paper after discovering it had intercepted voicemails left on his mobile phone.

Murdoch denies he was told about the full content of what became known as the "for Neville" email, after the paper's chief reporter, Neville Thurlbeck. He told MPs that Myler and Crone informed him in June 2008 about the existence of the email and they made it clear that it proved Taylor's phone had been hacked by the News of the World. Crucially, Murdoch denied the two men had also told him that the email showed hacking was not just the work of one reporter, as they insist they did.

The decision to settle, Murdoch said, was based on legal advice which said Taylor would settle. Last week, that legal advice was published by the committee. In it, the company's QC, Michael Silverleaf, warned the "for Neville" email constituted "overwhelming evidence" there was "a culture" of hacking at the paper. MPs are likely to press Murdoch about how much he knew about that advice, because it blew apart the company's claim that hacking was the work of a single reporter. That is crucial, because News International subsequently issued a series of denials sanctioned by its most senior executives, including one in July 2009 which accused the Guardian, the Observer's sister paper, of choosing to "mislead the British public" when it claimed News of the World journalists were engaged in systematic phone-hacking.

Murdoch's judgment and his integrity are at stake. Sources close to the company insist he stands by his version of events. Put simply, it is Murdoch's word against Myler and Crone's. The stage is set for a dramatic confrontation.

If Murdoch is nervous about the encounter, he was hiding it well last week. On Wednesday, he and his glamorous American wife, Kathryn Hufschmid, who works for the Clinton Climate Initiative, attended a party organised by BSkyB, 39.1% owned by News Corp and which Murdoch still chairs. Murdoch, dressed in jeans and a sharply tailored jacket, seemed relaxed and amiable. The message, intentional or otherwise, was that it is business as usual at News Corp. In reality, however, the phone-hacking scandal means it is anything but. Last month, around two-thirds of News Corp's independent shareholders voted against the re-election of James Murdoch to the board of the company. The Murdoch family controls nearly 40% of News Corp voting shares, enough to ensure Murdoch was re-elected regardless, but that vote cannot be ignored. It is an indictment of Murdoch's handling of the phone-hacking affair and the clearest signal yet that News Corp's investors do not want him to succeed his father.

This has thrown the family firm (it may be publicly quoted in New York, but it's run as if it were a private concern) into crisis. It has also disturbed the delicate equilibrium that exists between the younger members of the family, three of whom have held, or still do hold, senior positions at News Corp.

Lachlan, Murdoch's oldest son, remains on the board and the company recently bought Shine, the production company owned by Elisabeth, the eldest of Rupert's three children from his second marriage. Both had been viewed as the most likely to succeed Rupert in the past – James only emerged in recent years as his father's heir apparent. The family – Murdoch also has two young children with his wife Wendi, and an older daughter, Prudence, from his first marriage – had accepted James as primus inter pares.

But according to an article published in Vanity Fair, Elisabeth blames James for the company's disastrous response to phone-hacking. She reportedly urged her father to send James on a leave of absence, an idea he seems to have considered, if only fleetingly. The disagreements are serious, but as yet there is no rift. The family has sought help from a psychologist, however, in an attempt to ensure the succession issue does not result in schism.

James is regarded as a chip off the old block in the media industry. He poured scorn on the BBC in an industry lecture two years ago, and shouted at the former editor of the Independent during a visit to the paper's offices. When the hacking scandal was at its height, it was James who argued the News of the World should be closed while his father prevaricated. At Sky, he demonstrated his mettle by authorising an audacious dawn raid on ITV, snapping up a stake of the rival broadcaster in a successful attempt to prevent it being sold to Sky's main competitor, Virgin Media.

James was highly regarded at Sky. But at the end of the month, he could face another embarrassing vote at Sky's annual general meeting, where investors will vote on whether he should remain chairman.

If Parliament finds his answers this week unsatisfactory, he may even be deposed by shareholders at Sky – which News Corp would have owned outright by now if the hacking scandal hadn't derailed its multibillion pound bid for the remainder of the company it did not already own.

The key question now, for the Murdoch family and beyond is: has James been so tarnished by the hacking affair that he will never land the top job at News Corp itself? By the end of the week, the answer should be somewhat clearer.

THE MURDOCH FILE

Born In London 13 December 1972, the third child of Rupert and Anna Murdoch. Raised in the US. He won a place at Harvard but dropped out. Married American Kathryn Hufschmid in 2000.

Best of times When he was made heir apparent to his father in 2007, becoming chairman and chief executive officer of Europe and Asia at News Corporation.

