by Max Mosley
It didn’t take the lawyers long to come up with a way of doing this. There were already civil actions against News Group Newspapers, publishers of the News of the World, for damages for breach of privacy arising out of phone hacking. There were several cases where the newspaper had published information that could only have come from listening to voicemails. There was also an action for judicial review of the Metropolitan Police’s conduct in connection with phone hacking brought by Chris Bryant, the former government minister, and Brian (now Lord) Paddick, a former commander in the Met. They were joined later by Lord Prescott, the former deputy prime minister. All three had very good reason to believe their phones had been hacked and they were now challenging the complete failure of the Metropolitan Police to investigate properly.
Given the information that Mulcaire’s notes, already in the hands of the Met, included the evidence they needed for their clients, lawyers acting for phone-hacking victims began applying for court orders (so-called Norwich Pharmacal orders) to force the police to disclose Mulcaire’s notes relating to their clients. The Met resisted strongly but, in contrast to his control of parliament and the police, Murdoch had no influence over the judiciary. The orders were made and the evidence started to emerge. In December 2010, News Group Newspapers were forced to suspend Ian Edmondson, the news editor at the News of the World, who was later sent to prison.
Although lawyers acting for the victims who had brought civil actions against News International were now making successful applications to the High Court for orders forcing the police to disclose the evidence, it emerged that some of the victims were being deterred from litigation for fear of adverse costs orders should they lose, unlikely though that might be. In some cases, this was going to force them to abandon litigation; in others, there was a danger of settlements with draconian confidentiality clauses. Either way, the truth would not come out. Through my solicitors I agreed to stand behind some of them and meet the costs if the worst happened. I also met Chris Bryant with his lawyer and offered to stand behind him and Brian Paddick in their action for judicial review against the Metropolitan Police. This was made public by Lord Prescott, when he joined their action.
In November 2010, I happened to mention all this to Bernie. He was astonished. ‘Does Rupert know?’ he asked. I said I wasn’t sure but assumed he did. Bernie, who’s friendly with Murdoch, said he would find out. He called David Hill, a long-standing associate of Rupert Murdoch, who got back to Bernie and said no, Rupert didn’t know and would want to hear all the details. Bernie told me: ‘Rupert’s going to call you.’ The call never came.
It has always been my view that Murdoch must have been fully aware of what was going on. He was known to follow his newspapers closely and the News of the World was then the world’s biggest English-language newspaper. He was also known to call his editors before they went to print on the Saturday evening. It seemed to me inconceivable he didn’t know about phone hacking, one of the News of the World’s principal sources of information. It was, after all, being carried out on an industrial scale and significant sums were being spent.
I believe Bernie had envisaged the three of us having a quiet dinner in London or New York, during which I would reveal the Wapping criminality to Murdoch. I think he pictured an outraged Murdoch heading straight to Wapping to rid News International of its criminal infestation. In reality, of course, such revelations would have been the last thing he or his lawyers wanted. At that time the newspaper’s management, including James Murdoch, was still working hard, and spending a great deal of money, trying to maintain the cover-up. Evidence that he had been told about the hacking in the autumn of 2010 could have been very damaging.
Meanwhile, my lawyers were acting against various websites to try to remove the illegal images originally put on the internet by the News of the World. At one time, they were active in 23 different countries. In Germany alone, they secured the removal of images from over 400 sites. Of course, the story was of great interest in Germany because of the Nazi lie, which was enhanced because Formula One had become very big in Germany following the success of Michael Schumacher.
We arranged a meeting with Google and asked them to stop their search engine producing images that had already been ruled illegal for the News of the World to publish by the English High Court. That would have solved the problem. It did not matter if the images were on some obscure website – they would only be seen by a very small number of people. What did the harm was the search engine. Its robots would find the images even on the most obscure site and then display the thumbnails (small versions of the actual pictures) on Google’s own page of search results whenever someone Googled my name.
Unless it was stopped, for the rest of my life and beyond, anyone looking for me on the web would find the pictures. As the High Court had ruled it illegal to publish the images, it seemed reasonable to ask Google to respect this ruling and uphold the law. We knew that if they agreed, the other search engines would follow suit.
Google said they would take them down each time we complained and indeed did so. Not always very quickly, but at least they took them down. But they refused to stop them altogether. Initially, they claimed they didn’t have the necessary technology They have admitted (for example, in a post by Google director J. Fuller on 15 June 2013) that they have been using ‘hashing’ technology to identify illegal images anywhere on the internet since 2008. However, they refused to use this technology to block my images despite the English High Court ruling that they should never have been published.
Unable to convince them that it was much more rational to do the right thing voluntarily and respect the High Court decision even if it was not directed at them, I brought actions against them in France and Germany thinking that, in the end, Google’s general conduct would be a matter for the EU, so it was important to secure decisions in two major European countries and not just in the UK, where I am also suing them. Those actions have now been won in France and Germany (although Google have appealed), and there is also a recent decision in the European Court of Justice making it clear that Google is itself responsible for whatever it puts on the internet.
