Reopen files on News of the World phone hacking scandal, police tell prosecutors

By Rebecca Camber for the Daily Mail
Updated: 12:41 EST, 15 January 2011



Prosecutors are to re-examine all the police files on the News of the World phone hacking scandal in a move that could trigger new arrests.

Yesterday Scotland Yard asked the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer QC, to carry out a ‘comprehensive assessment’ of all the material from the original inquiry and any new evidence of celebrities’ phones being tapped illegally.

The move follows the suspension of Ian Edmondson, a senior executive at the Sunday newspaper, over suggestions that he was linked to the hacking of actress Sienna Miller’s voicemail messages.

Sienna Miller
Andy Coulson

Target: Actress Sienna Miller had her mobile voicemail hacked. The phone scandal  has dogged former News of the World Editor Andy Coulson who is now the Prime Minister's Director of Communications

In an open letter to the DPP, Metropolitan Police Acting Deputy Commissioner John Yates said there ‘remain outstanding public, legal and political concerns’ about the scandal, which has dogged the News of the World and its former editor, Andy Coulson, now the Prime Minister’s director of communications.

The development comes a week after Scotland Yard ruled out a fresh inquiry into the case despite pressure from former home secretary Alan Johnson and Labour home affairs spokesman Ed Balls.

An internal investigation has begun at the News of the World into the conduct of Mr Edmondson, assistant editor in charge of news. He was suspended just before Christmas after his name appeared in legal documents submitted by lawyers representing Miss Miller, who is suing the paper’s parent company, News Group, and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire, who worked for the paper, accusing them of breaching her privacy and harassment.

Mulcaire and former News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman were jailed in 2007 after they admitted intercepting voicemails left on mobile phones belonging to members of the royal household.

Downing Street has repeatedly said that David Cameron has full confidence in Mr Coulson. Last night a Government source said: ‘Andy Coulson has said from the beginning that he had no knowledge of phone hacking at the News of the World. Nothing has changed.’


 

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