In the
high court, Murdoch is mired in civil litigation. His UK company has
already settled and paid damages to some 718 victims of phone hacking by
Glenn Mulcaire – an average of nearly three for every week he was
contracted to the News of the World. Now News UK faces a new round of
litigation from victims of Dan Evans, a showbusiness writer who also
specialised in hacking phones for the News of the World. Evans has been
co-operating with police and, according to one source, detectives
recently have been approaching up to 90 people a week to warn them that
they were targeted by Evans with a possible final total of some 1,600
victims.
Rupert Murdoch is
expected to be interviewed by police in the UK in the near future under
caution. Photograph: Adrian Sanchez-Gonzalez/AFP/Getty Images
Rupert Murdoch has been officially informed by Scotland Yard
that detectives want to interview him as a suspect as part of their
inquiry into allegations of crime at his British newspapers.It is
understood that detectives first contacted Murdoch last year to arrange
to question him but agreed to a request from his lawyers to wait until
the phone-hacking trial was finished.The interview is expected to
take place in the near future in the UK and will be conducted "under
caution", the legal warning given to suspects. His son, James, who was
the executive chairman of News International in the UK, may also be
questioned.News of the police move comes after an Old Bailey jury
found Murdoch's former News of the World editor Andy Coulson guilty of
conspiring to hack phones but acquitted his former UK chief executive
Rebekah Brooks on all charges.The verdict on Coulson also means
that Murdoch's UK company is now threatened with a possible corporate
charge, while the media owner also faces the prospect of a dozen more
criminal trials involving his journalists as well as hundreds more legal
actions in the high court from the alleged victims of phone-hacking by
the News of the World.Also, the verdict revives troubling
questions for the prime minister about his links with Murdoch and his
hiring of Andy Coulson. Questions are likely to focus on why Cameron
employed Coulson without making effective checks and whether Cameron
gave misleading evidence on oath about this at the Leveson inquiry.The
eight-month trial heard copious evidence of the scale of crime at the
News of the World. This also included handwritten notes kept by Mulcaire
that suggested that during the five years when he worked under contract
for the News of the World, he had targeted some 5,500 people. The jury
were also shown internal emails explicitly discussing cash payments for
police working in the royal palaces.
Rupert Murdoch with his sons Lachlan, left, and James, right. Photograph: Jason LaVeris/FilmMagic
The Guardian understands that a senior Murdoch journalist, and two of
those who pleaded guilty before the trial – Glenn Mulcaire and Neville
Thurlbeck – had discussions with police about giving evidence for the
prosecution but that in all three cases, the negotiations failed.Murdoch's
former UK chairman, Les Hinton, was also interviewed under caution for
three hours in September 2012 as Weeting detectives pursued evidence
into what happened at the highest reaches of Murdoch's UK company.The
verdict on Coulson increases the possibility that Murdoch's UK company,
News UK (formerly News International) could be charged as a
corporation, which in turn could potentially lead to the prosecution of
members of the UK company's former board of directors, potentially
including Rupert and James Murdoch.Such a prosecution can occur
only if the "controlling minds" of the company are found to be guilty of
a crime. Following Tuesday's verdicts, Operation Weeting is expected to
submit a new file of evidence to the CPS.If the former UK
company was to be convicted of conspiring to intercept communications,
the members of its board of directors – including Rupert and James
Murdoch – could then be prosecuted personally under section 79 of the
Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa). This makes directors
liable for prosecution if their company breaches Ripa as a result of
their consent, connivance or neglect.Murdoch already faces a
volley of threats in the English criminal and civil courts. Eleven more
criminal trials are already planned to take place at the Old Bailey
involving a total of 20 current or former journalists from the Sun and
the News of the World, who are accused variously of making illegal
payments to public officials, conspiring to intercept voicemail and
accessing data on stolen mobile phones. The journalists have denied the
charges.In Scotland, Coulson and two other News of the World
journalists face final trials variously on charges of perjury, phone
hacking and breach of data protection laws. They too, have denied the
charges.Eleven other current or former Murdoch employees are
waiting to discover whether they will be prosecuted variously for phone
hacking, email hacking or perversion of the course of justice. Police
have arrested or interviewed under a caution a total of 210 people,
including 101 journalists from six national newspapers.
COPY http://www.theguardian.com/uk
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