Worst of times Ongoing. He has been under intense scrutiny following the phone-hacking affair, and will this week return to Parliament to face MPs investigating phone-hacking.

What he says "In this all-media marketplace, the expansion of state-sponsored journalism is a threat to the plurality and independence of news provision, which are so important for our democracy." On the BBC at Edinburgh television festival 2009.

What others say "There is an intensity to him. The guy's got intensity wrapped around energy."

Frank Luntz, the Republican pollster who once worked for him.

"I think he bears a great deal of responsibility. There's an expectation people have of you if you are a Murdoch that has made him quite mature."

Charles Dunstone, chairman, Carphone Warehouse.

[Douglas Caddy]

The question James Murdoch can't answer: will his father's empire survive?

Unless James Murdoch proves particularly impressive in his Commons grilling on Thursday, his family may cease to be a force in British life

By Henry Porter

The Observer,

Saturday 5 November 2011

It is difficult not to feel something for James Murdoch, as he prepares to answer questions for a second time at the House of Commons media committee. This is a man – not a bad man by any means – who is faced with maintaining a plea of ignorance when everyone knows that as the man responsible for running News International, not only should he have known about the extent of phone-hacking at the News of the World, he almost certainly did know.

It stretches credulity to suggest he was not briefed with the facts about the toxic waste lying in the basement after he succeeded Les Hinton in 2007. Indeed, new evidence – emails, a note and a legal opinion prepared for the News of the World, released by the committee – seems to point to a much more detailed knowledge of the scandal than he is admitting to.

The new facts are these. On 27 May 2008, the News of the World editor, Colin Myler, had a telephone conversation with a lawyer named Julian Pike at Farrer & Co, the solicitor representing the News of the World, about the possibility of settling with Gordon Taylor, the head of the Professional Footballers' Association, whose phone had been hacked. Pike made a note as they spoke and wrote down that Myler "spoke to James Murdoch". A few days later (3 June), News International received an opinion from its counsel, Michael Silverleaf QC, which warned of "overwhelming evidence of involvement of a number of senior journalists".

Leave this new material aside and just for a moment consider the nature of tabloid newspaper executives. This is not a class of people given to glorious self-sacrifice. The elementary requirement of the job is to pass blame down the line and responsibility up to senior management. Men such as Tom Crone, the legal manager at the News of the World and recipient of the damning opinion from Silverleaf, and Colin Myler had absolutely no reason to keep this information to themselves. Indeed, emails between Myler, Crone and Pike suggest that Myler talked in detail to Murdoch about the real extent of the problem, as Myler has testified.

So I may eat my hat and several goldfish if Murdoch manages to convince the world that he was not completely aware of and condoned the cover-up of the scandal, which, incidentally, is now believed by the police to have involved 5,795 separate individuals, somewhat revised from their original estimate of "a handful".

At this moment, Murdoch is no doubt seeking to navigate his way through these new obstacles and produce a performance that is consistent with the evidence he gave alongside his father in the summer. It's going to be an ordeal because it seems entirely possible that he is holding two contrary thoughts in his head: a strategy of denial, inherited from the previous administration and tacitly blessed by his father, and the truth, which is that all the key senior figures at News International knew exactly what lay in the basement.

He has been landed in this mess by his father, who denied knowledge of the scandal and shamefully blamed his subordinates, but also by his father's clannish need for a successor with his genes at News Corp. What must make it all the more painful for Murdoch is that an article by Sarah Ellison in Vanity Fair, for which I also work, suggests that Rupert contemplated a proposal from James's sister, Elisabeth, that he should resign after the closure of the News of the World.

Life in the Murdoch family is like high-altitude Tennessee Williams, but the drama is not playing well with investors of News Corp in the US, especially the revelation that James and Elisabeth, plus Murdoch's other two adult children, Lachlan and Prudence, took part in a family therapy session to decide who would succeed their father as head of News Corp. Normally, this is left to a board of directors, not the offspring of a minority stake. The more immediate issue, if Murdoch does not succeed in convincing the committee, is his position as chairman of BSkyB, the broadcasting company that News International failed to buy out in the summer after the hacking scandal broke.

In July, the independent directors supported Murdoch but this will change if he is discredited during questioning by committee stars such as Tom Watson, Paul Farrelly and Louise Mensch, because he could not, in those circumstances, continue to meet the standards of a "fit and proper person" required of a broadcasting licence holder by Ofcom. It became clear how much rides on his appearance when culture secretary Jeremy Hunt refused to back him in the Commons after being pressed by Labour MP Chris Bryant.

