LONDON: Former News of the World editor Andy Coulson sent an email to a senior journalist at the disgraced tabloid ordering him to “do” a celebrity’s phone, the trial over Britain’s phone hacking scandal heard yesterday.
Coulson, who later became Prime Minister David Cameron’s media chief, denies conspiring to illegally access celebrities’ voicemail messages in a scandal which forced tycoon Rupert Murdoch to shut the paper in 2011.
The trial heard on Thursday that Coulson had been having an affair with fellow defendant Rebekah Brooks, his predecessor as editor and a close Murdoch confidante, for much of the time the pair are accused of involvement in hacking.
Continuing to set out his case yesterday, prosecutor Andrew Edis said Coulson, as editor from 2003 until 2007, must have known his journalists were routinely hacking phones to glean stories for the tabloid, which prided itself on its celebrity scoops.
“Does he know about phone hacking? He says he doesn’t. We say: ‘Oh yes, he did’,” Edis told the court.
The jury heard that in May 2006, the paper was seeking to run a story about television personality Calum Best, the son of late Manchester United football star George Best, according to media reports from the trial.
In an email exchange with Ian Edmondson, the tabloid’s former head of news who is also on trial, Coulson wrote: “Do his phone,” the court was told, the reports said.
Edis told the jury of nine women and three men they would have to decide what that meant.
Prosecutors revealed Coulson’s 1998-2004 affair with flame-haired Brooks on the grounds that it showed they “trusted each other” and would have shared details about hacking at the paper.
In a letter found on Brooks’ computer, dated 2004, she wrote to him: “I tell you everything, I confide in you.”
Brooks was editor from 2000 until 2003 when Coulson, her deputy, took over.
AFP