In January 2011, the dam finally burst around News International. The court orders meant the police could no longer suppress the evidence in Mulcaire’s notes and a proper investigation began. Coulson finally left his position as director of communications for the British prime minister, having been with David Cameron since shortly after resigning as editor of the News of the World in 2007. My initial suspicion of the police soon gave way to confidence. It became clear that the senior police officer in charge, Deputy Assistant Commissioner Sue Akers, was not going to construct yet another cover-up but, on the contrary, was going to do a thorough job.11
Soon afterwards, the arrests started and one morning in April I received a text message that Neville Thurlbeck had been detained. Other arrests followed. There were more actions by victims of phone hacking and I undertook more underwriting of costs. As the year passed, the hacking cases began to be settled and the scale of my financial risk diminished. The Metropolitan Police settled the Bryant/Paddick/Prescott judicial review after quite disgracefully resisting for more than a year at the taxpayer’s expense.
In June 2011, the Guardian held a dinner for Nick Davies. Whether by then they had an inkling that they were shortly to break a huge story in the phone-hacking saga, I don’t know, but the dinner was like a sort of Who’s Who of hacking victims, lawyers and outstanding Guardian journalists. I found myself sitting next to Alan Rusbridger and came away more than impressed. He’s one of those full-on intellectuals who make me feel inadequate. Apart from editing the Guardian, not exactly a part-time job, it emerged he is an expert on Chopin and writing about him. On top of this, he has other intellectual interests and is a very accomplished pianist. How do such people manage it?
On 4 July 2011, I received a text from Nick Davies telling me to look at the Guardian website. They had just published Nick’s story ab
out the hacking of Milly Dowler’s voicemails. Like everyone else, I was horrified when I read it. Here was a blatant example of the immorality of the News of the World and the sort of people who worked for it. As everyone now knows, the Guardian story explained that voicemail messages left for the 13-year-old after she disappeared had been hacked by the News of the World, as had the messages of her parents.
Instead of just a few long-suffering celebrity victims, most of them well known or connected to someone who was, the general public finally understood what the News of the World represented and how it operated. It was clear the senior editorial staff of the newspaper had no concern for its victims. Even a missing child was fair game. The whole country now understood that the News of the World thought it quite normal to hack into the private voicemails of a murdered teenager in search of a story. The reaction was extraordinary to witness. It had taken these revelations, but the public could now see what a group of us had known for some time.
There followed an unprecedented wave of national revulsion. The next day, the Media Standards Trust founded Hacked Off, a pressure group for media reform. Brian Cathcart, professor of journalism at Kingston University, joined them, as did Hugh Tomlinson QC, one of the UK’s top privacy and defamation lawyers and the person behind the well-known legal blog, Inforrm.com. Dr Evan Harris, a former Lib Dem MP, was a key member and Hugh Grant emerged as their principal spokesman. Hugh turned out to be really good at putting the case and I think he may have surprised himself. When stopped by a TV crew and asked what he would ask Rupert Murdoch, he replied without hesitation: ‘What have you done to my country?’ He was well able to take on the politicians and professional TV pundits, and did so frequently and with success.
Inexplicably, Murdoch insisted there was no need for Rebekah Brooks, News International’s CEO, to resign, even though she had been editor of the paper when Milly Dowler’s voicemails were hacked. It seems Murdoch thought he could head off the critics by closing the paper and making a public apology. If he hoped things would calm down, he had completely underestimated the strength of public anger. Stopped in the street by television crews, he was asked what his priority was now. ‘This one,’ he replied, indicating Rebekah Brooks at his side. The following week she resigned. Three days later she was arrested.
Two days after James Murdoch announced the paper’s closure, the staff of the News of the World prepared the final edition. They then appeared as a group outside Murdoch’s Wapping headquarters, led by the wretched Colin Myler holding an early example of the last edition. Happily, the story on its front page reporting the end was not a ‘spoof’. The staff appeared shocked and some were in tears. For the large number of people whose lives or families had been gratuitously damaged or even ruined, for no better reason than titillation of the worst elements of the public, it was a great moment. Squalid employees of Murdoch who had caused so much misery without a thought for their victims were leaving their offices for the last time – some innocent people lost their jobs, too, but they had nothing or no one to blame but the culture they had been part of and the colleagues they had never spoken out against. In the end, they must have been only too aware that it was the British public who had decided their fate.
While all this was going on, the government was in the final stages of nodding through a takeover of Britain’s largest subscription television company, BSkyB. Murdoch’s News Corporation already owned 39 per cent of it and now wanted to buy the rest of this profitable company. This former Australian and naturalised American, who does not even pay tax in the UK, would then have had a massive presence in UK television as well as controlling nearly 40 per cent of the British press.
