British press ‘in the dock’ over hacking, inquiry told

The mother of Hugh Grant’s child received threats after the actor spoke out against media intrusion, while Kate McCann felt “mentally raped” when a newspaper published her private diary, the hearing was told.

Murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler’s mother Sally experienced “euphoria” when she got through to her missing daughter’s mobile phone voicemail after a private detective working for the News of the World deleted some of the messages.

Lord Justice Leveson’s inquiry into press standards heard that both well-known figures such as Harry Potter author JK Rowling and previously unknown members of the public have fallen victim to journalistic malpractice.

David Sherborne, representing 51 alleged victims of press intrusion, described the scale of phone hacking at the News of the World as an “Industrial Revolution” that represented a cultural shift away from old-fashioned journalism.

But he argued that there were wider problems with Britain’s newspaper culture.

“We are here not just because of the shameful revelations which have come out of the hacking scandal, but also because there has been a serious breakdown of trust in the important relationship between the press and the public,” he said.

“It is the whole of the press, and in particular the tabloid section of it, which we say stands in the dock, at least metaphorically so – and certainly in the court of public opinion.”

Mr Sherborne said the charges ranged against newspapers included: phone hacking, “blagging” private information through deception, blackmailing vulnerable or opportunistic people into breaking confidences about well-known people, intruding into the grief of crime victims and hounding celebrities, their families and friends.

He highlighted the “terrible intrusion” into the lives of the Dowler family after 13-year-old Milly was abducted in Surrey, in March 2002.

News of the World private investigator Glenn Mulcaire listened to the schoolgirl’s voicemails and erased some to make room for new messages, giving her family false hope she was still alive, the inquiry was told.

Mulcaire was jailed along with the newpaper’s former royal editor Clive Goodman in January 2007 after they admitted intercepting voicemail messages left on phones belonging to royal aides.

A former girlfriend of Grant, who was pregnant with his child at the time, received a sinister phone call when the Four Weddings and a Funeral star appeared on the BBC’s Question Time to discuss the culture of the News of the World, Rupert Murdoch and press standards in general, the inquiry heard.

Mr Sherborne said: “She was threatened in the most menacing terms, which should reverberate around this inquiry: ‘Tell Hugh Grant he must shut the f*** up’.”

Grant’s ex-partner, named in reports as Chinese actress Tinglan Hong, also had to take out an emergency injunction last week after being hounded by paparazzi, one of whom tried to run over her mother, the hearing was told. The parents of Madeleine McCann, who was three when she vanished on holiday in Portugal in May 2007, were also subjected to “blatant intrusion” by the press, Mr Sherborne said.

In September 2008, the News of the World published Mrs McCann’s personal diary, which she had not even shown to her husband, leaving her feeling “mentally raped”, the inquiry heard.

The inquiry was adjourned until Monday, when it will begin hearing evidence from witnesses, starting with the Dowler family.