Ex-Murdoch aide Brooks bailed over hacking case

AFP/London

Rebekah Brooks and her husband Charlie Brooks leave Westminster Magistrates’ Court in London yesterday

Rebekah Brooks, the former top aide to Rupert Murdoch and friend of Premier David Cameron, was granted bail by a court in London yesterday on charges relating to the phone-hacking scandal. Her first court appearance came amid new reverberations from the scandal, with a rift opening in the coalition government over a minister’s dealings with Murdoch’s US-based News Corporation.Brooks, 44, was alongside her racehorse trainer husband Charlie Brooks, 49, and four others facing charges of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice in the police investigation into hacking at the News of the World.Brooks - who resigned last July as chief executive of News International (NI), Murdoch’s British newspaper operation - and her spouse were greeted by a huge media scrum as they arrived at the court.After a short hearing, their first since they were charged on May 15, all six were bailed to appear again on June 22. All spoke only to confirm their dates of birth and addresses.Brooks was wearing a green scarf and dark blue jacket and sat next to her husband, who wore a charcoal suit and navy tie.The couple looked relaxed and were both smiling, unlike the other defendants. Brooks faces three charges of removing boxes of material from the archive of News International, and trying to conceal documents, computers and other material from police during the frantic last days of the News of the World.The tabloid closed down in disgrace in July 2011 after it emerged that it had hacked the phone of Milly Dowler, a murdered schoolgirl.Charlie Brooks, Cheryl Carter, 48, Brooks’s personal assistant, Mark Hanna, the head of security at NI, Brooks’s chauffeur Paul Edwards, 47, who was employed by NI, and Daryl Jorsling, 39, who provided security for Brooks that was supplied by NI, all face one charge each. The charges carry a maximum term of life imprisonment.The flame-haired Brooks edited the News of the World from 2000-03 before taking up the same post at The Sun, Murdoch’s top-selling British daily tabloid.Brooks moved in the highest circles of British politics, and testified to the Leveson inquiry into press ethics last month about her close friendship with Prime Minister Cameron. The premier is due to appear before the inquiry today, when he is likely to face scrutiny over his ties to Brooks. He also faced pressure yesterday after the Liberal Democrats said they would not back under-fire Conservative Culture Minister Jeremy Hunt over his handling of a bid for News Corporation for control of pay-TV giant BSkyB. Liberal Democrat Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg told his lawmakers they could abstain from a vote introduced by the opposition Labour party calling for a probe into whether Hunt broke the ministerial code of conduct.Hunt defended himself against the “disgraceful allegation” that he deliberately misled parliament, telling opposition lawmakers: “I have made huge efforts to be transparent and you know that perfectly well.” Clegg told the inquiry yesterday his party had not tried to curry favour with Murdoch as the Conservatives and Labour had.Observer  hacked bank account : SalmondScottish First Minister Alex Salmond yesterday said he believed his bank account was accessed by the Observer, a sister paper of the Guardian which helped expose the phone-hacking scandal. Salmond told the Leveson inquiry he had no evidence that Murdoch’s now defunct News of the World tabloid had illegally accessed his voicemails. But he added: “My bank account was accessed by the Observer newspaper some time ago, in 1999, and my reason for believing that is I was informed by a former Observer journalist.” He said the person knew details about purchases he made for his nieces that could only have come from the so-called “blagging” of his bank account, which happened during the run-up to elections in Scotland. “I believe that there is a substantial case that illegality was rife across many newspaper titles,” Salmond said.