'A must read for anyone who wants to understand not only our media,
but power in Britain' - OWEN JONES, author The Establishment 'Top
court reporting' - NICK DAVIES, THE GUARDIAN Go behind the doors of
Court 12 of the Old Bailey for what was billed as 'the trial of the
century' - the phone hacking trial of journalists from Rupert
Murdoch's two biggest British tabloid newspapers. Every twist and
turn of the longest-running criminal trial in English legal history
is covered by Peter Jukes in this edition, crowdfunded by members
of the public. Heard in London in 2013 and 2014, the phone hacking
trial had a heady brew of criminal eavesdropping, media rights,
political intrigue, and Hollywood stardust. Rebekah Brooks and Andy
Coulson were accused of phone hacking and corrupting public
officials while editing the Sun and the News of the World
newspapers respectively. Brooks and her husband Charlie and her
former PA, Cheryl Carter, were also accused of perverting the
course of justice in an attempt to thwart detectives investigating
the hacking. The trial took place after years of cover up of phone
hacking at Britain's biggest newspaper group News International
(now News UK), the country's biggest police force, the Metropolitan
Police, and the Conservative government led by David Cameron, who
employed Coulson as his director of communications. After they were
sworn in, the judge, Justice Saunders, told the jury: "British
justice is on trial". The long-running trial laid bare the intense
illegal surveillance of individuals carried out by the
politically-connected News of the World. Employing an array of
private detectives, pried deeply into the private lives of anyone
who mattered to them at the time: a Hollywood actress, a missing
schoolgirl, a Cabinet minister. Sometimes the surveillance was
based on well-founded intelligence that revealed a legitimate
story, sometimes it was on a whim or the result of a malicious
tip-off. The trial pitted London's most extravagantly paid
barristers against each other. Rupert Murdoch's millions hired top
Queens Counsel to represent the seven defendants. The
GBP5,000-a-day barrister, Jonathan Laidlaw, for instance,
represented Rebekah Brooks. The multi-million pound case tottered
on the brink of collapse several times as a result media
misbehaviour, illness and delay. Drawing on verbatim court
exchanges and exhibits, Jukes reveals the daily reality and grand
strategies of this major criminal case. He reveals a secret about
Rebekah Brooks' 14 days in the witness box. He explains why a
defence lawyer gave him a wry smile during a cigarette break. And
he discloses the failings of the Crown Prosecution Service which
contribute to the verdicts. Like Dial M for Murdoch by Tom Watson
and Martin Hickman and Hack Attack by Nick Davies, this book will
fascinate anyone wanting to know about the phone hacking scandal.
It is also ideal for anyone who wants to know the twists and turns
of a major criminal trial. REVIEWS 'Remarkable. I feel I now know
all the key players and why some defendants were found guilty and
some not, despite never having spent a minute at the trial.' -
PROFESSOR STEWART PURVIS, FORMER ITN EDITOR 'Written in a chatty,
gossipy style that brings the courtroom drama alive.' - NIGEL
PAULEY, DAILY STAR JOURNALIST
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