Police Charge News of the World Editor Over Voicemail Hacking 131
New submitter HarryatRock writes with news that former News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks and five others have been charged by police for their involvement in intercepting voicemail messages left for a murdered girl. From the article:
"She is charged with conspiring with her 49-year-old husband, personal assistant Cheryl Carter, chauffeur Paul Edwards, security man Daryl Jorsling, and News International head of security Mr Hanna to "conceal material" from police between 6 and 19 July. In a second charge Mrs Brooks and Ms Carter are accused of conspiring to remove seven boxes of material from the News International archive between 6 and 9 July. In a third charge, Mr and Mrs Brooks, Mr Hanna, Mr Edwards and Mr Jorsling are accused of conspiring to conceal documents, computers and other electronic equipment from police officers between 15 and 19 July."
"Charge ... Over Voicemail Hacking" (Score:5, Informative)
"Involvement in intercepting voicemail messages."
Accuracy has never been very important to /., has it?
They were charged with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice by withholding evidence from police. There is no charge that they were involved in voicemail hacking (though of course there are plenty of allegations that they were).
Re:Just another reason... (Score:5, Informative)
In the U.S., providing news is no longer required to maintain an FCC TV license, and neither is providing unbiased news. There is still a minimal educational requirement, but it's nothing compared to the 1970s, when outside business groups would try to capture station's FCC licenses by citing strict FCC public service requirements. Those were also the days of the Fairness Doctrine.
Some low-rent broadcast stations claim to fulfill the current minimal Educational/Instructional standards by showing Edgemont, a teen drama imported from Canada! You can read about it here, the requirement is called E/I: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edgemont_(TV_series) [wikipedia.org] In fact, Fox Family used to use Edgemont for this!
The station here that shows Edgemont (at noon, when its intended audience is not even home), fills much of the rest of its daytime schedule with infomercials, which would have been impossible under 1970s rules. An FCC license has gone from a license to print money to a license to shill trinkets.
Re:Insert (Score:5, Informative)
There's no difference between the two, except for their political beliefs.
You seem to have overlooked that this is a criminal case. Rebekah Brookes hasn't been tried yet so we can't say she personally is guilty yet. But the fact that a murdered girl and thousands of others had their phones hacked by the right-wing News International organisation isn't in question, it's established fact.
Re:Just another reason... (Score:5, Informative)
A Fox News producer was caught on tape trying to whip up the crowd for Glenn Beck's "9/12" demonstration. Fox then ran full-page advertisements in the newspaper asking why the other cable news networks weren't covering such an important event (using, for some bizarre reason, a video still from CNN, which was covering the event). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzWC0GX38Mk [youtube.com]
In 1996 Fox anchor Tony Snow endorsed Bob Dole for President. In 2000 Snow then went to purportedly cover the 2000 Republican convention as a journalist, then gave a speech to a Republican youth group when asked. Snow later went to the White House to become Bush's press secretary. http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1067 [fair.org]
You do not see comparable levels of bias with MSNBC. You just don't.