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FORMER RUPERT MURDOCH protege Rebekah Brooks said she feels vindicated after she was cleared in Britain’s News of the World phone-hacking trial.
In her first comments since Tuesday’s verdict, the one-time head of Murdoch’s British newspaper arm said her thoughts were with colleagues still facing legal action.
But the brief statement she delivered with husband Charlie outside their rented London house made no mention of her ex-colleague and lover Andy Coulson, who was found guilty.
“I am innocent of the crimes that I was charged with and I feel vindicated by the unanimous verdict,” Brooks told reporters in a wavering voice.
“The last few years have been tough for us and for those closest to us,” the 46-year-old mother-of-one said.
“But more importantly they’ve been tough for everybody on all sides that have been affected by the issues highlighted by this case.”
She refused to reply directly when asked if she had a message for Coulson, her successor as News of the World editor who faces jail after being found guilty of phone hacking at the same eight-month trial.
“All I can say to you all is that today my thoughts are with my former colleagues and their families who face future trials,” she said.
I am going to do everything I can to support them because I know how anxious the times ahead are.
Unprecedented
Her husband, a racehorse trainer, who was found not guilty of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice during the trial at the Old Bailey in London, said the couple had been through an “unprecedented investigation of an incredibly forensic and personal nature”.
News Corporation boss Murdoch flew in to the country earlier in the day to visit the headquarters of his British operation, but he has not yet commented on the trial.
Murdoch strongly supported Brooks following her arrest in 2011, which came shortly after he shut down the News of the World following revelations that the paper had hacked into the voicemail of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.
Brooks, 46, rose from relatively humble beginnings to become editor of the News of the World and The Sun, which is read by millions.
She had close links to politicians including Prime Minister David Cameron and his predecessor Gordon Brown.
Cameron has apologised for hiring Coulson as his media chief after Coulson quit the News of the World.
Coulson finds out on Monday if he will face a retrial on charges of conspiring to commit misconduct in a public office by paying police, and he is due be sentenced for hacking on 4 July.
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Interesting study. Of course airlines disagree, since it hits then where it hurts.
@The Descolada: *them
@The Descolada: it will hit you harder when airfares double because of this or there’s no direct flights left to places you’d like to visit in the future. Air travel is an industry that weshould be supported not demonising. Without it our island nation would be left in isolation. Think before you write
@The Descolada: Airlines are a business, not a charity. If there’s a route that’s not viable, the route won’t last. So two options, increase the fare being charged or cut the route altogether. Nobody needs reminding we are an island nation!
@The Descolada: the study was done in 2017 with no masks. This is complete nonsense.
@The Descolada: Irish traffic has been the most affected in Europe. I doubt they need the middle seats. American carriers blocked it off until recently. Not anymore due successful vaccine rollout
@The Descolada: Can you blame them insofar that they’ve been pretty much put out of business for over a year. Mark my words, between Covid and the Greens, this world is and will continue to be a much less fun place particularly when it comes to travel.
@The Descolada: the Airlines paid for the study , and several US Airlines have been using this policy for months now.
16,000 people arrived into Dublin in the last two weeks. Are they all corona virus free I do wonder!!?
@Brian Kelly: yes. With mandatory pcr tests 99% of them would be. Sure the 500+ daily cases are probably being spread in supermarkets and/social interactions
@Brian Kelly: Really. Do you ever wonder how case numbers and hospital figures are falling constantly if they weren’t all virus free?
@BRIAN MCCARTHY: Yeah because we didnt get the variants through travel. It was all supermarkets
@BRIAN MCCARTHY: More like meat factories.
So the price of a flight ticket will go up by 1.5 times
@Jim Buckley Barrett: Yes and in six months the same people will be moaning about Ryanair rip off.
What a surprise since we’ve been told for over a year to stay between 1 to 2 m apart.
When will a study look into the relationship between reducing the funding of public healthcare systems for decades and the impact on people recovering or on the budgets of healthcare systems vs budget of Covid handling?
@Claude Saulnier: Its already done. It was in the lancet around 6 months ago. If I get time I’ll try and find the link….