The week after the newspaper’s closure, the takeover was the subject of a full-scale debate in the House of Commons. MP after MP got up to denounce Murdoch. It was no longer just a courageous few, it was everyone. Even former Murdoch supporters joined in, making it seem as if the spell he had cast over the Commons until that moment had suddenly been broken. Seeing them all turn on him like that was almost sinister, so profound was the change. The vehemence of the attack may have been partly due to some guilt at their previously supine attitude. After all, despite being manifestly wrong, the BSkyB bid would have been nodded through had Nick Davies and the Guardian not broken the Milly Dowler story. Now, Murdoch had to withdraw the bid knowing it would be rejected by parliament no matter how hard his allies in government tried to push it through.
Through Alan Donnelly, I had met the Labour MP Tom Watson and we had an immediate rapport. Tom completely understood about Murdoch; in fact, he was way ahead of me. He was also a member of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, so he was in the thick of it when, shortly after the denunciation of Murdoch in the House of Commons, the committee decided to invite the two Murdochs to appear before it. At first they declined with characteristic arrogance, so the committee, very unusually, formally summoned both of them. When I heard about the refusal I rather hoped an official, appropriately dressed in some 18th-century costume, would ride down to Wapping on a horse to deliver the summons. Somewhat disappointingly, he travelled by underground.
The day before the select committee hearing, Tom and I had a meeting with Dominic Crossley in his office to prepare some points. Dominic, who is probably the UK’s top privacy and defamation solicitor and has represented me throughout, including against the News of the World, was a bit dubious about some of the proposed questions to James Murdoch. Strictly speaking, he was probably right, but Tom and I have a similar approach and we both wanted to take a hard line. The hearing received worldwide coverage and one of the sound bites (that James ‘must be the only Mafia boss in history who didn’t know he was running a criminal enterprise’) attracted the sort of exposure that Murdoch likes to give his enemies. Tom’s tactic of keeping James quiet while he questioned Rupert worked very well. However, much of the effect of the session was lost when someone threw a cream pie at Rupert. I was always very suspicious about that – it was so very helpful to Murdoch just when things were getting difficult for him.
We opened up another front when I went to America with Alan Donnelly in September 2012. Murdoch has immense power in the US, and not just because of Fox News and the fact that his News Corporation is a multibillion dollar company. His influence in the media and entertainment business is such that anyone who crosses him is likely to have trouble. It’s a different sort of power from the one he exercised in the UK. He does not control the American government, the police or the FBI. But his tentacles reach into almost every corner of the media and entertainment industries.
We had a meeting with the New York Times and various people who were interested in Murdoch, following which we got the train down to Washington for more meetings. These included the staff of the Senate Commerce Committee. I had never been in the Senate building before and, like everyone from the UK, I was impressed. Everywhere we went there seemed to be an appreciation of the danger Murdoch presents to society. He may not be particularly political but his influence and power are so enormous and corrupting that he distorts the democratic process. However, what happened next will make it more difficult for him to wield such influence again, at least in Britain.
37
LEVESON AND AFTER
Following the Guardian’s Milly Dowler story, the pressure on Cameron was considerable. He had hired former News of the editor, Andy Coulson, as Conservative Party director of World communications in 2007. After winning the 2010 election he took Coulson into the heart of government as Downing Street director of communications. Coulson had resigned in January 2011 when the full phone-hacking story started to emerge, and on 11 July 2011 was arrested by the Metropolitan Police. Two days later, Cameron did what politicians do when in difficulty – he announced a public inquiry.
When the Leveson Inquiry was announced, it felt somehow unreal. So much had happened in such a short time after years of trying to get movement. I quickly set up a meeting with Dominic Crossley and David Sherborne.
As we discussed the options, we concluded it was vital that victims of press abuse were properly represented at the inquiry. But a major problem was that only a small minority could afford to retain lawyers, and most might not want to get involved or even know how to go about it. There was also the risk that, if those who could afford their own lawyers all turned up with different representatives, the victims might appear diffuse and all over the place. They would be up against a phalanx of top Queen’s Counsel representing the press, all co-ordinated and highly organised. We decided the only way to make sure the victims’ voices were heard properly was to establish a legal team for them. I agreed to pay. Hugh Grant insisted on contributing and the inquiry itself eventually met a proportion of the costs.
Dominic set about contacting and organising the victims and getting in touch with the solicitors of those who had been in prominent recent cases. Eventually, he and David were appointed the official representatives of the victims of press abuse at the inquiry. The victims were all given ‘core participant’ status, along with other concerned individuals. This meant they would have advance information and better access to documents than the general public.
By co-ordinating the victims, Dominic and David were able to agree an order of appearance with the inquiry legal team. It is now clear that the fortnight or so of victims’ evidence exposed for the first time to the general public the full iniquity of tabloid conduct and the utter inadequacy of the Press Complaints Commission. I think the extent and seriousness of the misconduct that emerged as the victims appeared one after another took even the tabloids by surprise. We all feel strongly when something outrageous happens, such as the monstering of Christopher Jefferies or the treatment of the McCanns, but it’s largely forgotten by the time the next one comes along. Being presented with a succession of such incidents one after the other made a real impression. It showed just how bad the conduct of the tabloids had been.