Labour's fox gets shot ...

Certain Labour party spinners and bloggers, and their friends at the Guardian have been trying to talk up the possibility that the PM's media advisor, Andy Coulson, might face charges over illegal phone hacking while he waws editor of the News of the World.

As Mike Smithson at political betting suggests here, there has consequently been a betting market on whether Coulson will have to resign - and Mike advises putting your money against it.

At one stage the BBC was also running with this story, but they seem to have seen the writing on the wall. The BBC reports here that prosecutors have investigated the allegations and dropped any idea of bringing charges.

As the BBC reports, the Director of Public Prosecutions, Keir Starmer, says there was no admissible evidence to support the claims that public figures' phones were hacked.

Former News of the World reporter Sean Hoare had made lurid allegations in the New York Times about widespread phone hacking at the paper, but refused to co-operate with police in their investigation.

The DPP added that "A number of other witnesses were interviewed and either refused to co-operate with the police investigation, provided short statements which did not advance matters, or denied any knowledge of wrongdoing.

"Against that background, there is no admissible evidence upon which the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) could properly advise the police to bring criminal charges."


Translated into layman's language that means there are no grounds to take the allegations seriously until and unless someone comes forward with real evidence, which so far they haven't.

Comments

Tim said…
But yet again let's ignore the cancer in our presence - namely one Rupert Murdoch in order for you to make some petty, meaningless party political point.
Chris Whiteside said…
And what does that have to do with the price of fish?

O.K, I gather you don't like Murdoch. That is no reason why I shouldn't point out that an allegation against a senior associate of the PM by Labour's friends in the media has been investigated and found to be without foundation.
Anonymous said…
"there is no ADMISSIBLE evidence upon which the CPS (Crown Prosecution Service) could properly advise the police to bring criminal charges."

This does not mean there is no evidence, it just means that the evidence is not admissible in court. It wouldn't surprise me it was just the CPS playing silly politcal games again.
Chris Whiteside said…
No admissable evidence means no evidence that can be used under rules designed to ensure that any person against whom charges are brought gets a fair trial.

Those rules may not be perfect, but I'd much rather live in a country which does have rules about what sort of evidence can be used to convict people.

E.g. if someone writes a load of allegations in a newspaper but will not co-operate with police or repeat the charges in court, then what he wrote in the newspaper is not admissable evidence.

And personally I think that's fair enough, I wouldn't convict my worst enemy on what some disgruntled ex-employee wrote in a newspaper if he or she was not prepared to repeat that testimony to the police or in court.
Anonymous said…
Chis, you do live in a country that abuses the rules of evidence to effectively convict people.
What do you think Control Orders are for? Infringing the rights of citizens on the basis of no admissable evidence.
Chris Whiteside said…
I don't like Control Orders and hope that the new government grasps this particular nettle.

None of which alters the reality that if you don't have rules about the admissability of evidence, you are more likely to get innocent people convicted.

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