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The scum of the earth (tabloid media)
I have to qualify this by saying this is an allegation that News International has not confirmed or denied.
But if this is true, these people are the scum of the earth.
They cannot argue that this was one bad apple, because if it happened, there MUST have been people who covered it up. Media freedom is seen as one of the key values of the West, but freedom for this kind of dispicable gutter journalism? Freedom MUST be contailed by the boundries of law of decency.
BBC News - News of the World 'hacked Milly Dowler phone'
Quote:
News of the World 'hacked Milly Dowler phone'
Milly Dowler Schoolgirl Milly Dowler went missing nine years ago
Continue reading the main story
Phone-hacking scandal
* Phone-hacking probe: Key people
* Timeline: Phone-hacking row
* How will pay-outs be calculated?
* How the papers got their stories
An investigator working for the News of the World newspaper allegedly hacked into the mobile phone of murdered girl Milly Dowler, a lawyer has said.
Mark Lewis, who represents the Dowler family, said her parents were told by police that Glenn Mulcaire hacked into her phone while she was missing.
The Guardian has claimed he intercepted messages left by relatives and said the NoW deleted some it had listened to.
NoW owner, News Group Newspapers, has not yet responded to the reports.
Mr Lewis said the hacking dated from 2002 when the News of the World was under the editorship of Rebekah Brooks (nee Wade) - now News International's chief executive.
In a statement he said: "Sally and Bob Dowler have been through so much grief and trauma without further distressing revelations to them regarding the loss of their daughter.
'Despicable and evil'
"It is distress heaped upon tragedy to learn the News of the World have no humanity at such a terrible time.
"The fact that they were prepared to act in such a heinous way that could have jeopardised the police investigation and gave them false hope is despicable.
Solicitor for the Dowlers, Mark Lewis: "It is distress heaped upon tragedy"
The Guardian claims that after Milly's voicemail facility became full, the News of the World deleted messages it had already listened to.
It quotes one source as saying that this gave false hope to friends and family, who mistakenly believed that Milly herself had cleared her message inbox and that therefore she was still alive.
By that time, she had been murdered by a nightclub doorman, Levi Bellfield, who was convicted of the killing last month.
The Guardian also alleges that the News of the World employed another private investigator, Steve Whittamore, to illegally obtain ex-directory numbers for families called Dowler living in Walton-on-Thames, where Milly and her family lived.
Reacting to the story, Tom Watson MP told the Commons it was a "despicable and evil act that will shock parents up and down the land".
He also said it strongly suggested that parliament was misled in the press standards inquiry that was held by the Department for Culture Media and Sport last year.
The claims about Milly Dowler are significant in the overall phone hacking inquiry, which has until now focussed largely on the intrusion into the private lives of celebrities.
In January, the High Court will hear claims from five test cases involving public figures who say their phones were hacked into.
They are former footballer Paul Gascoigne, actor Jude Law, sports agent Sky Andrew, interior designer Kelly Hoppen and MP Chris Bryant.
The cases arise out of the disclosure of information by the Metropolitan Police relating to material forfeited by Mulcaire.
He and former News of the World royal editor Clive Goodman were jailed in 2007 over tapping the phones of members of the royal household.
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"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."
The Gospel of Thomas
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