Rebekah Brooks and husband to be charged

**Miss P** · 15-05-2012, 10:02am

Breaking news from BBC website:

Rebekah Brooks and her husband, Charlie, are to be charged with perverting the course of justice as part of the phone hacking inquiry.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18062485

Will be interesting to see how this plays out.

gah! can't edit typo in heading... sorry about that!

**Damsella** · 15-05-2012, 10:03am

Interesting. I'm surprised more people haven't been charged, maybe they will yet.

**Miss P** · 15-05-2012, 10:08am

Damz, can you edit my title to correct the spelling of Brooks, please, as it's going to bug me all day!

**bubbasweet** · 15-05-2012, 10:11am

Was just coming on to post this. I've not been following all this very closely - does anyone know specifically what she's accused of doing?

**parkejm** · 15-05-2012, 10:13am

She's being charged with trying to hide/delete data, emails, texts etc from the Police in the course of their investigation of the phone hacking scandal. The full penalty is life imprisonment! (although apparently no-one ever gets that).

Have to say, love her style in pre-empting the announcement by making her own announcement about it first. Nothing like controlling the media.

**Jubjub** · 15-05-2012, 10:13am

She's a real piece of work. I'll be following with interest too.

**Damsella** · 15-05-2012, 10:14am

Perverting the course of justice. Ie, lying under oath or to police.

Update: Conspiring to conceal documents from the Metroplitan police service.

**Carrington** · 15-05-2012, 10:14am

Bubba, have a look at BBC News 24 they're discussing it all in some detail now.

I've just heard that amongst other things, she and her PA concealed seven boxes of potential evidence.

**Miss P** · 15-05-2012, 10:14am

The CPS have just made a statement seting out who has been charged and the charges. The Guardian are doing a live update here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012...eveson-inquiry

Ms Brooks and her husband have also released a statement:

"We have this morning been informed by the Office of the Department of Public Prosecutions that we are to be charged with perverting the course of justice.

We deplore this weak and unjust decision.

After the further unprecedented posturing of the CPS we will respond later today after our return from the police station."

**Damsella** · 15-05-2012, 10:16am

Deleting or not disclosing emails, I should think. Plus maybe instructions and invoices to private detectives.

**Tara** · 15-05-2012, 10:41am

Originally Posted by Damsella

Interesting. I'm surprised more people haven't been charged, maybe they will yet.

Oh yes!

I thing the issue at the moment is the huge amount of evidence that the three police enquiries are having to sift through which inevitably delays charging. Today's charges relate to crimes committed in a very small time frame. Gripping stuff!

**Damsella** · 15-05-2012, 10:44am

I think it also reflects very, very badly on the Met at the time when they said "Nothing to see here, move along, move along" and tried to brush the whole thing under the carpet and said there was nothing to investigate, just one rogue reporter, don't you know

**cheeky_biscuit** · 15-05-2012, 11:09am

I saw something saying about the concealment of a number of archive boxes too.
I used to buy newspapers pretty much daily but since "all of this" I think I've bought a handful; using BBC & reuters for my news (& the odd online news link from damsels).