Brooks and Coulson to face charges over phone hacking
DAVID Cameron’s former head of communications Andy Coulson and ex-News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks are to face criminal charges in relation to phone hacking offences, it was announced yesterday.
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) alleges that 600 people were targeted between 2000 and 2006. Brooks and Coulson face specific charges of conspiring to intercept the voicemails of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.
Six other people with connections to the defunct News of the World newspaper will also be charged.
“There is sufficient evidence for there to be a realistic prospect of conviction in relation to one or more offences,” said CPS legal adviser Alison Levitt QC.
“I have concluded that a prosecution is required in the public interest.”
In a statement Brooks said: “The charge concerning Milly Dowler is particularly upsetting not only as it is untrue but also because I have spent my journalistic career campaigning for victims of crime. I will vigorously defend these allegations.”