The call is for you, dear readers:
"UK police knew of hacking in ’02, chief says" October 21, 2011|Associated Press
LONDON - Authorities knew that Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World tabloid had hacked into the phone of murdered teenager Milly Dowler nine years before the scandal over the practice exploded, a police chief said yesterday.
Surrey Police Chief Constable Mark Rowley acknowledged that his force knew as far back as April 2002 that someone linked to the News of the World had accessed Dowler’s voicemail, although he said it was not yet clear why no one was prosecuted over the practice....
To do that would have EXPOSED POLICE COMPLICITY in the whole mess!
Related:
"London’s police force.... repeatedly overlooked evidence of widespread illegal behavior at the News of the World - apparently in a bid to not antagonize Murdoch’s powerful media empire.... Details of senior officers’ professional and social links to Murdoch’s newspaper arm have also embarrassed police."
But it's not clear to the media why no one was prosecu... sigh.
The disclosure that police were aware that the girl’s phone had been hacked and took no action may raise new questions about how police have handled the scandal investigation.
No, not really. Not in my mind.
Although former journalists say that the practice of hacking into people’s phones to score scoops was common across the British tabloid newspaper industry in the early 2000s, the spying did not come into the public eye until 2006, when the News of the World’s royal editor, Clive Goodman, was arrested for eavesdropping on members of the British royal household.
Oh, so WHEN IT AFFECTS some ELITE it is an ISSUE! Never mind the spying on your average Tom, Dick, and Harry.
--more--"
This call is starting to get expensive:
"Murdoch to pay $3.2m to family" October 22, 2011|By Cassandra Vinograd, Associated Press
LONDON - Rupert Murdoch’s company said yesterday that it has agreed to pay $3.2 million to the family of a murdered schoolgirl whose phone was hacked by the tabloid News of the World.
News International and the family of Milly Dowler confirmed the settlement in a joint statement. It said Murdoch also will donate $1.6 million to charities chosen by the Dowler family, including youth and cancer research groups.
Murdoch shut down the 168-year-old News of the World in July after evidence emerged that its reporters had eavesdropped on the voicemail messages of the 13-year-old who disappeared in 2002 and was later found murdered.
That touched off a storm of public outrage that rocked Murdoch’s media empire and ricocheted through Britain’s political, police, and media establishments....
Yesterday, British lawmaker Tom Watson grilled Murdoch about covert surveillance techniques by company employees as News Corp. held its first shareholders meeting following a phone-hacking scandal.
More than 100 people demonstrated outside the annual meeting on the lot of News Corp.’s Fox Studios. Watson asked Murdoch whether he was aware that a person who had left prison was hired by News Corp. and hacked the computer of a former army intelligence officer....
--more--"
Related:
"A journalist at Rupert Murdoch’s The Sun tabloid has been arrested on suspicion of police corruption, British media reported yesterday, a development that spreads the taint of scandal to the country’s biggest-selling newspaper....
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"A private investigator working for Rupert Murdoch’s News of the World conducted surveillance on Prince William as well as dozens of politicians and celebrities, the BBC reported yesterday....
--more--"
"Murdoch denies misleading panel; Son of chairman testifies again at UK Parliament" November 11, 2011|New York Times
LONDON - At one point, a committee member, Tom Watson, compared the Murdoch media empire to a Mafia family bound together by a vow of silence.
Related: Murdoch Media Mafia in the Window
James Murdoch, News Corp.’s deputy chief operating officer and the younger son of its chairman, Rupert Murdoch, responded with a pained expression. “Mr. Watson. Please. I don’t think that’s appropriate,’’ he said.
I do. Any media mouthpiece that lies us into wars is considered such.
“You must be the first Mafia boss in history who didn’t know he was running a criminal enterprise,’’ Watson snapped back. Murdoch was a deft witness in July when he appeared before the parliamentary committee investigating the phone hacking scandal that was riveting the country....
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Then again, I don't want to be too hard on James:
“Murdoch said he didn't see what the Palestinians' problem was and James said it was that they were kicked out of their f---ing homes and had nowhere to f---ing live,” said the account in The Guardian."
Maybe that's why the scandal is in the papers, 'eh? Can't take a chance on the son after the old man dies.
More:
Slow Saturday Special: No More News of the World
Sunday Globe Special: Stop the Presses!
The Fall of Another English Empire
Hacking Away at the U.K.
FBI Saves Fox
Yeah, that investigation is going nowhere (as expected).
More calls coming in:
"Britain abolishes royal male precedence" October 29, 2011|New York Times
LONDON - The 16 countries that recognize the British monarch as head of state abolished male precedence in the order of succession to the throne yesterday.
But the possibility of a Catholic monarch will have to wait, nearly 500 years after Henry VIII broke with Rome.
The decision to overturn the centuries-old tradition known as primogeniture was accompanied by the scrapping of a constitutional prohibition on the monarch’s marrying a Roman Catholic. But the rule that reserves the throne to Protestants will remain.
The changes will have no immediate impact on the existing line of succession.
The current heir to the throne, Prince Charles, will retain that position and is in any case the oldest child of his parents, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip. The second-in-line to the throne is his firstborn child, Prince William. The new succession rule will come into play with William’s children.
It was the marriage last spring of Prince William and Kate Middleton, now the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, that accelerated the change.
Their wedding spurred a widespread sense that the young couple, by bringing a more contemporary influence to the royal court, are likely to have a far-reaching, if not determinant, impact on the monarchy’s future.
Time to dump the monarchy. The whole notion of supremacy and elitism needs to go.
With the change in the succession rules, their first child, if a girl, would automatically enter the line of succession as a future queen, instead of being relegated behind a younger brother.
A dark queen as treacherous as the sea?
The change comes at the 60th anniversary in February of the succession of Queen Elizabeth II to the throne.
Oh, you already have one.
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Will someone please answer that damn phone?
"UK consulate exasperated by frivolous phone calls" November 10, 2011|By Paisley Dodds, Associated Press
LONDON - One British man rang his consulate after being dumped by a dominatrix abroad, while another caller asked what to do about ants in his Florida holiday villa.
Those are just some of the many bizarre requests straining the UK’s Foreign Office staff.
“We’re not directory inquiries,’’ Britain’s exasperated Foreign Office proclaimed in a statement yesterday.
Other calls included a man who asked the consulate for advice on prime fishing spots in Greece, another who asked what restaurants might not be full for the holidays, and a third who wanted to know what size shoe Prince Charles wears. That caller apparently wanted to send the heir to the throne a special gift, even though Charles is known to get his shoes custom-made by John Lobb, one of the world’s most exclusive shoemakers.
Another British man rang the Sydney consulate to ask what he should pack for his holiday.
“We wanted to draw attention to things that we actually can help with,’’ Charles Hay, director of consular services at the Foreign Office, said. “One way of doing that is to detail some of the other requests we get and discourage callers from making these types of requests.’’
More than 1 million Britons live abroad, and consular officials handle some 1.4 million calls each year, Hay said.
Like most embassies or consulates, Foreign Office staff can assist if citizens become victims of crime and give alerts about developing situations such as the nuclear disaster in Japan or the earthquake in Haiti.
But weather forecasts, translation services, and other nonessential requests are out of their remit.
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I'm finding the newspaper rather frivolous these days.
"Fiery, massive crash on highway kills 7
LONDON - A huge crash Friday involving 34 vehicles in southwestern England caused explosions and killed at least seven people, British police said yesterday. Foggy conditions and wet road surfaces on the M5 highway were partly to blame (AP)."
Better call it in.