So, Murdoch allies on the board may have an awkward choice between his interests and those of other shareholders. Three weeks after the hearing, Murdoch must make another appearance in front of the AGM of BSkyB shareholders. Like the recent AGM of News Corp in Los Angeles, this may be a rough ride, and let's not forget the pall that hangs over NI on account of two ongoing police investigations, the Leveson inquiry and 16 arrests of past and present employees, the most recent being of a Sun reporter in connection with payments to police officers.

These are incredible pressures for a relatively untested 38-year-old man who must comply with a disastrous strategy that was not originally of his devising and who has not received all the support he should from his family. As Ellison points out, the conflict between feelings of protectiveness for his 80-year-old father and impulses of resentment must be extremely hard, which is why he has my sympathy.

The phone-hacking scandal is a story of folly and arrogance, as well as corruption. We may well be watching the slow-motion disintegration of one of the greatest business empires and most formidable political influences ever known in the democratic world. There is a long way to go, but the thing to remember, especially by those commentators who continue to maintain that phone-hacking is an essentially frivolous issue, is that the scandal at News International may also involve extensive police corruption.

When I spoke a couple of months ago to a US senator about the possibility of large-scale payments to the London police, it took a couple of beats before the senator's eyes narrowed and the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act was mentioned. It is this issue that may prove to be far the most serious aspect of the scandal for News Corp in a country where the penalties for bribing officials in another country are steep

[Douglas Caddy]

News of the World hired investigators to spy on hacking victims' lawyers

Exclusive: Investigators followed and filmed lawyers of hacking victims in apparent bid to gather material on their private lives

By Nick Davies

guardian.co.uk,

Monday 7 November 2011 10.41 EST

The News of the World hired a specialist private investigator to run covert surveillance on two of the lawyers representing phone-hacking victims as part of an operation to put pressure on them to stop their work.

The investigator secretly videoed Mark Lewis and Charlotte Harris as well as family members and associates. Evidence suggests this was part of an attempt to gather evidence for false smears about their private lives.

The News of the World also took specialist advice in an attempt to injunct Lewis to prevent him representing the victims of hacking and attempted to persuade one of his former clients to sue him.

The surveillance of Lewis and Harris occurred during the past 18 months, when Rupert Murdoch's son James was executive chairman of the paper's parent company, News International.

He is due to give a second round of evidence to a House of Commons select committee on Thursday and is likely to face intense questioning about the quality of his leadership.

Neither lawyer would comment but friends say they are furious at what they see as an attempt at "blackmail" and are considering suing the News of the World for breach of privacy. They have previously had to reassure clients that their private lives would not be exposed if they dared to sue the paper.

Lewis and Harris have been part of a small group of lawyers who have mounted a series of devastating legal actions against News International. Separately, they represented Gordon Taylor and Max Clifford, the first two hacking victims to sue the company for hacking their phones.

Harris also acts for football agent Sky Andrew, whose case led in January to the resignation of the prime minister's media adviser, Andy Coulson. Lewis also represents the family of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler, whose case led to the closure of the News of the World in July.

Emerging evidence suggests they were targeted on at least two occasions by Derek Webb, an investigator who specialises in physically following people and in making secret videos of their movements. Webb has worked for the News of the World since 2003, following hundreds of targets including members of the royal family and serving cabinet ministers.

Emails that have been recovered by Scotland Yard disclose the names of those working for News International who hatched the plans.

Webb was tasked as part of an attempt to prove a false claim that Harris was having an affair with a Manchester solicitor and other false claims about the private life of Charlotte Harris and her children. It is not yet clear exactly how the News of the World would have used the information if any claim had proved to be true.

In the spring of 2010, following a hostile report by the Commons media select committee, the News of the World hired Webb to gather evidence on Lewis. For reasons which are not yet clear, he focused on Lewis's former wife and secretly filmed her home in Manchester, following her and making further video of and her daughter as they visited local shops and a garden centre.

In January 2011, Webb was hired to spy on Harris. This was at a time when the case of her client Sky Andrew had uncovered information which led to the sacking of the paper's news editor, Ian Edmondson.

Webb was tasked to find evidence that she was having an affair with a Manchester solicitor. The allegation was false; Harris had never met the solicitor in question.

Other investigators also were hired to supply reports on the two lawyers, although it is not clear who commissioned them. One of the reports which has been seen by the Guardian, clearly suggests that somebody had been following Harris and her two young children.

