piers morgan Explained how to hack mobile phone voicemail to get news, Tony BlairThe director of strategic communications has made the claim during a high-profile phone-hacking trial against Mirror Group Newspapers.
prince harry and other claimants have alleged daily Mirror Publisher MGN was accused of using illegal methods to obtain the stories, with prosecutor David Sherborne arguing that such methods were widely used, becoming the “go-to” for the stories.
He said Morgan, who edited the Mirror from 1995 to 2004, and other senior editors authorized the use of private investigators to employ illegal methods to obtain stories, and “should have known” what they were doing. “.
In a written submission to the High Court on Wednesday, Benjamin Wegg-Prosser, a journalist who later became director of strategic communications for Blair, claimed Morgan had once told him how to hack voicemails.
After the two dined together after the Labor Party conference in September 2002, Morgan was asked by then-Guardian journalist Weg-Prosser after the Daily Mirror ran a story about an affair between the then England football manager Sven Göran-Eriksson and the television presenter How did you manage to get it. Ulrika Johnson, the court heard.
“Mr Morgan asked Mr Prosser which network provider he used for his mobile phone and then told him the default PIN for that network, and then explained that the default PIN numbers were well known and rarely changed. Mobile phone messages could be accessed remotely.
He then added, with a smile, that the story on Mr Erickson and Ms Jonsson had been obtained through that method. During the 2012 Leveson inquiry, after watching Jeremy Paxman give evidence in May 2012, Mr Wegg- Prosser emailed counsel for the inquiry Robert J QC on 23 May 2012 and told him about a conversation he had with Mr Morgan in 2002.
Sherborne told the court that the use of private investigators was authorized at senior levels, including desk chiefs, editors, managing editors and senior executives, and suggested that it was “inconceivable” that Morgan and others did not know about the hacking.
“To put it bluntly it was worth the risk,” Sherborne said, claiming in his opening argument that MGN spent £11m on the use of private investigators despite being a company “concerned with aggressive cost controls”.
“It was a risk because it contradicted the very public denials they were making regarding illegal information gathering,” he said.
On Wednesday, the High Court was told that the tabloid publisher has apologized “unreservedly” to the Duke of Sussex for an instance of unlawful information gathering.
Andrew Green Casey for MGN said that voicemail interception was denied in test cases including Harry's.
However Mr Green also said the publisher “unreservedly apologises” to the Duke for an instance of illegal information gathering and accepted he was entitled to “reasonable compensation”.
The barrister said it was accepted that a private investigator had been instructed by an MGN journalist at The People to illegally collect information about her activities on a night in February 2004 at Chinawhite nightclub.
“Otherwise, the specified charges are denied, or in some cases not admitted,” he said.
Prince Harry is due to give evidence in the case in June, although an exact date is not yet known.
Morgan resigned from her role on Good Morning Britain after being criticized for repeatedly attacking Harry's wife. meghan markle,