@Sean Oige: not the paper that I was looking for but there is a lot of work being done on it. https://socialprotection.org/discover/blog/universal-health-coverage-uhc-and-coronavirus-crisis-%E2%80%93-challenges-and-responses
@Claude Saulnier: Are you for real, the issue with our Health Service is not underfunding, we actually have one of the best funded Health Services. The issue with our health service has always been about decades of mismanagement, wanton wastage of money, too many pen pushers and not enough medical staff as a result. Add in to the mix unions completely averse to any kind of change, and voila you have the Irish Health Service.
So basically flying will now go back to being an expensive exercise again for most, cos taking away middle seats will mean prices will go up. If people are vaccinated and are allowed enter a country, then it shouldn’t matter where they sit on a plane. Between this and the political version of covid 19 known as the greens trying to get rid if 10 euro flights, I have a feeling plenty will have to save a whole lot more and have less chance of taking short haul flights going forward cos this just sounds like a mess
@Tarraing Mo Liathróidí: These seem to be interpolated studies based upon other ones, none of which took into account all the factors like wearing masks or vaccinations. The truth being, nobody knows until it’s tried in a real world senario.
If this was a 100% death sentenance for all, and we tend to lose sight of the fact the it will be for a small minority of people, I doubt anyone would dare get on any plane, mask, vaccination or not.
I thought it had to be 2 metres apart for covid , last time I checked the aisle seat and the window seat on my Ryanair flight were not 2 metres apart, more like 50cm tops, this is just another nonsense make it up as we go along study.
@Hugo Bugo: The study suggests that blocking the middle seat can reduce transmission. It doesn’t suggest that staying 0.5 metres apart can prevent covid transmission. Go back to sleep I’d say
@HectorPickaxe: Each seat should be it’s own individual sealed, sterilized, oxygen-fed pod ….. That way we can sit in our own filth for 8 hrs to New York, without bothering the fragile-minded, worried about catching anything….. Prices of flights will go through the roof, but hey, as long as the PC snowflakes feel safe, it makes total sense ….
@HectorPickaxe: if you are gullible enough to swallow this kind of nonsense then I think u need more than sleep to fix that for u, a virus that is transmitted through the air with a passenger that is 40 to 50cm away from u to the left, to the right, in front and behind u but leaving the middle seat empty will lower transmission when it’s been drilled into us for 12 months that 2 metres is the magic number, OMG u are so gullible its hilarious, I would love to be doing business deals or be a salesman on your doorstep, lol.
More bunkum, the fact is if you’re vaccinated it doesn’t matter , if you’re not , you ain’t flying anywhere anyway in the next few years
@Dave McCabe: Vaccines much less effective against SA and Brazil variants, so it does matter.
I have not seen any evidence of Covid spread on an aircraft if ppl are wearing masks..
@Aire Dezamba: apart from you know the British variant that plagued this country in December in Janaury after over 50k people had flown into Ireland for Christmas
@Aidan O’ Neill: they most likely had Covid before travelling….
Google it, I’ve seen loads of published seating plans showing how a couple of people spread it to several other people on the same flight. More so in America where they regularly fly between States.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: masks are working and help to prevent Covid on flights..”Emirates had five flights with seven or more infected passengers on each flight, for a total of 58 coronavirus-positive passengers flying on eight-hour trips. And yet, nobody else on the planes — none of the other 1,500 to 2,000 passengers — picked up the virus, Freedman and his colleague report in the Journal of Travel Medicine”. …passengers were wearing masks
Flying Petri dishes. Of course the airlines want you to think they’re safe. How come you end up with a cold every time you get off a plane?
Many airlines have done this throughout the pandemic. United airlines only now unblocked it last month. Vulnerable have all been afforded vaccine in the US I guess
Flight out to Spain last week was packed with families.. Barely an empty seat on it! And no, I wasn’t on it, friend flew out to her sick mother!
If one is concerned about someone sitting next to them, buy those seats. Simple
Suggests! A new science similar to unknown “experts say”
thats news from 12 months ago
Airlines refused reduce passengers and if argee reduce passengers may end up increase cost ticket flight
@Brian Flavin: Maybe they could put some parcels in the middle seat to defray costs? I’m not flying anywhere until I get my jabs, but I was thinking that I’d be fine staying put beside a silent stack of post for a flight.
@Fiona Fitzgerald: I think that would be a health and safety issue in case of an emergency etc.
have your say