In evidence to the media select committee in September, the News of the World's in-house lawyer, Tom Crone, was asked by the Labour MP Tom Watson if he had seen dossiers on the private lives of claimant lawyers. Crone said: "I saw one thing in relation to two of the lawyers, except I do not know whether it was a dossier. It involves their private lives."

He suggested that he could not name those who had commissioned this work without interfering with current police inquiries. Separately, according to internal emails recovered by Scotland Yard, the News of the World commissioned a senior barrister to advise on whether they could injunct Lewis to stop him working for any alleged victim of phone hacking on the grounds that he had confidential information from his work for Gordon Taylor.

The newspaper's solicitors, Farrer and Co, wrote to Lewis threatening to injunct him if he took on any hacking clients but took no action when Lewis ignored the threat.

The internal emails also reveal that the newspaper's lawyers tried to approach solicitors acting for Lewis's former client Gordon Taylor to see if they could persuade him to sue Lewis. This also failed, and Lewis has gone on to represent several dozen clients who are suing the News of the World for their alleged role in hacking their phones.

Webb is now also in dispute with the newspaper and has sought the help of the National Union of Journalists to pursue a claim that the News of the World failed to honour an agreement to give him a loyalty payment after the paper closed in July.

Webb is known to have followed members of the royal family, often on instructions from the former royal correspondent Clive Goodman, who was jailed in January 2007 for intercepting the voicemail of three members of the royal household.

Webb, who is a former police officer, also followed cabinet ministers, including John Prescott when he was deputy prime minister and Charles Clarke, the former home secretary.

The newspaper continued to hire him even after the phone-hacking scandal broke and he is known to have been following a leading trade unionist shortly before the paper closed.

In November 2008, Webb was cleared of aiding and abetting misconduct in public office in a controversial case in which Thames Valley police arrested a local newspaper journalist, Sally Murrer, and tried to have her prosecuted for receiving information from a police officer.

Physical surveillance is not normally seen as a criminal offence but it is possible that Webb's targets might sue for breach of privacy.

[Douglas Caddy]

News of the World hired private eye to spy on phone hacking victims' lawyers

Daily Telegraph

By Gordon Rayner, Chief Reporter

8:13PM GMT 07 Nov 2011

A private investigator hired by the News of the World carried out covert surveillance on two lawyers representing phone-hacking victims as part of an apparent plan to smear them.

The investigator spied on Mark Lewis and Charlotte Harris, as well as members of their families, to compile a “dossier” about their private lives.

Last night News International, which published the News of the World, admitted to carrying out surveillance on the two lawyers, which it described as “deeply inappropriate”.

James Murdoch, who was in his current role as executive chairman of News International at the time the surveillance took place, is likely to be asked whether he knew about it when he makes a second appearance before a committee of MPs on Thursday.

The Daily Telegraph has been told that an internal News International memo unearthed by police suggests that one of the reasons the two solicitors were targeted was because the company was trying to protect Andy Coulson, the former editor who became the Conservative Party’s head of communications.

NI executives were desperate to avoid “negative publicity” which could bring down Mr Coulson. He resigned from his Downing Street post earlier this year despite denying any knowledge of phone hacking.

In September Tom Crone, a former senior lawyer at the News of the World, confirmed he had seen a file on two of the phone hacking claimants’ lawyers which “involves their private lives”.

It has now emerged that Derek Webb, a former policeman who regularly carried out surveillance work for the News of the World, was hired by the now-defunct tabloid in early 2010 to gather evidence on Mr Lewis.

Mr Webb told the BBC he watched Mr Lewis’s ex-wife and filmed her with her daughter as they went shopping and visited a garden centre near their home in Manchester.

Mr Lewis had represented Gordon Taylor, the chief executive of the Professional Footballers’ Association, who was paid £700,000 compensation by the News of the World after it admitted his phone had been hacked.

He went on to represent several other high-profile victims, including the family of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.

In January 2011 Mr Webb was reportedly hired to spy on Miss Harris to find evidence of an alleged affair with Mr Lewis, for whom she worked at the time. The allegation was entirely bogus.

Other investigators were also reportedly hired, and followed her with her two young children and obtained copies of their birth certificates.

Miss Harris was being followed at a time when she was representing the football agent Sky Andrew, whose case uncovered information that led to the sacking of the News of the World’s news editor, Ian Edmondson.

