Phone hacking: NI lawyer says he knew its 'rogue reporter' defence was wrong

guardian reporting:
A lawyer who acted for News International (NI) over phone-hacking claims has told MPs he knew the company had misled parliament about the affair but he had not spoken up because of client confidentiality.
Julian Pike, a partner at Farrer & Co, the law firm whose clients include the Queen, told MPs on the Commons culture, media and sport select committee on Wednesday that he was aware the company's often-repeated "rogue reporter" defence was untrue.
Pike said he had seen evidence in 2008 that suggested there was "a powerful case" that an additional three News of the World journalists were "illegally accessing information in order to obtain stories" and had informed NI of this.
When asked by Labour MP Paul Farrelly how he would feel about newspaper headlines that might read "Queen's solicitors knew News of the World was lying and did nothing about it", Pike replied: "That sort of headline is obviously not ideal." But he insisted that Farrer & Co was not part of a cover-up and denied he was embarrassed professionally by his decision to stay silent.
In evidence to MPs on the committee two years ago and in 2007 NI executives said phone hacking was the work of a single journalist, former royal editor Clive Goodman. It has emerged since then that the practice was more widespread.
Pike also told MPs that former News of the World editor Colin Myler had met with James Murdoch, who is now deputy chief operation officer of News Corp, in May 2008 to discuss a phone-hacking claim brought by Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association.
It is the first time that a second meeting to discuss a possible payment to Taylor has been referred to.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/oct/19/phone-hacking-lawyer-ni-rogue-reporter

News Corp. Ignored Wall Street Journal Aberrant Circulation

Bloomberg reporting:

Oct. 19 (Bloomberg) -- News Corp., the media company facing an investor uprising over its business practices, was alerted to a plan to inflate circulation at the Wall Street Journal Europe almost a year before the newspaper’s publisher resigned, according to a former employee and internal documents.

Les Hinton, the former chief executive officer at the News Corp. unit that publishes the Wall Street Journal Europe, was contacted with details of the payment practice in November 2010, according to former circulation manager Gert Van Mol and e-mails he provided to Bloomberg News. Todd Larsen, president of the Dow Jones & Co. unit, was also notified.

Van Mol said in the correspondence that a Dow Jones business partner was being compensated at the same time that partner was buying thousands of copies of the Wall Street Journal Europe, effectively boosting the publication’s circulation. Andrew Langhoff, the newspaper’s publisher who stepped down last week, had approved the payments, the circulation manager said in the e-mails.

“It was a non-ethical practice,” Van Mol said in an interview. “I didn’t want to be part of it, so I contacted Hinton and Larsen.”

Bethany Sherman, a Dow Jones spokeswoman, declined to comment on whether Hinton and Larsen had been alerted to the payments last year. She said Dow Jones had been investigating Van Mol for his “business dealings” for several months before November 2010.

Already Under Fire

Sherman said Langhoff, 49, resigned because of the perception the newspaper’s agreement with the Executive Learning Partnership could have compromised editorial integrity. She said his departure had nothing to do with the payments to ELP, a Netherlands-based strategy and consulting firm, or with ELP’s bulk newspaper purchases, which the company said are legitimate.

Hinton, who resigned in July after allegations of phone hacking by journalists at a different News Corp. unit he ran for 12 years, didn’t respond to calls for comment. Langhoff also didn’t return calls for comment.

London’s Guardian newspaper reported the payments to ELP and the company’s bulk purchases last week.http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-10-19/news-corp-ignored-wall-street-journal-aberrant-circulation.html