Exactly what the News of the World intended to do with the information is unclear, but emails recovered by Scotland Yard investigators suggest the newspaper was determined to stop Mr Lewis representing any other phone hacking victims.

The newspaper reportedly hired a senior barrister to assess whether it would be possible to injunct Mr Lewis on the grounds that he was privy to confidential information because of his work with Mr Taylor.

The law firm Farrer and Co wrote to Mr Lewis threatening an injunction if he took on other phone hacking clients, but did nothing when he ignored the letter.

Mr Lewis said: “To follow my teenage daughter, my youngest daughter and video her is nothing short of sick. On another level, looking at me, that’s not how you litigate, you play the ball you don’t play the man…this is Mafia-like.”

Mr Lewis is said to be considering suing the company for breach of privacy.

Miss Harris declined to comment, but Max Clifford, the publicity agent who was represented by Miss Harris when he successfully sued the News of the World for £1m, said: “I know that she will be horrified at the thought that she was spied on and followed.

“She is a young mum and it’s horrendous that this happened.

“She became a thorn in the side of News International right from the start and they were desperate to silence her as she and Mark Lewis got closer and closer to the truth about the extent of phone hacking.”

A spokesman for News International said: “News International’s enquiries have led the company to believe that Mark Lewis and Charlotte Harris were subject to surveillance.

“While surveillance is not illegal, it was clearly deeply inappropriate in these circumstances. This action was not condoned by any current executive at the company."

[Douglas Caddy]

News of the World paid me to follow 90 people, claims private detective

Former policeman says he surveilled figures including Prince William and the parents of Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe

By Lisa O'Carroll

guardian.co.uk,

Tuesday 8 November 2011 13.33 EST

A private detective has claimed the News of the World paid him to target more than 90 people, including Prince William, former attorney general Lord Goldsmith and the parents of Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe, for eight years until it was shut down in July.

Derek Webb, a former policeman who said he started working for the News of the World shortly after setting up his own private detective agency in 2003, has told the BBC's Newsnight he continued to carry out surveillance for the News International title until it was closed at the height of the phone-hacking scandal.

The investigator said he was paid by the paper to follow more than 90 targets including Prince William, Goldsmith, Radcliffe's parents and Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker.

"I was working for them extensively on many jobs throughout that time. I never knew when I was going to be required. They phone me up by the day or by the night… it could be anywhere in the country," Webb told Newsnight's Richard Watson, in a report to be broadcast on the BBC2 daily current affairs show on Tuesday night.

In 2006 he was asked to follow Prince William while he spent a few days in Gloucestershire.

A former police officer, Webb worked for many years on covert surveillance and had some training from MI5.

He told the BBC he set up his own detective agency in 2003 and was approached shortly after that by the News of the World.

Most of commissions were over the phone, but sometimes he was sent photographs or address details to work from. The orders came from several journalists on the paper, he reveals.

Like Glenn Mulcaire, the other private investigator known to have been used extensively by the News of the World, Webb kept detailed notes of his movements.

"Basically I would write down what they were wearing at the time, what car they were in, who they met, the location they met, the times – the times were very important – and I would keep that.

"And then I would transfer part of it into my diary, but not the actual log itself. Just the names of the people," says Webb.

He said 90% of his targets were celebrities and politicians and that he got calls from "numerous journalists on the news desk".

The BBC said the names of more News of the World surveillance targets would be revealed in Tuesday's Newsnight.

His claims will further add to claims that the News of the World targeted celebrities, royals, politicians and victims of crime on an industrial scale.

The Guardian revealed on Monday that the News of the World had also paid Webb to to run covert surveillance on two of the lawyers representing phone-hacking victims as part of an operation to put pressure on them to stop their work.

Webb secretly videoed Mark Lewis and Charlotte Harris as well as family members and associates. Evidence suggests it was part of an attempt to gather evidence for false smears about their private lives.

Last week the Metropolitan police confirmed that the number of possible victims of phone hacking by Mulcaire is now close to 5,800.

This is 2,000 more than previously identified by detectives tasked with trawling through 11,000 pages of notes seized from Mulcaire's home.

[Douglas Caddy]

Prince William 'among News of the World surveillance targets'

Daily Telegraph

6:26PM GMT 08 Nov 2011

A private investigator carried out surveillance of Prince William and scores of other targets for the News of the World, it was claimed tonight.

In 2006 Mr Webb was asked to follow Prince William when he was spending a number of days in Gloucestershire

Derek Webb was paid to follow and record the movements of celebrities picked by the newspaper's staff, the BBC reported.

The investigator told Newsnight: "Basically I would write down what they were wearing at the time, what car they were in, who they met, the location they met, the times – the times were very important – and I would keep that.

"And then I would transfer part of it into my diary, but not the actual log itself. Just the names of the people."

A spokesman for the Duke of Cambridge declined to comment.

Mr Webb told the broadcaster that over eight years he was paid to follow more than 90 targets including former Attorney General Lord Goldsmith and football pundit Gary Lineker.

Relatives, such as the parents of actor Daniel Radcliffe, were also targeted, he said.

In 2006 Mr Webb was asked to follow the Prince when he was spending a number of days in Gloucestershire, it was claimed.

The investigator, a former policeman, told Newsnight: "I was working for them extensively on many jobs throughout that time.

"I never knew when I was going to be required.

"They phoned me up by the day or by the night ... It could be anywhere in the country."

Carrying out surveillance is not illegal and is not new for journalists or private investigators.

Mr Webb added: "I got calls from numerous journalists on the news desk."

The private detective said that 90% of his targets were celebrities or politicians.

It was also in 2006 that Mr Webb covertly followed Gary Lineker, a job which lasted a number of weeks, the BBC reported

[Douglas Caddy]

8 November 2011 Last updated at 13:30 ET

Dossier shows NoW surveillance on massive scale

Prince William was followed in 2006

BBC News

A dossier of evidence obtained by BBC Newsnight from an ex-policeman hired by the News of The World (NoW) shows the newspaper was engaged in covert surveillance on an industrial scale.

Over eight years Derek Webb was paid to follow more than 100 targets.

They included Prince William, Prince Harry's ex-girlfriend Chelsy Davy, former attorney general Lord Goldsmith and football manager Jose Mourinho.

The now-defunct paper's owner News International has yet to comment.

Along with celebrities like football pundit Gary Lineker, relatives of celebrities - such as the parents of actor Daniel Radcliffe - were also targeted.

Mr Webb says he is not ashamed of his actions and that he did nothing illegal.

Speaking exclusively to Newsnight's Richard Watson, he said that shortly after setting up his own private detective agency in 2003 he was contacted by the NoW and offered work.

He continued to work for the newspaper until it was shut down in July after a string of allegations emerged about the hacking of phones, including that of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.

"I was working for them extensively on many jobs throughout that time. I never knew when I was going to be required. They phoned me up by the day or by the night... It could be anywhere in the country."

Mr Webb is a former police officer who worked for many years in covert surveillance and received additional training from MI5.

He said he felt the paper should have given him "loyalty money" for his eight years of service when it closed - as it had done for other freelancers - but it refused.

Target selection

Mr Webb said that most of the time he received his commissions over the phone, but sometimes he was also e-mailed photographs or address details to assist him in his work. The approaches came from a number of journalists at the paper, he said.

"I got calls from numerous journalists on the news desk," Mr Webb said.

The private detective said that 90% of his targets were celebrities or politicians.

In 2006 Mr Webb was asked to follow Prince William when the prince was spending a number of days in Gloucestershire.

It was also in 2006 that Mr Webb covertly followed Gary Lineker, a job which lasted a number of weeks.

Lord Goldsmith was followed by Mr Webb whilst he was attorney general for England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

And on occasion the surveillance was not restricted to celebrities or public figures, but the people that surrounded them - Mr Webb's records show that in the last two years he was hired to follow the parents of Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe.

Detailed logs

Mr Webb kept detailed logs of his movements and observations while on surveillance jobs, which Newsnight has seen.

"Basically I would write down what they were wearing at the time, what car they were in, who they met, the location they met, the times - the times were very important - and I would keep that.

"And then I would transfer part of it into my diary, but not the actual log itself. Just the names of the people."

Mr Webb said he never asked his contacts at the newspaper why they had selected the targets for surveillance.

He also defended his work for the newspaper pointing out that what he had done was legal.

"The News of The World employed me to do a job, I did the job to the best of my ability. I didn't infringe on private ground, on private property... I never did anything which is unlawful," he said.

Mr Webb said that he was not concerned by the nature of his work:

"I don't feel ashamed. I know to a certain extent people's lives have been ruined with front page stories but... if I wasn't doing it, somebody else would have been."

Watch Richard Watson's full report in which the names of more News of the World surveillance targets will be revealed on Newsnight at 22:30 GMT on Tuesday, 8 November 2011, then afterwards on the BBC iPlayer and Newsnight website.